Moses Montefiore

Montefiore retires from the London Stock Exchange at forty and devotes the next five decades to Jewish causes across the world. He travels repeatedly to the Ottoman Empire, Russia, Morocco, and Romania to intervene personally with rulers on behalf of threatened communities, most famously during the Damascus blood libel of 1840. In Jerusalem he funds Mishkenot Sha'ananim, the first Jewish neighborhood built outside the Old City walls, along with a windmill intended to make the community self-supporting. His work marks the arrival of organized international Jewish advocacy and the first practical steps toward a modern Jewish presence in the land.