The Damascus Affair 'Ritual Murder', Politics, and the Jews in 1840 [Paperback]

This 1997 book assesses the impact of the Damascus affair on European and Jewish politics, including the Holocaust and creation of modern Israel.Many Jews in Damascus were charged with ritual murder and tortured after the disappearance of an Italian monk and his servant in 1840. This book assesses the Damascus affair as a factor in the European and Jewish politics of the time as well as a chapter in Jewish history and historiography.Many Jews in Damascus were charged with ritual murder and tortured after the disappearance of an Italian monk and his servant in 1840. This book assesses the Damascus affair as a factor in the European and Jewish politics of the time as well as a chapter in Jewish history and historiography.In February of 1840, an Italian monk and his servant disappeared in Damascus. Many Jews in that city were charged with ritual murder and tortured until they confessed. The case turned into a cause célèbre across much of the Western world and produced an explosion of polemics, fantastic theories, and strange projects. This book, the first since 1840, assesses the affair as a factor in European and Jewish politics of the time, a chapter in Jewish history and historiography, and the stuff of radically conflicting myths that eventually led to the Holocaust and the establishment of the Israeli state.Preface; 1. Introduction; Part I. The Dynamics of Ritual Murder: 2. Ritual murder: official documents; 3. The mechanics and motivations of the case; 4. Beyond Damascus: early reactions; 5. The consuls divide; Part II. In Search of Support: 6. The press, the politicians, and the Jews; 7. Restoring the balance: the Middle East; 8. Political polarization and the genesis of the mission to the East; Part III. 1840 - Perceptions, Polemics, Prophecies: 9. The crisis: Jewish perceptions; 10. The religious polemics; 11. Christian Millennialists, Jewish Messianists, and Lord Palmerston; 12. Jewish nationalism in embryo; Part IV. Last Things: 13.lc&