Around 1,500 Jews live today in Tunisia where Tunisian President Zine el Abidine Ben Ali, who has ruled the country since 1987, fled on Friday for Saudi Arabia after deadly protests over unemployment, high prices and lack of freedom of expression.
Prime Minister Mohamed Ghannouchi announced Friday that he has taken over the responsibilities of the president.
World leaders have called for free and fair elections in Tunisia, seeing the end of Ben Ali's 23-year rule as a chance for Tunisians to shape their own democratic future.
The Jewish community in Tunisia is still one of the largest in the Arab world but its numbers have sharply dropped from 100,000 on independence from France in 1956. Most of the Jews emigrated to France or Israel after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
There are several synagogues in the country together with kindergartens and schools.
The most famous synagogue is the Ghriba synagogue located in the village of Hara Sghira on the island of Djerba. The current building was constructed in late 19th or early 20th century, but the site is believed to have had a synagogue on it for the past 1,900 years.
Thousands of Tunisian Jews from around the world have for centuries made an annual pilgrimage to the Ghriba on the Jewish festival of Lag Ba'Omer.
On April 11, 2002, just before the pilgrimage, a truck full of explosives was detonated close to the synagogue, killing 21 people of whom 14 were German tourists, five Tunisians and 2 Frenchmen, and wounding over 30. Al Qaeda had claimed responsibility.
Nearly half of the Jews who remain in Tunisia live in Djerba.