About Bizerte

Bizerte is known as the oldest and most European city in Tunisia. It was founded around 1000 BC by Phoenicians from Tyre. It is also known as the last town to remain under French control after the rest of the country won its independence from France. Initially a small Phoenician harbour, the city came under the influence of Carthage after the defeat of Agathocles during the Punic Wars. The city was then occupied by the Romans, under the name of Hippo Diarrhytus or Zarrytus, was dismantled and moved to Utica. Bizerte was successively conquered by the Arabs in 647 (who gave the city its current name), by the troops of Charles V of the Holy Roman Empire in 1535, and then by the Turks in 1574. The city then became a corsair harbour and struggled against the French and the Venetians. Under the Treaty of Berlin, 1878, France gained control of Bizerte and built a large naval harbour in the city. Due to its strategic location on the Mediterranean, France wanted to keep control of its naval base there. So France kept control over the city even after Tunisia gained its independence in 1956. The city was blocked in 1961 by the Tunisian Army and Navy, then attacked. France responded by dropping 7,000 paratroopers and forcing the navy blocked with three warships. The three day battle resulted in 700 dead and 1,200 wounded amongst the Tunisians at the cost of 24 dead and 100 wounded amongst the French. The French finally abandoned Bizerte on 15 October 1963. In 1924, after the French government officially recognised the Soviet Union (USSR), the military fleet of Tsarist Russia that had been kept in the port of Bizerte was returned to the Soviet government. The ships never moved from the port and finally were sold there as scrap metal