1834 looting of Safed

Anti-Jewish violence in Palestine October 2023 October 2023 Looting of Safed (1834) the Arab Peasant Revolt Sidon Eyalet, Ottoman Empire (1795).png 250px Map of the Sidon Eyalet within the Ottoman Empire Safed, Ottoman Syria (now Israel) Jews he ביזת צפת בשנת תקצ"ד yes he 32 57 57 N 35 29 54 E type:event_region:IL inline,title yes 1834 06 15 – yes 1834 07 17(1834-06-15 1834-07-17) Pogrom Arabs and Druze The 1834 looting of Safed he ביזת צפת בשנת תקצ"ד (also known as the 1834 Safed pogrom) was a month-long attack on the Jewish community of Safed in the Sidon Eyalet of the Ottoman Empire during the Peasants' revolt in Palestine. It began on Sunday, June 15 (7 Sivan), the day after the Jewish holiday of Shavuot, and lasted for 33 days.Bloch, Abraham P. One a day: an anthology of Jewish historical anniversaries, 1987. p. 168.Louis Finkelstein The Jews: their history, culture, and religion https://books.google.com/books?id=1-QDAQAAIAAJ 17 February 2012 1960 Harper 679 Rabbi Isaac b. Solomon Farhi records that the pillage continued for 24 days. It has been described as a spontaneous attack on a defenseless population during the armed uprising against the rule of Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt, the Ottoman governor.Martin Sicker Reshaping Palestine: from Muhammad Ali to the British Mandate, 1831–1922 https://books.google.com/books?id=TWBxUi5fVS0C&pg=PA13 1999 Greenwood Publishing Group 978-0-275-96639-3 13 However, the insurrection soon lost its original purpose and turned into bloody rioting and excesses directed against the Jewish population. The rioting was most severe in Safed, where assaults and vandalism forced many Jews to flee to the nearby village of Ein Zetim or relocate to Jerusalem. During the attacks, some 500 Torah scrolls were destroyed in Safed alone. The rioting continued until a contingent of Druze troops from Ibrahim's army arrived to halt the violence. The governor of Safed and thirteen of the ringleaders were taken captive, summarily tried, and put to death.S. Almog Antisemitism through the ages https://books.google.com/books?id=GBNHAAAAMAAJ 1988 Published for the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, by Pergamon Press 978-0-08-034792-9 218 However, the attacks on the Jews of Safed and Jerusalem in 1834, though part of the general uprising, were only minor episodes in a campaign whose wrath was directed primarily against the Egyptian conquest. The event took place during a power vacuum while Ibrahim Pasha was fighting to quell the wider revolt in Jerusalem.Schwartz 1850 Accounts of the month-long event tell of large-scale looting,Nathan Schur Twenty centuries of Christian pilgrimage to the Holy Land https://books.google.com/books?id=K65tAAAAMAAJ 1992 Dvir Publishing House 128 In Galilee the Jewish community of Safed was, for a month, subjected to a wild orgy of looting by its Moslem neighbors as well as killing and raping of Jews and the destruction of homes and synagogues by Druze and Muslims.Dovid Rossoff, Safed: The Mystical City. Feldheim Publishers, 1991 978-0-873-06566-5 pp. 149ff: The Druze Massacre of Safed Many Torah scrolls were desecrated and many Jews were left severely wounded.Abraham Yaari Israel Schen Isaac Halevy-Levin The goodly heritage: memoirs describing the life of the Jewish community of Eretz Yisrael from the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries https://books.google.com/books?id=-JNtAAAAMAAJ 1958 Youth and Hechalutz Dept.. of the Zionist Organization 37 Revolt broke out on the 15th June, 1834. The Arab villagers, together with the townspeople, armed themselves and attacked the Jews, raping their women and destroying their synagogues. The riots in Safed went on for 33 days, but in Jerusalem, Hebron and Tiberias they ended sooner.Abigail Green Moses Montefiore: Jewish liberator, imperial hero https://books.google.com/books?id=3fNYmj1uyzgC&pg=PA119 2010 Harvard University Press 978-0-674-04880-5 119 During the revolt of the Arab peasantry against Mehmed Ali in 1834, villagers from the surrounding area had sacked the Jewish quarter, assaulting and killing the men, raping the women, plundering and destroying their homes. The event has been described as a pogrom or "pogrom-like" by some authors.Ronald Florence Blood libel: the Damascus affair of 1840 https://books.google.com/books?id=bJDLrLlWg18C&pg=PA47 17 February 2012 2004 Univ of Wisconsin Press 978-0-299-20280-4 47 There had been pogroms against the Jews in Safed in 1834 and 1838.Gabriel Baer Gabriel Baer Fellah and Townsman in the Middle East: Studies in Social History https://books.google.com/books?id=myoYuye0dS4C&pg=PT322 2012 Routledge 978-1-136-27872-3 322 The Structure of Turkish Guilds and its Significance for Ottoman Social History During the same rebellion the fellahs robbed the Jews of Tiberias and Safed "of immense property, as is reported, for there was no one to offer any opposition." An eyewitness has vividly described the pogrom-like attack of the villagers of Upper Galilee on the Jews of Safed on 15 June 1834. The Jews were stripped of their clothes and driven out of the town, the remaining women and youths were violated, the belongings of the Jews were looted and their holy articles were desecrated. Hundreds fled the town, seeking refuge in the open countryside or neighbouring villages. Lebanese Druze troops quelled the rioting under the orders of Ibrahim Pasha following the intervention of foreign consuls. The instigators were arrested and later executed in Acre. Prelude Safed had long been inhabited by Musta'arabi Jews. It became a kabbalistic centre from the 1540s onwards when students attracted by the teachings of sages such as Moses ben Jacob Cordovero settled there.Simon Schama, Belonging: The Story of the Jews, 1492–1900, Bodley Head 2017, p. 99: 'In a very few years, Safed's streets and houses, tumbling over the pretty hills, became populated by ardent young Kabbalists wanting nothing to do with the longer-settled Arabic-speaking Musta'arabi Jews, but instead attached themselves to the new sages like Moses Cordovero'. By the 1830s around 4000 Jews were living in the town, comprising at least half the population.Moshe Maʻoz Studies on Palestine during the Ottoman period https://books.google.com/books?id=apYJAQAAIAAJ 1975 Magnes Press 67 9789652235893 Up to 1837 the population of Safed showed an increase. A considerable number of sources report a population of 7000–8000, with half, or even more than half, being Jews. Throughout their history, the Jews of Safed, though supported by the Sublime Porte, had been the target of oppressive exactions by corrupt local officials. In 1628, the Druze seized the city and, holding it for several years, despoiled the local community, and the Jewish population declined as Safed Jews moved to Hebron and Jerusalem.Jerome R. Verlin, Israel 3000 Years,,August 2023 InternetArchiveBot yes Pavilion Press, 2010, p. 167.Louis Finkelstein The Jews: Their history – 1960 "In 1628 the Druses attacked Safed. Mulhim, brother of Fakhr-al-Din, took the city and plundered the Jews, many of whom fled for their lives. In 1633 the Pasha of Damascus routed Fakhr-al-Din and again Safed felt the heavy hand of a conqueror. After Mulhim's defeat the Jews returned to Safed, once more under Turkish rule, but again they did not long enjoy peace." The 1831 annexation of Palestine to the Egyptian Ottoman governorate by Muhammad Ali rendered life relatively more secure than had been the case under the Ottomans.Sicker, p. 12 In 1833, however, at the approach of Ibrahim Pasha, the Jewish quarter of Safed was plundered again by the Druze, although the inhabitants managed to escape to the suburbs.Safed Jewish Encyclopedia. A year later, in 1834, it was announced that new taxation laws would be imposed, and conscription was introduced, drafting fellahin into the Egyptian army, who were also disarmed by local notables. The news was greeted by widespread anger. The Druze of the Galilee themselves, profiting from a weakness of control over their area, rose in revolt in the spring and were joined by a mass uprising by the fellahin, who resented local Jewish collaboration with the Egyptians.Baruch Kimmerling Clash of Identities: Explorations in Israeli and Palestinian Societies https://books.google.com/books?id=UB7lVldlFT4C&pg=PA68 2010 Columbia University Press 978-0-231-14329-5 68Jeff Halper,Between Redemption And Revival: The Jewish Yishuv Of Jerusalem In The Nineteenth Century, Routledge, 2019 978-0-429-72223-3 Safed had been severely damaged by the 1834 Jerusalem earthquake in May of that year, and following the uprising, attacks broke out on the weaker members of Ottoman towns, namely the Jews and Christians.Gudrun Kramer Graham Harman A History of Palestine: From the Ottoman Conquest to the Founding of the State of Israel https://books.google.com/books?id=tWrW_CKODdQC&pg=PA68 2011 Princeton University Press 978-0-691-15007-9 68Martin Sicker, p. 12 It was in this setting that the plunder at Safed was unleashed, causing many Jews to seek refuge among friendly Arabs in the neighbouring town of Ein Zeitim.Martin Sicker, p. 13 One account, retold by several Safed Jews to the 25-year-old Alexander William Kinglake, who visited in 1835,Introduction to Eothen: Traces of Travel Brought Home from the East, Northwestern University Press, 1997 blamed the incident on the intolerant rantings of a local Muslim cleric named Muhammad Damoor. The account stated that at the beginning of 1834, Damoor publicly prophesied that on June 15, the "true believers would rise up in just wrath against the Jews, and despoil them of their gold and their silver and their jewels." Attack left|thumb|250px|Letter to the Jewish community of London from a resident of Safed describing the event and appealing for assistance, 10 August 1834 The account of Neophytos, a monk of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, described the looting of the town, alongside similar events in Ramla, Lydda, Jaffa, Acre and Tiberias, noting that the perpetrators "robbed the Jews, who lived in these towns, of immense property, as is reported, for there was no one to offer any opposition".Annals of Palestine, 1821–1841, S.N. Spyridon, in: Journal of the Palestine Oriental Society, Volume 18, 1938, "Meanwhile, the fellaheen of Nablus [Sh'khem] and other districts made some daring movements on the plains around Ramleh and Lydda [Lod], where they looted all the houses. The fellaheen also laid siege to Jaffa and Ptolemais [Akko in Hebrew, Acre in English] and captured Tiberias and Safed. They robbed the Jews, who lived in these towns, of immense property, as is reported, for there was no one to offer any opposition" The 1850 account of Rabbi Joseph Schwartz stated that "Everything was carried off which could possibly be removed, even articles of no value; boxes, chests, packages, without even opening them, were dragged away; and the fury with which this crowd attacked their defenceless victims was boundless... [The perpetrators] were perfectly safe and unmolested; for they had learned that Abraim Pacha was, at the moment, so much occupied at Jerusalem and vicinity with his enemies there, that he could not go into Galilee."Schwartz 1850 One anecdote suggests the rioting was premeditated, organised by a local antisemitic Muslim cleric.Alexander William Kinglake Alexander William Kinglake Eothen Harrison https://archive.org/details/eothenbyawkingl00kinggoog 17 February 2012 1864 291–295 XXIV: The Prophet Damoor (Web edition published by University of Adelaide, South Australia ) According to the anecdotes narrated to Kinglake, when June 15 arrived, Muhammad Damoor appeared to the gathered Muslim crowd and incited them to fulfill his prophesy. Kinglake only mentions the occurrence of looting, writing that "the most odious of all outrages, that of searching the women for the base purpose of discovering such things as gold and silver concealed about their persons, was perpetrated without shame." Kinglake's is the only account which mentions the individual involvement of a local Muslim clergyman. Other reports suggest the attack was more violent. Isaac Farhi (d. 1853) described how several Jews were killed and raped in the attack. Men, women and children were robbed of their clothes and then beaten. Some fled into the surrounding fields and remained naked "like wild animals" until the danger passed.Bat Yeʼor Islam and Dhimmitude: where civilizations collide https://books.google.com/books?id=PK-TPKvmG7UC&pg=PA119 17 February 2012 2002 Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press 978-0-8386-3943-6 119December 2022 12 year-old Jacob Saphir was among refugees who found sanctuary in the adjacent village of Ein al-Zeitun, assisted by a sympathetic Arab sheikh.November 2021 He describes how for the first three days they had nothing to eat and how they hid in fear of their lives for forty days. Afterwards, they had found their homes completely ransacked and emptied; "not even small jugs, doors or windows had been left behind."Jacob Saphir. Even Sapir (I:1–2) 1866. Menachem Mendel Baum, a prominent member of the Ashkenazi community, published a book (Korot ha-ʻitim li-yeshurun be-Erets Yisrael, 1839) vividly detailing his recollections. He describes an aggressive onslaught, including one incident in which a group of elderly Jews, including pious rabbis, were beaten mercilessly while hiding in a synagogue.Menachem Mendel Baum. Korot Ha-Eytim (Hebrew), Vilnius, 1839. In May 1934, an article appearing in Haaretz by Palestinian historian and journalist Eliezer Rivlin (1889–1942) described the event of 100 years earlier in detail. His article, based on similar first-hand accounts, tells of how the head of the community, Yisroel ben Shmuel of Shklov, was threatened with his life and another rabbi who had fled to the hills seeking refuge in a cave was set upon and had his eye gouged out. Rivlin states many Jews were beaten to death and severely wounded. An estimated 500 Torah scrolls were destroyed. Valuable antique books belonging to the 14th-century rabbi Isaac Aboab I were also lost. Jewish homes were ransacked and set on fire as looters searched for hidden gold and silver.Eliezer Rivlin. The Great Plunder of Safed: June 15–July 17, 1834 https://web.archive.org/web/20100825135858/http://www.israel-palestina.info/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=428 August 25, 2010 , Haaretz, (May 22, 1934). Some Jews managed to escape to a nearby fortress and held out there for a few weeks. The mob unsuccessfully tried to break into the building to reach the fugitives.November 2021 The sources do not indicate how many Jews died. Tudor Parfitt The Jews in Palestine, 1800–1882 The Royal Historical Society; The Boyden Press 1987 57–63 It seems to have not been many, though hundreds were wounded. thumb|175px|British philanthropist Sir Moses Montefiore furnished Yisrael Bak with a new printing press (pictured) after his original one was destroyed in the pogrom The sole Hebrew printing press in Palestine and many copies of the Bible were destroyed. It was three years before the press started functioning again.Israel M. Ta-Shma The Hebrew book: an historical survey https://books.google.com/books?id=qYXgAAAAMAAJ 1975 Keter Pub. House Jerusalem 978-0-7065-1389-9 117 In 1834 Bedouin peasants attacked the Jewish quarter in Safed, and the damage they caused brought the press to a standstill for three years. Yisrael Bak, who established the printing house in Safed, incurred a wound on his foot that left him with an enduring limp.Jeff Halper Between redemption and revival: the Jewish yishuv of Jerusalem in the nineteenth century https://books.google.com/books?id=7XltAAAAMAAJ 17 February 2012 1991 Westview Press 978-0-8133-7855-8 86 For the next year or more everything went well. The press flourished and Bak found himself employing some thirty workers. Then, in 1834, disaster struck. The Druze of the Galilee revolted against Ibrahim Pasha. Joined by Arabs who resented the Jews' collaboration with the Egyptians, they fell upon the Jewish community of Safed just as the Jews in Jerusalem were being attacked. For days the looting and killing continued until Ibrahim Pasha finally suppressed the rebellion. Bak himself sustained an injury to his left foot that caused him to limp for the rest of his life. Even more painful was the damage done by the rioters to his press. Bak would later write of his experience fighting to protect his workers and the printing press from the Arab rampage, which nearly killed him.Abbey Alan D The Misadventures of the Printer Israel Bak https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/history/articles/misadventures-printer-israel-bak Tablet And they destroyed my house and the printing house and there was nothing left. We were thrown out in the open for days, left naked, and there was nothing left for us, and they waited for me to die. Had it not been for the grace of God (blessed be He), I would not have remained alive. Among the distinguished men who gave their lives helping others were Rabbis Leib Cohen, Shalom Hayat and Mendel of Kamnitz, who wandered around the streets without fear of the attackers to return little children to their mothers, rescuing the victims physically and emotionally, and burying the dead.Schur, Nathan. Toldot Tzefat, Tel Aviv: Am Oved; Dvir, 1983, pp. 189–193. Suppression and aftermath Rabbi Joseph Schwartz noted the justice that once calm had been restored, Ibrahim Pasha's army arrested and executed a number of perpetrators, and enforced summary justice on many suspects to ensure stolen goods were returned: The most respectable Mahomedans of Zafed and its environs were arrested as the authors of the outrage, and some of them were afterwards publicly executed, and whatever could be found of the stolen property of the Jews was restored. Every Jew was believed, when saying that he recognised this or that Arab among the robbers. The person so accused was instantly arrested, and punished with blows till he at last confessed and gave up his booty. Even many of the richest and most respectable of the Arabs were arrested, loaded with chains, and punished, upon the mere assertion of a very poor and common Jew. The word of a Jew was regarded as equal to the command of the highest authority, and severe punishment was at once resorted to, without any previous investigation, without any grounds or proofs. In this manner much of the stolen property was discovered; since many, in order not to be exposed to the violence of the Druses, delivered up everything of their own accord. The Jews were now required, by order of the Pacha, through the intervention of the consuls, to make out a correct list of all they had lost, of whatever they missed, and to indicate the true value of the same, and to hand it in to Abraim Pacha through means of the European consuls.Schwartz 1850 While in hiding from the rampage, Yisroel ben Shmuel of Shklov wrote letters to leaders of foreign nations based in Beirut who might be willing to take action to protect their citizens in Safed. Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt sent Bashir Shihab II, the Emir of Mount Lebanon, to suppress the revolt, and his arrival with his troops led to the end of the rioting by mid-July and the arrest and execution of perpetrators. Safed's Jewish community was devastated, with the destruction of ritual objects including torah scrolls, as well as of synagogues and of Bak's printing press, the area's only press for Hebrew publications; residents were only able to recover a tenth of the value of the property destroyed.Bemsoussan, Georges. "Pogroms in Palestine before the creation of the state of Israel (1830-1948)", Foundation for Political Innovation, April 2024. Accessed April 30, 2026. "From his hiding place, Rabbi Israel of Shklov sent several letters to the consuls of foreign states in Beirut. He informed them in detail of the hardships endured by several of their nationals, Jewish subjects 'protected' by foreign powers. In response, the consuls encouraged Ibrahim Pacha to go to Safed to quell the rebellion. He entrusted this mission to the Druze emir, Emir Bashir, who came down to Galilee from his home in Lebanon. By mid-July 1834, the riot had subsided and most of the rioters had fled. Several of their leaders were arrested and executed in the street. When the Jewish residents of Safed came back to their homes after the looting and destruction, despite the aid from consuls to the neediest among them, the majority found themselves devastated. They managed to salvage less than 10% of their belongings’ worth. Additionally, the sole Hebrew printing press in the entire Syria-Palestine region, established three years prior by an Ashkenazi Jew named Israel Bak (1797-1834), was demolished." Most of the rebels fled, but thirteen ringleaders along with the town's governor were captured, tried and publicly hanged in Acre.Sherman Lieber Mystics and missionaries: the Jews in Palestine, 1799–1840 https://archive.org/details/mysticsmissionar0000lieb registration 1992 University of Utah Press 978-0-87480-391-4 215 The Jews returned to their homes and gathered their few remaining belongings. According to Löwe'sSeptember 2014 investigations, the loss incurred amounted to 135,250 piasters. The consuls tried to raise money to compensate victims and made lists of the damages. When Ibrahim Pasha returned, he imposed an indemnity on the surrounding villages, but the victims received only 7% of the value of the damage. Only a small proportion of stolen property was ever recovered.Dovid Rossoff Where heaven touches earth: Jewish life in Jerusalem from Medieval times to the present https://books.google.com/books?id=zhdp9btWGWQC&pg=PA183 2001 Feldheim Publishers 978-0-87306-879-6 183 See also 1517 Safed attacks 1660 destruction of Safed Battle of Hebron 1838 Druze attack on Safed 1929 Palestine riots References 2 Bibliography Karagila Svi http://www.ybz.org.il/_Uploads/dbsAttachedFiles/Article_27.9.pdf Samuel ben Israel Peretz Heller Describes the Sack of Safed 1834 Cathedra 27 1983 109–116 he 19 February 2012 17 December 2010 https://web.archive.org/web/20101217033034/http://www.ybz.org.il/_Uploads/dbsAttachedFiles/Article_27.9.pdf dead Schwartz Joseph. https://archive.org/details/adescriptivegeo00schwgoog/page/n469 A descriptive geography and brief historical sketch of Palestine A. Hart 1850 403–407 Category:Syrian Peasant Revolt (1834–35) Category:Jews and Judaism in Ottoman Galilee 1834 looting Category:1834 riots Category:1834 in the Ottoman Empire Category:1834 in Asia Category:June 1834 Category:1834 in Judaism Safed 1834 Category:Shavuot Category:Anti-Jewish pogroms in Ottoman Palestine Category:Judaism and Druze Category:Druze in the Ottoman Empire