2025/06/19 by Olga Borovaya · 1 voice
Social Sciences · #Islamic Studies and History #Jewish and Middle Eastern Studies #Middle East and Rwanda Conflicts
paper · doi:10.1080/00263206.2025.2515602
openalex publication_date 2025/06/19 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/06/15
Virtually. nothing is known about the response of Ottoman Jews to the beginning of the Tanzimat reforms because of the lack of relevant sources. The present study, the first of its kind, examines a community conflict in Izmir in 1846–1847 through the lens of two extant Ladino (Judeo-Spanish) sources, whose authors directly articulate their attitude to the reforms, revealing their interpretation of the Tanzimat Decree. This article argues that it was this understanding that prompted the poor members of Izmir’s Jewish community to split and temporarily form a community of their own. The first Ladino periodical and a separate Ladino account of the events show that the wealthy put a disproportionate financial burden on the poor by making them pay the meat gabela (an indirect tax on kosher meat), which made meat unaffordable for them, while community elites were exempted. When for the first time, the poor realized that they were Ottoman subjects whose rights were presumably violated by the rich, they rebelled.