Behor Bohor De Menasce

The ancestors of this influential Sephardi family were originally named Levi and migrated from Morocco to Hebron and later to to Cairo where the name Menasce was adopted. Jacob Levi Menasce (1807-1882) became a prominent banker and merchant whose company had branches in Cairo, Alexandria, Marseille (under his son Moise), Liverpool (under his son Joseph), London (under his son Elie) and Manchester. He was given Hungarian nationality and created Baron de Menasce by the Emperor Franz Joseph in 1876. He moved to Alexandria in 1871, and his son Bekhor and grandsons Jacques and Felix served as heads of the Jewish community there. The family was well known for its philanthropy, and later generations were prominent in the arts.

The leading member of the family in the nineteenth century was Jacob De Menasce (1807 - 1887), who began his career in Cairo as a money changer (sarraf) and banker and gradually emerged as the private banker of the Khedive Ismaʿil. He was one of the earliest entrepreneurs in Egypt to recognize the opportunities offered by European trade and, with Jacob Cattaoui, opened the banking and trading establishment of J. L. Menasce et Fils with branches in England, France, and Turkey. In 1872 and 1873, De Menasce was granted Austro-Hungarian protection and subsequently was given the title of baron by the Austro-Hungarian Empire, along with Hungarian citizenship. In 1871, he moved to Alexandria, the new and permanent seat of the family. His son, Béhor Levi, continued in the family's financial enterprises, but his grandson, Baron Jacques Béhor De Menasce (1850 - 1916), deserted the banking profession in favor of the cotton and sugar businesses. In 1890, Jacques served as the president of Alexandria's Jewish community and remained in that capacity for about twenty-five years. His younger brother Félix Béhor (1865 - 1943) became concerned with Zionism and was a personal friend of Dr. Chaim Weizmann, then president of the World Zionist Organization. In September 1921, Félix represented the Egyptian Zionist organization in Carlsbad at the twelfth World Zionist Congress; in later years he served as Alexandria's Jewish community president. The De Menasce family was not merely wealthy. It was European-educated and Western-oriented and led the Alexandria community from the early 1870s into the 1930s.

Jaffa, in a total population of 17,713 inhabitants, including 11,630 Moslems and 3,113 Christians, besides Armenians, Greeks, Latins, Maronites, and Copts, possesses 2,970 Jews, of whom 1,210 are Sephardim and 1,760 Ashkenazim. The Jews occupy three city districts, bearing the respective names "Neweh Ẓedeḳ," "Neweh Shalom," and "Neweh Yafeh," and each comprising a block of houses. The Jewish market, consisting of shops and workrooms, is partly on the quay and partly on the main street traversing the city. Although of recent foundation, the community possesses a number of institutions, e.g.:

The Hospital Sha'ar Ẓiyyon, founded in 1891, and sustained by the gifts of the Jewish philanthropists of Europe; a public library, founded in 1885, and containing several thousands of books in different languages; two schools, founded in 1894, sustained by the Alliance Israélite and by Zionist societies of Russia and Vienna, and educating 118 boys and 241 girls; two Talmud Torahs: one, Or Torah, Sephardic, founded (1838) through the munificence of Baron Menascé of Alexandria and educating 180 boys; the other, Sha'are Torah, Ashkenazic, dating from 1884 and accommodating 130 boys; three Ashkenazic synagogues,one Sephardic; and some private midrashim. Jaffa possesses also five Jewish benevolent societies, among them a B'nai B'rith lodge.

Jaffa

The small town of Jaffa was just as important to the modern development of

Eres Yisrael as Jerusalem had been to religious life for Jews centuries past. In

the 17th century, there were very few Jews in Jaffa, probably because of the

lack of structures suffered after the major earthquake which occurred in the

previous century. Because of this, it was said Jewish travelers suffered

oppression and humiliation while passing through the town. When Jews

arrived at Jaffa, the community in Jerusalem would be notified and a man

would be sent with camels, donkeys or mules to transport the new arrivals to

Jerusalem.

At Jaffa, Isaiah Agiman, a Jewish banker of Constantinople, purchased

a lot for the purpose of building an Hahnasat Orchim (a wayfarer’s home) for Jewish pilgrims.7 The house was afterwards transferred to the Sephardic

community of Jerusalem, who settled some Sephardic families there.

The Sephardic community established the first school in Jaffa in 1838

known as Or Torá which could educate 180 boys at a time. The school was

built with funding from Jacob Menasce (1807-1882). The Menasce family was

originally named Levi; they had migrated from Morocco to Hebron and later

to Cairo where the name Menasce was adopted.8 An international businessman,

Jacob, was given Hungarian nationality and called Baron de Menasce by the

Emperor Franz Joseph in 1876.