Explosion in the Jewish quarter of Cairo

Haret al-Yahud, the "Jewish alley," was the old Jewish quarter of Cairo, densely populated, where the community's poorest families lived. It was struck on June twentieth by an explosion that destroyed several buildings.

The origin of the charge was never established with certainty; the Egyptian authorities, at war with Israel for a month, conducted no public inquiry. The explosion occurred in a climate of arrests, seizures, and denunciations targeting the community.

It was followed in September by a series of attacks against the great Jewish department stores in the city center. Together, these attacks opened the movement of departure that would empty Egypt of its Jews within roughly fifteen years.