What is called The Damascus Affair was the disappearance and suspected murder in 1840 of a Christian Priest, said to have been killed while in the Jewish Quarter for his blood to be used in the approaching Passover celebration. The accused men were declared innocent after a delegation of high-level European Jews, headed by Sir Moses Montefiore, traveled to the capital of the Ottoman Empire  to negotiate with the Pasha.  Following this major “blood libel” event, international-minded Jews considered how to organize for the protection of the Jewish reputation world-wide. One result was the Alliance Israelite Universelle, founded in 1860 by Adolphe Cremieux who was also a member of the above-mentioned delegation. This new sense of, and felt-need for, solidarity gave rise to the modern Jewish Press, a mass of new institutions and organizations all aimed at serving the “Jewish community,” and the emergence of a written plan, a version of which we know as the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion.

Image: Symbol of the Alliance Israelite Universelle on door of “Mikveh Israel’ school. The hands clasping indicate the “helping hand” that Jews should offer to one another, no matter where they are.