"BLOOD-LIBEL" IN RUSIA.

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 1901, 8 November 1913, Page 3

"BLOOD-LIBEL" IN RUSIA.

A MENACE TO THE JEWS. Every week/ says "Darkest Russia," we receive some fresh illustration of the effect which the spread of the , "blood libel" by the . anti-Semitic press has upoii the' most ignorant and ; superstitious section of t'Ee Russian people. In many cases the."ritual murder" cry is 'engineered by local' members of the "Black Hundred" fraternity. Our. St. •Petersburg correspondent gives the details of a case bearing a somewhat different character.' A little' girl living in St. Petersburg was sent out'shopping and did not return for'-several weeks. On Jier return t-ho unfolded a Btory whioh suggested that she had been decoyed away by Jews; presumably with the usual "ritual" object. When, howover, her account of her adventures' was prut to the test it' waß discovered that on-her way homo from her shopping expedition she had .been robbed of ner purchases,, and ..through,fear of being punished on, her 'return'she had elected to run away. The "ritual" story waß 'her own invention ; and, as may be imagined; tiib anti-Semitic papers made the most of it' until it' was exposed. The appalling feature of, this unpleasant episode is that' it should have occurred to a child that such a. story i would furnish a convincing explanation 'of her disappearance. Xne. persistent ■ dissemination of the "blood libel" is an everrpresent menace to tho Jewish population, and if not checked is bound some 1 day -to give rise to a, fanatical outburst 'of savagery/- ' ' According to the "Kusskoe Znamya; the organ of the anti-Semitic Union of the Russian people, the Minister of Justice is preparing a detailed report on the Beilis case for presentation to the Tsar..

The "Russkia Vyedomosti" is informed that, as a result of the consultations held both in St. Petersburg and Kieff, the officials of the Ministry of Justice have formed the opinion that neither 'the report of the head of the Kieff Defective Department nor; that of the .Publio Prosecutor 1 is convincing with regard to the alleged "ritual" character of the murder of Yuschinsky. The indirect proofs, in tftie shapo of stores to the effect that 'he baking of Passover cakes requires Christian blood, are dismissed as untenable. When one of those present at the consultations pointed out that-the material supplied by the prosecution was not likely. to satisfy a jury,' the Conference advised that the prosecution should not lay particular stress on the "ritual character of the murder, but should admit the possibility of an ordinary crime having been committed. The "Zemschina, Darkest Russia continues, now resorts to the Gospels for the purpose of establishing the blood accusation against the Jews. It I quotes the utterances of Christ relating to the Last Supper which it interprets as evidence or the uso of blood among Jews for ritual purposes. The Archangel Michael Union, , which represents the PurishkevMi wnig of the Union of the Russian People, has Tesolved to issue a pamphlet on the Beilis case, which is intended, to eerre as a general manifesto against the Jews. _____