Tunisian anti-Israeli leader denies death threats

The leader of a Tunisian group opposed to the normalisation of diplomatic ties with Israel on Monday attempted to explain inflammatory comments he made a day earlier at a demonstration. At a rally of around 600 people in the Tunisia capital Sunday, Ahmed Kahlaoui galvanised the crowd by threatening "death to all Tunisians attempting to normalise relations with Israel." On Monday, he issued a statement in which he claimed he had never called for anybody to be killed. "I never advocated the physical elimination of those who defend normalisation with the Zionist enemy but I called for the death of the idea of normalisation and any policy that supports it," Kahlaoui said. Earlier this month, the authority in charge of political reform following the January ouster of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali after 23 years of dictatorial rule adopted a "republican pact" meant to form the basis of a new constitution. It rules out a normalisation of ties with Israel but some members of the commission that drafted the text were reportedly in favour of leaving the issue out of the document. "We will denounce them and publish their names," Kahlaoui had said at his rally on Sunday. After several years of warming ties, the Israeli and Tunisian authorities opened interest sections in each other's countries in 1996 but Tunis broke off all relations in 2000 after the outbreak of the second intifada.