Overlap

I like that Sfar touched on the way religions can overlap, especially in the same wider tradition (Abrahamic in this case) and in the same geographic region and similar cultures.  I'm referring to the pilgrimage to the Saint/Sufi grave mentioned on pages 83-87.

Sfar's inclusion of this side-trip was probably fed by the current tension in France over (mostly) Muslim Algerian immigration.  It's the author's way of including a contemporary moral, or at least his views on the topic, while keeping in embedded deep within the story set in pre-war Europe and North Africa.  It's cute how Sfar even introduces the character's to each other with the strikingly similar greetings: shalom aleichem and salaam aleikum.

I'm reading into it too much but I find it amusing that the only character's ready to fight over religious claims are the cat and the donkey.  The religious men are perfectly happy to converse, play music, and enjoy each others' company.  Sfar may be hinting that such disputes over religious claims appeal to a more 'animal' territorial nature, whereas "real men of god" (presented as fully human here) are more inclined to celebrate commonalities than devolve into such disputes.  Of course this is just my guessing at Sfar's intentions, without his direct acknowledgment of his motive in these panels I cannot be 100% sure.