The Schiaffo di Tunisi (literally in English Slap of Tunis), was a name given by Italian journalists to the response of the Italian Empire to the French conquest of Tunisia.
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see also Italian Tunisians and History of Tunisia
Tunisia had strategic importance for the European powers when it came to ownership and controlling the flow of trade across the Straits of Sicily. For that reason, Britain would support the French claim to the protectorate, denying Italy the opportunity to develop a stranglehold over trade passing through Tunisia and Sicily. (Italians had a long history in Tunisia, tracing back to the 16th Century. The Italian language was a lingua franca among merchants, partially because of the existing Italian-Jewish merchant community.)
Italy had close relations with the Bey of Tunis, receiving its own capitulation in 1868, giving it most favored nation status.
The "betrayal"
The supposed "betrayal" of France would sour Franco-Italian relations for decades to come. The inability of the Office of Foreign Affairs, then run by Benedetto Cairoli, to foresee the occupation of Tunis would result in his sacking from both his post of Foreign Minister, and as Prime Minister of Italy.
Cairoli's replacement, Agostino Depretis, signed onto the Triple Alliance a year after the event, as Italy felt threatened by French expansionism and sought protection. Italian irredentism would later be one of the main factors in Italy's entry into the First World War. Mussolini, remembering the humiliation of the Italians, would later claim Tunisia as part of Italian Africa, using the native Italian community of Tunisia as pretext.
Self-reported ethnic affiliation of voters (according to a joint Gallup/News24 poll.)[1]