1838 Druze attack on Safed

The 1838 Druze attack on Safed began on July 5, 1838, during the Druze revolt against the rule of Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt. Tensions had mounted as the Druze captured an Egyptian garrison outside of Safed.[1] The local Safed militia of several hundred was heavily outnumbered by the Druze, and the city was gripped in despair as the militia eventually abandoned the city and the Druze rebels entered the city on July 5.[2] The Druze rebels and a Muslim mob descended on the Jewish quarter of Safed and, in scenes reminiscent of the Safed plunder four years earlier, spent three days attacking Jews, plundering their homes and desecrating their synagogues.[3][4][5] Besides religious and sectarian tensions, the Jewish community in Safed was seen as being favorable toward Ibrahim Pasha and the Egyptian Eyalet. Some Jews ended up leaving the town, moving south to Jerusalem and Acre.[6] Among them was Yisrael Bak, whose printing press had been destroyed a second time.[7]

  1. ^ Rossoff, David. Safed: the mystical city. p.162-165.
  2. ^ Schur, Nathan (October 31, 1983). תולדות צפת. עם עובד. ISBN 9789650100971 – via Google Books.
  3. ^ Sherman Lieber (1992). Mystics and missionaries: the Jews in Palestine, 1799-1840. University of Utah Press. p. 334. ISBN 978-0-87480-391-4. The Druze and local Muslims vandalised the Jewish quarter. During three days, though they enacted a replay of the 1834 plunder, looting homes and desecrating synagogues — but no deaths were reported. What could not be stolen was smashed and burned. Jews caught outdoors were robbed and beaten.
  4. ^ Louis Finkelstein (1960). The Jews: their history, culture, and religion. Harper. p. 679. In the summer of 1838 the Druses revolted against Ibrahim Pasha, and once more the Jews were the scapegoat. The Moslems joined the Druses in repeating the slaughter and plunder of 1834.
  5. ^ Ronald Florence (18 October 2004). Blood libel: the Damascus affair of 1840. Univ of Wisconsin Press. p. 47. ISBN 978-0-299-20280-4. There had been pogroms against the Jews in Safed in 1834 and 1838.
  6. ^ Emile Marmorstein (1975). Middle Eastern Studies II: "European Jews in Muslim Palestine". pg. 77.
  7. ^ Israel M. Ta-Shma (1975). The Hebrew book: an historical survey. Keter Pub. House Jerusalem. p. 151. ISBN 978-0-7065-1389-9. After the Safed earthquake in 1837 and the Druze revolt in 1838, during which his farm was despoiled and his printing press again destroyed, he moved to Jerusalem.