The Dangerous Legacy of the 1840 ‘Damascus Affair’ Blood Libel (PART ONE)

According to a recent article in Aish:

On November 11, 2025, Dr. Samar Maqusi, a researcher at the University College London (UCL) proudly stated that in 1838 a group of Jews kidnapped and murdered a priest in Damascus and used his blood in order to make special pancakes for their Feast of the Tabernacles (Sukkot). She added that for Jewish people the blood used in their pancakes must be from a gentile. She asserted that a group of Jews admitted to murdering this priest in order to use his blood in their food.

Her lecture was hosted by UCL’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and titled “The Birth of Zionism.”

The Damascus Affair of 1840 (not 1838) was an infamous blood libel that became international news and led to one of the first instances in which Jewish communities around the world worked together to demand justice for another Jewish community.

The Damascus blood libel is recognized as one of the turning points of modern Jewish history, when Jews around the world realized the importance of uniting to advocate for each other.

The Blood Libel

On February 5, 1840, Father Thomas, an Italian Friar of the Capuchin Order who lived in Damascus, disappeared with his Muslim servant Ibrahim Amara.

They were assumed murdered, possibly by businessmen with whom Thomas had had shady dealings, or by a Muslim who was infuriated by an insult to Islam that Father Thomas had uttered.

But the Jews were to bear the blame, as the Capuchin friars began spreading rumors that the Jews had murdered the two men to use their blood for Passover. This led to one of history’s most famous blood libels, the Damascus Blood Libel, better known as the Damascus Affair of 1840.

Damascus was then under the rule of the Ottoman Empire. Since the Ottoman Empire was weak, the Ottoman governor of Egypt, Muhammad Ali Pasha, primarily ruled over both Egypt and Syria as quasi-independent principalities, with just nominal subordination to the Ottoman Empire. France also retained some measure of control in Syria, as the French had maintained a presence in the region since the time of the Crusades. The Catholics of Syria, including Father Thomas, were officially under French protection.

Due to the French jurisdiction over this case, the French consul, Ulysse de Ratti-Menton, known for his anti-Jewish views, presided over the investigation.

Along with the governor-general, Sharif Pasha, he conducted a short investigation, and a barber named Shlomo Negrin, among others, was arbitrarily arrested and tortured.

They managed to extort a “confession” from Negrin that the monk had been killed in the house of David Harari by seven Jews. The men whom he named were arrested and tortured. Two of the detained men died, one converted to Islam to be spared, and the statements made under torture by the others were considered adequate as an admission of guilt.

Bones that were discovered in a sewer were “identified” as those of the monk and buried in a funeral on March 2nd, which increased the anger against the Jews. The inscription on the monk’s tombstone stated that this was the grave of a saint tortured by the Jews.

After the “funeral,” attacks began against the Jews, and Sharif Pasha had to move hundreds of soldiers to protect the Jewish quarter.

The focus of the “investigation” was now on the servant, Ibrahim Amara. More torture extracted the “confession” that he had been murdered by Jews, among them members of the prominent Farhi and Picciotto families, and the authorities sought to arrest them.

Knowing the torture that they would be subjected to, some of the accused tried to hide or escape. Rabbi Yaakov Antebi, accused of having received a bottle of the blood of Thomas, was arrested and tortured, yet he held strong under the torture and would not confess to anything.

More bones were found, and the investigators claimed they were the remains of Ibrahim Amara. However, the physician in Damascus, Dr. Lograso, did not believe they were human bones and, considering the pressure on him, requested that the bones be sent to Europe for examination. Ratti-Menton refused and instead announced that based on the confessions of the accused and the remains found of the victims, the guilt of the Jews in the double murder was proven beyond a doubt.

One of the Jews who was arrested during the second round of accusations was Isaac Levi Picciotto, an Austrian citizen and thus under the protection of the Austrian consul. Initially, he was also subject to torture, but on March 8th, there was a sudden turnabout.

The Austrian vice-consul, Caspar Giovanni Merlato, a personal friend of Picciotto, demanded that Picciotto be returned to Austrian jurisdiction and that the investigation be carried out at the Austrian consulate.

With Merlato’s involvement, things changed dramatically. Picciotto proved he was in a different place the evening of the murder, and a Christian corroborated this. Picciotto now moved from the defensive to the offensive and began accusing officials of instigating this blood libel, carrying out investigations under torture, and openly accusing Ratti-Menton of murder.

He demanded that the Austrian authorities carry out the investigation. As torture methods were seen as unjust, cruel, and backward by Western countries, his accusations put Ratti-Menton and his aides on the defensive.

The Blood Libel Spreads

The predictable result of the accusations was that the Jews of Damascus and other parts of Syria began to suffer from antisemitic mobs. Synagogues were destroyed and looted, cemeteries were desecrated, and Jews were attacked all over the country.

News of the atrocities spread throughout the Jewish world, causing waves of shock and anger at what was going on in Syria.

The first Jewish attempt to intervene in the tragic situation came via a petition initiated by Israel Bak addressed to Muhammad Ali, as he was the governor of Syria. At the same time, the Austrian Consul General in Egypt, Anton Laurin, received a report from the Austrian consul in Damascus. Recognizing the tremendous injustice, Laurin became very involved in the case, and he began by using his influence to petition Muhammad Ali to stop the torture methods used by the investigators.

Muhammad Ali agreed, and instructions were issued accordingly to Damascus by express courier. As a result, the use of torture came to an end on April 25, 1840, which caused a new round of riots in Damascus.

The accusation of murder and blood libel remained, and the investigation against the Jews continued, albeit without torture. Now, Austrian Consul General Laurin attempted to influence the French Consul General in Egypt to order his subordinate, Ratti-Menton, to stop the libel, but this effort was unsuccessful.

At this point, Laurin went against all procedures and decided to send the information he received from Damascus to Baron James de Rothschild, the honorary Austrian consul in Paris.

Baron Rothschild appealed to the French government to stop the injustice, but when his appeals were ignored, he chose to turn to the media and publish the report in newspapers worldwide, creating public pressure to halt this travesty of justice.

His brother in Vienna, Solomon Rothschild, worked alongside him and used his influence to speak to Chancellor Klemens von Metternich about the situation. Metternich ultimately supported his consul, Laurin, since the negative publicity for France, archenemy of the Austro-Hungarian empire, was to his benefit. The British also chose to support the Jews in fighting the libel, and the British Consul General of England in Egypt expressed those policies.

As a result of the advocacy, a message was sent to Damascus on May 3, 1840, ordering protection for the Jews from the violence of Muslim and Christian mobs.

Rabbi Menachem Levine is the CEO of JDBY-YTT, the largest Jewish school in the Midwest. He served as Rabbi of Congregation Am Echad in San Jose, CA from 2007 – 2020. He is a popular speaker and has written for numerous publications. Rabbi Levine’s personal website is https://thinktorah.org. A version of this article was first published at: https://aish.com/the-damascus-affair/