Damascus affair

The Damascus affair refers to an incident that took place on February 5, 1840 in Damascus, during which Franciscan Capuchin friar Father Thomas and his servant were reported missing, never to be seen again. The Turkish governor and French consul believed blood libel and ritual murder accusations, as the murder occurred before Jewish Passover. A fake investigation was staged and Solomon Negrin, a Jewish barber, confessed under torture and accused other Jews. Two others died under torture, and one converted to Islam to escape the torture. More arrests and atrocities followed, culminating in sixty-three Jewish children being held hostage and mob attacks on Jewish communities throughout the Middle East.

The affair attained wide international attention. In a groundbreaking effort, fifteen thousand American Jews protested in six American cities on behalf of their Syrian brethren. The United States consul in Egypt expressed official protest by the order of President Martin Van Buren. Sir Moses Haim Montefiore, backed by Western influentials (British Lord Palmerston, the French lawyer Adolphe Crémieux, Austrian consul Merlatto, missionary John Nicolayson, and a Solomon Munk, among others, led a delegation to the ruler of Syria, Mehemet Ali. The Damascus affair prompted French Jews to establish the Alliance Israelite Universelle.

Negotiations in Alexandria continued from August 4 to August 28 and secured the unconditional release and recognition of innocence of the nine prisoners still remaining alive (out of thirteen). Later in Constantinople, Montefiore persuaded Sultan Abdülmecid to issue a firman (edict) halting the spread of blood libel accusations in the Ottoman Empire:

"... and for the love we bear to our subjects, we cannot permit the Jewish nation, whose innocence for the crime alleged against them is evident, to be worried and tormented as a consequence of accusations which have not the least foundation in truth...".

The 1840 accusations re-emerged in a recent book by a Syrian official, The Damascus Blood Libel (1840) as Told by Syria's Minister of Defense, Mustafa Tlass ([1]). A fictional gay retelling of the Damascus Affair by the Israeli novelist Alon Hilu, emphasizing the contribution of Jews themselves to the false accusations, and claiming that Father Thomas died from a heart attack during intercourse with a Jewish young man, was published recently in Hebrew under the title Death of a Monk.

See also

* Anti-Semitism
* History of anti-Semitism