Jewish Museum of Turkey

In the late 15th century, Isaac Sarfati, Chief Rabbi of Edirne, wrote the following to brethren in Germany: ‘Brothers and teachers, friends and acquaintances! I, Isaac Sarfati, proclaim to you that Turkey is a land wherein nothing is lacking, and where, if you will, all shall yet be well with you…Here, every man may dwell at peace under his own vine and fig tree.’ At around the same time, Sultan Beyazıt II proclaimed ‘…the Jews of Spain should not be refused, but rather be welcomed with warm feelings’. Alas, this enlightened state didn’t last through the centuries, and Jewish Turks were made to feel considerably less welcome when racially motivated ‘wealth taxes’ were introduced in 1942 and violence against Jews and other minorities was unleashed in 1955, prompting many families to flee the country. More recently, Islamist terrorists bombed synagogues on a number of occasions. This museum, housed in the ornate 19th-century Zullfaris synagogue near the Galata Bridge, chooses to focus on the positive rather than the negative, tracing the rich 700-year-history of Jews in Turkey and documenting their mostly harmonious coexistence with the Muslim majority. The displays, though modest, are as fascinating as they are well-intentioned.