Egyptian authorities react to charges of neglect of Jewish Synagogue

Egyptian authorities stung by charges of neglect over Jewish site

The Egyptian authorities have been stung by a critical open letter issued by Egyptian Jews as president Mubarak visited Washington this week, and pictures of a derelict Jewish site appearing on weblogs such as Point of No Return. They are at pains to state that the site is not a synagogue but a yeshiva.

To show that accusations of neglect of Egypt's Jewish heritage are unfounded, they are trumpeting their plans to restore the Maimonides* synagogue. This is not linked, they say in this AFP report, to the culture minister Farouk Hosni's bid to head UNESCO. Hosni once said he would 'burn Israeli books.'

CAIRO — Egypt denied on Thursday that it was restoring its Jewish antiquities only to help bolster a controversial bid by Culture Minister Faruq Hosni to head UNESCO.

Antiquities chief Zahi Hawass was responding to complaints by Jewish groups after recent pictures circulating on the Internet reportedly showed religious books scattered on the floor of a synagogue.

"There have been some pictures published in newspapers and on Internet sites implying that Egypt has neglected its duties towards Jewish temples and this is not true," Hawass told reporters at the Musa bin Maymun (or Maimonides) synagogue in Cairo?s ancient Jewish Quarter.

Continued here with a video: Egyptian authorities stung by charges of neglect over Jewish site