page_title: Rhodes blood libel
section_title: European diplomatic involvement
hierarchical_section_title: Rhodes blood libel / European diplomatic involvement
context_page_description: The Rhodes blood libel was an 1840 event of blood libel against Jews, in which the Greek Orthodox community accused Jews on the island of Rhodes of the ritual murder of a Christian boy who disappeared in February of that year.
  Initially the libel garnered support from the consuls of several European countries, including the United Kingdom, France, the Austrian Empire, Sweden, and Greece, although later several supported the Jewish community. The Ottoman governor of Rhodes broke with the long tradition of the Ottoman governments and supported the ritual murder charge. The government arrested several Jewish subjects, some of whom were tortured and confessed. It blockaded the entire Jewish quarter for twelve days.
  The Jewish community of Rhodes appealed for help from the Jewish community in Constantinople, who forwarded the appeal to European governments. In the United Kingdom and Austria, Jewish communities gained support from their governments. They sent official dispatches to the ambassadors in Constantinople unequivocally condemning the blood libel. A consensus developed that the charge was false.
context_section_description: In the first days of the blockade, someone managed to smuggle a letter out of the Jewish quarter to the Jewish leadership in Constantinople. It was not until March 27 that the leaders of the Jewish community in the Ottoman capital forwarded it to the Rothschild family, together with a similar call for help from the Jews of Damascus. To these documents, the Jewish leaders attached their own statement in which they cast doubt on their ability to influence the sultan.
  The intervention of the Rothschilds bore the quickest fruit in Austria. The head of the Rothschild family bank in Vienna, Salomon Mayer von Rothschild, played the key role in raising financing for the Austrian Empire, and he had a very close relationship with the Austrian chancellor von Metternich. On April 10, Metternich dispatched instruction regarding both the Damascus and Rhodes affairs to Bartholomäus von Stürmer, ambassador in Constantinople, and Anton von Laurin, consul in Alexandria. In his dispatch, Metternich wrote: "The accusation that Christians are deliberately murdered for some blood-thirsty Passover festival is by its nature absurd…" Regarding the Rhodes case, the chancellor instructed von Stürmer "to tip the wink to the Turkish regime, so that they instruct pasha of Rhodes accordingly and that you let [our] vice-consul in Rhodes know that in such cases he should work in the spirit of sensible mediation." Von Stürmer, responded, "[T]here have been no persecutions against the Jewish population, at least not by the authorities."
  In the UK, it took the Jewish community longer to react to the calls for help from Rhodes and Damascus. The Board of Deputies of the British Jews convened on April 21 to discuss the blood libels. They resolved to request the British, Austrian, and French governments to intercede with the Ottoman government and stop the persecutions. The resolution condemning the ritual murder charges was published as a paid advertisement in 35 British journals; it appeared twice in the most important newspapers. On April 30, a delegation elected by the Board met with the foreign secretary Lord Palmerston, who called the blood libel a "calumny" and promised that "the influence of the British government should be exerted to put a stop to [the] atrocities." In his dispatch of May 5, the foreign secretary told Lord Ponsonby, the British ambassador in Constantinople, to communicate the material on the Rhodes affair to the Ottoman government "officially and in writing" and to "request… an immediate and strict inquiry to be made… especially into the allegation that these atrocities were committed at the instigation of the Christians and the European consuls."
  A consensus formed within the European diplomatic community in Constantinople that the persecution of the accused Jews had to be stopped. This opinion was held not only by Lord Ponsonby, but also by von Stürmer, whose correspondence revealed that he was not at all convinced of the innocence of the Jews; by the French ambassador Edouard Pontois, whose government stood by the French consuls who supported blood libels in Rhodes and Damascus; and by the Prussian ambassador Hans von Königsmark. Consequently, the way was open for Lord Ponsonby, by far the most powerful diplomat in Constantinople, to intervene unopposed on behalf the Jews of Rhodes.
caption: Map of southeastern Europe and the Levant, showing the extent of the Ottoman Empire in 1840 (red outline). Major Jewish communities are denoted in blue.
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