April 17 1912 – Nisan 30 5672
Rioting broke out in the Mellah, the Jewish quarter of the city of Fez, Morocco, in response to Sultan Malai Hafiz’s decision to make Morocco a French protectorate. 5000 armed soldiers rebelled against their French overseers, shooting and killing them, then marched against the French embassy. Confronted by intense French rifle fire, they retreated to the Mellah, whose Jewish inhabitants tried unsuccessfully to lock the gates and keep the army out. Breaking into the Jewish quarter, followed by many of the ordinary citizens of Fez, the rioters, both soldiers and civilians, looted private homes, stores and synagogues, attacked Jews wherever they found them and raped women and young girls. Fifty-one Jews were killed in what became known as the Tritel, including eighteen women and ten children; dozens more were severely wounded. The twelve thousand Jews living in the Mellah fled to safe havens allocated to them by the French authorities, forced to spend weeks in conditions of severe overcrowding and lack of sanitation. Apart from the victims maimed and killed, and the damage to property, hundreds of rare manuscripts were destroyed in the Tritel, including some works existing only in a single copy which were thus lost forever.
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