Israeli diplomats were not evacuated from the Israeli Consulate during a bomb alert in the southern French city of Marseilles. Israel's Foreign Ministry denied French media reports claiming staff were temporarily evacuated from the building after an anonymous bomb threat was received by local police. According to the reports sappers discovered a suspicious device in a vehicle parked outside the Israeli Consulate. Further inspection revealed it was a mock bomb consisting of a pressure cooker marked with radiation warning stickers with wires protruding from it. An hour and a half after the initial alert the bomb was declared harmless and the area opened to traffic. Last year Marseilles was the site of a number of pro-Palestinian rallies were participants demonstrated against Israel over the raid on the Gaza bound flotilla boat the Mavi Mamara.
