Antisemitism in Turkey refers to historical and contemporary acts and sentiments of hostility, prejudice, or discrimination directed against Jews as individuals or as a community, based on their religion, ethnicity, culture, or perceived identity in Turkey.
Demographics Jews have lived in the territory comprising modern Turkey for over 2,400 years. Initially, the population consisted of Greek-speaking Romaniote Jews, but the Romaniotes gradually assimilated into the Sephardic Jewish community. The Sephardic community began migrating from the Iberian Peninsula to the Ottoman Empire's territory in the 15th century as a result of the persecution of Jews and Muslims by Manuel I of Portugal, the expulsion of Jews from Spain, the Spanish Inquisition, and the Portuguese Inquisition.
Although Jews constituted only approximately 0.03% of the Turkish population in 2009, the Republic of Türkiye nevertheless houses one of the largest Jewish diaspora communities in the Muslim world. The population of Turkish Jews was counted at 23,000 in 2009 and between 10,000 and 14,000 in 2022; the community is declining. The majority of Jews in Turkey reside in Istanbul. As of 2010, there were 23 active synagogues in Turkey, including 16 in Istanbul alone. Historically, the Jewish population of the Ottoman Empire reached its apex at the end of the 19th century, when Jews numbered around 500,000 individuals, of which approximately half lived in the territory of modern Turkey.
Although Jews form a very small portion of the Turkish population today, antisemitic sentiment is widespread among modern-day Turks. Public criticism of Israel in Turkey frequently turns into expressions of general antisemitic sentiment.
Since 2009, the Jewish population has declined. By September 2010, the population had dropped to about 17,000 people, mainly due to emigration to Israel precipitated by security concerns from increasing antisemitism sentiments following incidents such as the 2006 Lebanon War, the 2008–2009 Gaza War, and the May 2010 Gaza flotilla raid in which nine Turkish citizens were killed by Israeli Navy commandos boarding the flotilla ships to uphold the maritime blockade of the Gaza Strip.
Historical status of Jews in Turkey
Jews and antisemitism in the Ottoman Empire
In accordance with Islamic law (), Jews in the Ottoman Empire were considered dhimmis, which subordinated them to Muslims. However, the status of dhimmi guaranteed Jews personal inviolability and freedom of religion. That said, dhimmitude did not prevent antisemitism in Ottoman Turkey.
The first Ottoman case of blood libel—that is, claims of Jews abducting and sacrificing non-Jews in sinister rituals—was reported during the reign of Sultan Mehmed II in the 15th century (according to other sources, at the beginning of the 16th century). Subsequently, and despite the mass migration of Jews from Spain in 1492, such blood libels occurred rarely and were usually condemned by Ottoman authorities. Some Jewish sources mention blood libel incidents during the reign of Sultan Murad IV. Sultan Mehmed II issued a firman (a royal decree) that was the first of its kind in the Ottoman Empire: He ordered that all cases related to the blood libel should be considered by the Divan, the highest council of the Empire.
In general, the Alhambra Decree and subsequent migration of Jews from Western Europe to the Ottoman Empire were welcomed by the authorities. In 1553, Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent, taking up the opinion of his personal physician and adviser, Moses Hamon, reconfirmed the orders of Mehmed II, which prohibited local courts from adjudicating the cases about alleged Jewish ritual murder. He also successfully counter-measured the intention of Pope Paul IV to place the Jews of Ancona into the hands of the Inquisition.
However, later, the attitude of the authorities towards the Jews deteriorated. In 1579, Sultan Murad III reportedly heard that Jewish women wore silk clothes decorated with gemstones and ordered the destruction of all Jews in the Empire. Even though the decree was lifted, thanks to Solomon Ashkenazi, the adviser to the grand vizier, special clothing was ordered for Jews to wear. In particular, women were forbidden to wear silk, and men were required to wear the so-called Jewish hat.
There were a number of known cases of blood libel in the 19th century on the territory of the Ottoman Empire: Aleppo (1810), Beirut (1824), Antioch (1826), Hama (1829), Tripoli (1834), Jerusalem (1838), Rhodes and Damascus (1840), Marmora (1843), Smyrna (1864). The most famous of them were the Rhodes blood libel and Damascus affair in 1840, both of which had major international repercussions.
A blood libel in Rhodes occurred in February 1840, when the Greek Orthodox Church, with the active participation of the consuls of several European states, accused the Jews of kidnapping and murdering a Christian boy for ritual purposes. The Ottoman governor of Rhodes supported the accusation. Several Jews were arrested, some of whom have made self-incriminating confessions under torture, and the entire Jewish quarter was blocked for twelve days. In July 1840, the Jewish community of Rhodes was formally acquitted of accusations.Frankel J. The Damascus Affair: "Ritual Murder", Politics, and the Jews in 1840. Cambridge University Press, 1997.
In the same year, the Damascus affair took place, in which Jews were accused of the ritual murder of father Thomas, a Franciscan friar from the Island of Sardinia and his Greek servant, Ibrahim Amarah. Four members of the Jewish community died under torture, and the matter resulted in international outrage. British politician Sir Moses Montefiore intervened to clear the remaining imprisoned Jews and persuaded Sultan Abdülmecid I to issue a decree on 6 November 1840, declaring that blood libel accusations is a slander against Jews and to be prohibited throughout the Ottoman Empire. The decree read:
"We cannot permit the Jewish nation... to be vexed and tormented upon accusations, which have not the least foundation in truth..."
In 1866, with the resumption of cases of blood libel, the Sultan Abdulaziz issued a firman, according to which the Jews were declared to be under his protection. Orthodox clergy limited such accusations thereafter. Another known case of blood libel happened in 1875 in Aleppo, but the alleged victim of the murder—an Armenian boy—was soon found alive and well.
In the second half of the 19th century, the Ottoman Empire initiated the Tanzimat reforms aimed at aligning the rights among its subjects regardless of ethnic origin and religion. These transformations positively affected the Jews, who finally acquired equal rights. In the beginning of the 20th century, the Jewish population in the Empire had reached 400–500,000 people. In 1887, there were five Jewish members in the Ottoman Parliament. However, actual equality under the law was not achieved by Jews until much later.
With the appearance of Zionism in the late 19th century, the attitude of Ottoman authorities towards Jews began losing its traditional tolerance, thus marking the first signs of modern Turkish antisemitism. There were also conflicts with local Muslims, especially in the area of present-day Israel. Towards the end of the 19th century, the Arab population protested against the increasing Jewish presence in Palestine, resulting in a ban in 1892 on all land sales to foreigners. Jews were forbidden to settle in Palestine or live in Jerusalem, regardless of whether they were subjects of the Empire or foreigners.Bat Yeor. Dhimmi. Jews and Christians under Islam Rule S. Dudakov. Russian and Jerusalem Hostility to Jews grew with the increase in numbers of Jews in the region, and there was a major pogrom in Jaffa in March 1908, in which the Arab population participated and resulted in 13 people being seriously injured, several of whom died later. The local government was sacked.
During World War I, Jews were persecuted by the Ottoman Empire, as the Ottomans accused Jews of being British and Russian spies, greatly affecting the Aliyah and Yishuv community. Subsequently, the Ottomans issued the 1917 Jaffa deportation, in which thousands of Jews were expelled or died.
During the Greco-Turkish War of 1919–1922, the Jewish communities in Western Anatolia and Eastern Thrace were persecuted by the Greeks, and a pogrom occurred in Çorlu.
In the Republic of Turkey In 1923, when the creation of Turkish Republic was proclaimed, at that time there were 200,000 Jews living on its territory, including 100,000 in Istanbul alone. Jews were granted civil equality; however, the subsequent pogroms and persecution triggered a mass Jewish emigration, which reduced the Jewish community by 10 times.
In 1920, the opponents of the regime of Mustafa Kemal (Atatürk) launched an antisemitic campaign, claiming, besides classical antisemitic rhetoric, that the Jews supported Greek interests in the Turkish War of Independence and illegally appropriated abandoned property. The campaign did not find widespread support and ultimately ceased with the stabilization of Mustafa Kemal's regime. In the same period the government forced the Jewish community to abandon the cultural autonomy granted to ethnic minorities, thereby violating the treaty of Lausanne, although this was the general policy of Mustafa Kemal's regime, which also affected Armenians and Kurds, among others.
On 2 July 1934, a pro-Nazi group headed by Cevat Rıfat Atilhan organized pogroms against Jews in Thrace. Authorities decisively stopped the anti-Jewish riots, announced a state of emergency in Eastern Thrace, and brought looters to justice. At the same time, some sources mention there was a forcible eviction of Jews from Eastern Thrace, based on the Law on Resettlement "(№ 2510). Under this law, the Interior Minister had the right to relocate national minorities to other parts of the country depending on the level of their "adaptation to Turkish culture". In particular, the Jews were expelled by Turkish authorities of the city of Edirne. In 1935, the Turkish Army bought 40,000 copies of Attilhans' antisemitic book Suzy Liberman, Jewish Spy and distributed them amongst the officers.
In 1939–1942, Turkey again saw antisemitic propaganda spreading that had seen support from Nazi Germany, in which the Turkish government did not intervene. In July 1942, power in Turkey was seized by right-wing politicians. On 11 November 1942, a law on tax on property (Varlık Vergisi) was ratified by the Turkish Parliament. The tax rate for Jews and Christians was 5 times greater than for Muslims. As a result, about 1,500 Jews were sent to labor camps for non-payment of taxes. The Act was repealed on 15 March 1944. Despite this, Turkey received substantial numbers of Jewish refugees during the rise of fascism in Europe in the 1930s and the Second World War. There were cases of Turkish diplomats in Europe aiding Jews in escaping the Holocaust.
From 1948 to 1955, approximately 37,000 Turkish Jews emigrated to Israel. One stated reason for emigration was pressure from authorities to use Turkish language even at home.
In 1950, Atilhan and other right-wing Turkish politicians, to a great extent, spread antisemitic propaganda through the media, some of which, though, were confiscated by the authorities. Attacks on Jews and antisemitic incidents were recorded in 1955, 1964, and 1967. Authorities took steps to protect the Jewish population.