In a few days the world’s Christians and Jews will celebrate Easter and Passover. It’ll be a weekend of good food (and at my seder, plenty of good Israeli wine)—but most of all it’ll be an affirmation of freedom and faith, an expression of joy, hope and renewal.
But for many people across the planet it’ll be an opportunity to indulge in a bit of Jew-bashing.
Brace yourself as the planet’s anti-Semites engage in their annual rite-of-hate, when the internet will soon become awash in the crazy notion of
the blood libel.
It’s a centuries-old mad idea that Jews kill gentile children for making matzo, the unleavened bread that’s eaten during the Passover holiday.
As
Lord Jonathan Sacks, emeritus Chief Rabbi of the British Commonwealth, and one of the leading intellectuals of our time, recently wrote in an important article on the
resurgence of global anti-Semitism (it’s behind the Wall Street Journal paywall, but his remarks are also captured in
this CNN interview):
The idea [of the blood libel] is absurd, not least because even the tiniest speck of blood in food renders it inedible in Jewish law.”
As explained by Sacks, the libel was an English invention, originating in Norwich around 1144. It was introduced into the Middle East in the 19
th century, where it helped instigate the targeting of innocent Jews in Lebanon and Egypt (and, most famously, in Syria with the
Damascus trials of 1840).
This violence and hatred against Jews happened decades before the first wave of persecuted European Jewish refugees arrived in pre-state Israel seeking refuge in their ancient homeland.
Zionism didn’t provoke it.
