Videos shared on social media showed chaos and scuffles between security guards and demonstrators, with several injuries reported. The incidents took place in the city of La Marsa, prompting local protest groups to call for escalating demonstrations outside Carrefour branches nationwide.
On Monday, a Facebook post by boycott supporters announced another protest at 10:00 a.m. outside the Carrefour store in Béja, a city of roughly 90,000 in northwestern Tunisia. The invitation described the rally as “a condemnation of the assault on campaign members and of the presence of the Zionist company on Tunisian soil.”
After videos of the clashes spread, the Tunisian boycott group issued a statement saying: “Carrefour workers violently attacked a group of young people who had gathered outside the branch as part of a ‘Day of Rage against Carrefour.’ For months, the group has waged a peaceful campaign through boycotts and grassroots pressure to end the partnership between the Tunisian company UTIQ and the French Carrefour, which supports genocide and ethnic cleansing in Palestine and engages in misleading Zionist propaganda.”
The statement added: “We, the Tunisian Campaign for Boycott and Opposition to Normalization with Israel, do not see this assault as an isolated incident, but rather as part of Carrefour management’s repressive policy in confronting the boycott movement. This is not the first or only attack. We have witnessed a series of assaults recorded at more than one Carrefour branch in Tunisia.”
The group demanded that the partnership with Carrefour be cut off, “as has happened in other countries thanks to public pressure and effective boycotts,” and called for accountability for those behind the assault. It urged Tunisians nationwide to act against Carrefour, declaring that it had ceased to be merely a partner company and was now “a Zionist company.”
In another Facebook post, the movement wrote: “After the brutal assault on our activists, we returned to several stores on the ‘Day of Rage against Carrefour,’ and again management decided to violently attack the peaceful demonstrators. Every drop of blood spilled in Carrefour Tunisia will be another nail in the coffin of the Zionist company here. With every drop of blood, you disturb those who have not yet boycotted you. With every drop of blood, you confirm your link to the Zionist entity. With every drop of blood, you transform the economic violence inflicted on the Palestinian people into physical violence embedded in Tunisian collective memory. With every drop of blood, you remind us of our closeness to our brothers in Palestine. Your end is near.”
The group also published a list of dates and Carrefour branches where it claimed its activists had been attacked.
Protesters accuse Carrefour of supporting Israel and supplying food to IDF soldiers. Demonstrations across Tunisia have included vandalizing store entrances, hanging banners, and distributing leaflets to passersby. One leaflet showed the Israeli flag alongside IDF and Carrefour logos, with the caption: “IDF thanks you for your support of Israel through your shopping at Carrefour.”
Joining the boycott campaign was Tunisian parliament member Mohamed Ali, who called for legislation criminalizing normalization and endorsed boycotts of companies supporting Israel. He criticized the assault on protesters in La Marsa, saying: “Instead of praising their steadfastness, we punish them.”
At the same time, others in Tunisia oppose the protests, arguing that Carrefour serves the public and provides livelihoods for many families, in a country already struggling with high unemployment and a deteriorating economy.