The blood libel

I stumbled across a rather nasty individual on Twitter who threw at me the accusation that when Jews bake matzah they include non-Jewish blood in it. I challenged @Jew4palestine several times about this but this self-professed Jew just couldn't or wouldn't provide proof. In fact I challenged him about quite a few of his statements, always with the same result - insults or silence. Last night he apparently decided that he had enough of being out-argued and made his tweets 'protected'. Part of me is sad that I will not be able to try and correct @Jew4palestine's errors of fact but another part of me rejoices that his vile slurs will have a smaller audience now than previously. Hopefully the only people who will see his tweets from now on will be people with mindsets similar to his. As to the matter of the blood libel, @jew4palestine presented this as  proof...

That is the story of a bad man, doing bad things. A rabbi trading in organs for transplant and making a profit, is a nasty story but does not in any way prove the blood libel. This is not surprising as the blood libel is a lie. For those of you who don't know what I am talking about, consider yourselves fortunate. However I think I should explain so you know the sort of lies that are spread about Jews, including by Jews such as jew4palestine. Wikipedia defines blood libel thus:

'Blood libel (also blood accusation^[1][2]) is a false accusation or claim^[3][4][5] that religious minorities, usually Jews, murder children to use their blood in certain aspects of their religious rituals and holidays.^[1][2][6] Historically, these claims—alongside those of well poisoning and host desecration—have been a major theme in European persecution of Jews.^[4]
Blood libels typically allege that Jews require human blood for the baking of matzos for Passover, although this element was absent in the earliest cases that claimed (the contemporary) Jews reenacted the crucifixion. The accusations often assert that the blood of Christian children is especially coveted, and, historically, blood libel claims have been made to account for otherwise unexplained deaths of children. In some cases, the alleged victim of human sacrifice has become venerated as a martyr, a holy figure around whom a martyr cult might arise. Four of these have been previously canonized as saints, namely William of Norwich, Little Saint Hugh of Lincoln, Simon of Trent (Simon was decanonized^[7] in the 20th century), and Gavriil Belostoksky who remains canonized in the Russian Orthodox Church.'

That Wikipedia article gives some interesting historical examples of the blood libel, going back to the first century BC. It is the modern day libels that interest me, especially those that emanate from Israel's neighbours, Wikipedia lists a few:

In 2003 a private Syrian film company created a 29-part television series Ash-Shatat ("The Diaspora"). This series originally aired in Lebanon in late 2003 and was broadcast by Al-Manar, a satellite television network owned by Hezbollah. This TV series, based on the antisemitic forgery The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, shows the Jewish people as engaging in a conspiracy to rule the world, and presents Jews as people who murder Christian children, drain their blood and use this blood to bake matzah.

 During a speech in 2007, Raed Salah, the leader of the northern branch of the Islamic Movement in Israel, accused Jews of using children's blood to bake bread. "We have never allowed ourselves to knead [the dough for] the bread that breaks the fast in the holy month of Ramadan with children's blood," he said. "Whoever wants a more thorough explanation, let him ask what used to happen to some children in Europe, whose blood was mixed in with the dough of the [Jewish] holy bread." ^[42]

In an address that aired on Al-Aqsa TV on March 31, 2010 (as translated by MEMRI), Salah Eldeen Sultan (Arabic: صلاح الدين سلطان‎), founder of the American Center for Islamic Research in Columbus, Ohio, the Islamic American University in Southfield, Michigan, and the Sultan Publishing Co.^[46] and described in 2005 as "one of America's most noted Muslim scholars," alleged that Jews kidnap Christians and others in order to slaughter them and use their blood for making matzos. Sultan, who is currently a lecturer of Muslim jurisprudence at the Cairo University stated that: "The Zionists kidnap several non-Muslims [sic] – Christians and others... this happened in a Jewish neighborhood in Damascus. They killed the French doctor, Toma, who used to treat the Jews and others for free, in order to spread Christianity. Even though he was their friend and they benefited from him the most, they took him on one of these holidays and slaughtered him, along with the nurse. Then they kneaded the matzos with the blood of Dr. Toma and his nurse. They do this every year. The world must know these facts about the Zionist entity and its terrible corrupt creed. The world should know this."^{[47][48][49][50][51]}

Here's a couple of examples that Wikipedia have missed:
From Likud.nl:

'Following is a translation of a virulently anti-Semitic article entitled
‘The Talmud, the Jews and Human Sacrifice’ which appeared in the Egyptian
opposition newspaper Al-Shaab on November 17, 1998.
The article was written by Dr. Fahmi Abd al-Salaam.
It asserts that Jews
use blood of Christians to bake passover matzah and carry out human sacrifices:
Throughout history, the Jews have been known to be a depressed and whiny
people. There is a clear connection between the Jewish race and depression,
and many writers have described Jewish depression as a trait characteristic
of this despicable race. And we all remember Shakespeare’s Shylock who was
absorbed by dark bitterness and demanded a pound of human flesh.
In the important book ‘The Jews in Egypt in the Modern Era’ by researcher
Orpah Abdah Ali, which was published in 1991 and which surveyed the life
and activity of the Jews in Egypt from the time of Muhammad Ali through
1967, there is a chapter about the religious ceremonies conducted by Jews
on behalf of their God, who is the blood-thirsty God which the Jews
invented in accordance with their nature. In that chapter it states that
the Talmud, which is full of errors, falsehoods and fabrications, played an
important part in the formulation of the of the phenomenon of ‘fanatic
nationalism’ among the Jews, and they prefer it over the Torah.
It also states in the chapter that the Jews carry out human sacrifices to
please their blood-thirsty God. In this context, the book quotes the Talmud
as saying “We have two ways of satisfying our God: the first is on the
Feast of Matzah [Passover], using matzah mixed with human blood, and the
second is the circumcision ceremony for our children.” This, while the
Jewish Encyclopedia says, “The rabbis have given their approval for
carrying out human sacrifices of Christians to our God.”
The author of the book surveys the methods by which the rabbis slaughter a
person prior to his being sacrificed to God:
1. The first method is that the victim is brought while still alive and
placed into a large barrel with sharp needles embedded in its side. The
needles pierce the victim’s skin and his blood begins to drip into the
barrel. The more the victim moves due to the pain, the worse his wounds
become until finally his body is emptied of all blood. Thus, when his soul
departs from his body, the last drop of his blood leaves as well.
2. The second method is used in places which are not secure for Jews, where
they are compelled to carry out their crimes quickly without enjoying them:
they slaughter the victim by severing his neck and arteries after having
placed a receptacle underneath him so the blood will flow into it.
Afterwards, the blood is gathered in a jar. These jars are brought on
Passover and Purim to the leading rabbi, who blesses the blood. Then, they
mix the blood together with flour to make matzah. Afterwards, the matzah is
distributed to God-fearing Jews and they eat it with an appetite
commensurate with the depth of their hatred for Jesus and Christians.
The conditions which the victim must fulfil to be fit for Purim, as noted
by the author, are as follows: he must be an adult Christian who is
religious – preferably a priest – and he must be gentle and shy – which
attests to the quality of his blood – and not sexually active. Similarly,
he must be a friend of the Jews, so that the blood will not be contaminated
by hatred for them. The slaughtering of the victim is entrusted to a group
of 7 Jews, of whom at least one must be a rabbi.
I had thought that the matter of Jewish matzah mixed with blood was a
fabrication, but the shocking thing is that it is a fact, a fact which has
been proved in some 400 cases which have become known, while the number of
cases that have not been revealed is far higher. It was in this framework
that the Jews slaughtered a young Egyptian girl in 1881 in Port Said.'

The blood libel lives on in many Middle East countries here is one video as an example



The extraordinary good blogger Elder of Ziyon has a fascinating article from last year on this very subject, I suggest you read it.

Elser of Ziyon  has a more recent article that I found even more interesting, here's an extract or so:

'Dr. Salman bin Fahd al-Odah, Assistant Secretary General of the Federation of Muslim Scholars, spoke in a wide-ranging interview on a Ramadan TV program that was shown throughout the Arab world.

Al-Odah's topic was - Jews.

He spoke approvingly of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, as well as an Arabic book called "Stones on the Chessboard" with a similar theme.

...

He then went on to say that the Talmud and other Jewish holy books demand the murder of non-Jewish children in order to make matzoh for Passover, and he said that this is documented historically as well as in an Arabic novel called "The blood of the unleavened bread of Zion." He also said, as proof, "I read a story that a doctor was working in a lab and he lived near a Jewish family so they asked him about human blood, and he began to investigate only to discover that scandal" that Jews bake matzoh with human blood.

This sort of anti-semitism is mainstream Arab TV fare.  '

So to @jew4palestine I issue a challenge, find me one piece of proof that Jews use blood in the making of matzah or withdraw your foul accusation.


@jew4palestine has proved to be a rich source of material, more blogposts based upon his tweets may well follow...