20 august 1955 pogroms

On 20 August 1955, series of particularly heinous pogroms against Europeans Algerians are perpetrated in the Philippeville (now. Skikda) area, by Muslim civilians flanked by fighters of the FLN wilaya 2 led by Zighoud Youcef (زيغود يوسف in arabic).

Similar pogroms in the atrocity and barbarity are held in Morocco on the same date as the second anniversary of the deposition of the sultan of Morocco

The purpose of these pogroms is highly cynical, Youssef Zighoud means to spread terror among Europeans by giving systematic extermination, but also lead to repression of the French army at the height of the crimes committed. The goal is to dig a definitive gap between the two Algerian communities : French and Muslims.

Philippeville

Tens of thousands of Muslim civilians supervised by men of the ALN invest the city and systematically slaughter the Europeans they find as well as Muslims with French sympathies or employed by French Algerians. The massive presence of the French army greatly limit the number of victims, a dozen at most.

El Halia

The savagery and heinousness of physical abuse practiced in El Halia will be a decisive psychological impact on the European population and the French army. El Halia is an iron mine near Philippeville where 2000 Muslims live with 130 Europeans.

On 20 August 1955, a crowd of men and women armed with guns, axes and knives enter the village to the shout of "Jihad".
Europeans try to escape the massacre where assassination succeeds torture. The men are cut throat, women and girls raped before being disemboweled, babies burst against walls, children killed with knifes and axes

Communications with the outside world were cut and carnage lasted three hours before help arrived. A total of thirty people were tortured and died during the pogrom of El Halia.

Aïn-Abid

One family (Mello) is tortured and executed in Ayn Abid, but with an extreme barbarity. The father is dismembered, arms and legs cut with an axe, a new born baby girl of 5 days is cut and placed in her disemboweled mother stomach. The 11-year-old girl and her grandmother are raped and murdered.

Zighoud Youcef, hero of independance.

Youcef Zighoud who died in a clash with the French army in 1956, is celebrated as a hero and many streets and schools bear his name in Algeria, to his native village formerly known as Conde-Smendou.