Composed and carefully groomed, Premier Félix Gaillard rose from his front-row chair in France's National Assembly last week and assured his countrymen that the bombing of Sakiet-Sidi-Youssef constituted a display of "exemplary patience." By the time Gaillard spoke, dozens of foreign diplomats and journalists had visited Sakiet-Sidi-Youssef and confirmed Tunisian reports that a high percentage of the 209 casualties (79 dead, 130 wounded) inflicted by the French air force were women and children. Blandly ignoring these facts, Gaillard insisted that "the majority of the victims were soldiers of the Algerian F.L.N." and that, in.any case, responsibility for the attack must be laid at the door of Tunisia's President Habib Bourguiba for allowing Algerian rebel forces to use Sakiet as a base of operations. "It is evident," ended Gaillard coolly, "that the French government does not recognize culpability in this affair."
Even in France's myopically nationalistic Assembly, there were a few men who found this hard to swallow. But when the most notable of the dissenters, ex-Premier Pierre Mendés-France, rose to speak, he was showered with right-wing catcalls of "Jew" and "traitor." In the end the duly elected representatives of the French people approved the bombing of Sakiet-Sidi-Youssef by a vote of 339 to 179. Of the 179 nays, all but 31 came from Communists or fellow travelers.
A Leader for the Parade. France's intransigence put pro-Western Habib Bourguiba squarely on the spot. Appearing in the streets of Tunis, he was greeted by outraged crowds shouting. "Give us arms! Give us arms!" L'Action, official organ of Bourguiba's Neo-Destour Party, editorialized: "To be respected in 1958 one can no longer be a friend of the West. The day that Bourguiba decides to follow the path set by Nehru, Tito and Nasser, Tunisia will no longer be lied about and attacked. She will be wooed." Cooed Beirut's El Massa: "Turn to Cairo, 0 Habib. Turn to the Arab Republic, to the camp of neutralism and to dignity and sovereignty."
A politician with a barometric response to popular mood, shrewd Habib Bourguiba recognized that his only hope of heading off a national swing to neutralism lay in putting himself at the head of the anti-French parade. Bourguiba ordered 400 French civilians out of the Tunisian-Algerian border area "for security reasons," demanded that France close five of her ten consulates in Tunisia, directed his U.N. delegation to request an immediate Security Council debate on the Sakiet-Sidi-Youssef bombing. In his most drastic move he also demanded immediate withdrawal of the 22,000 troops that France has been permitted to leave in Tunisia even after the establishment of full Tunisian independence in 1956.