Jewish Imperial Allegiance and the Greco-Ottoman War of 1897 · 41speeches in Ladino as well as Turkish emphasizing their dedication to
the cause and to their state; many donated money, clothing, or supplies
to funds created for the mostly Muslim soldiers of the Ottoman army.
In fact, this particular form of identification was made concrete through
Jewish participation in Red Crescent Society activities and other proj-
ects aimed directly at aiding Muslim populations displaced by the war,
notably those in Crete. Alignment with local and even distant Ottoman
Muslims had become an integral part of how Ottoman Jews expressed
their loyalty to the empire during the war, in Izmir as well as Salonica.
The Ottoman Jewish press praised those who undertook such patri-
otic activities and duties and called upon every community member to
make his or her contribution, however small, to the war effort. El Meseret,
for its part, began a special fund-raising campaign, announcing that half
of all income made from new subscribers would support the Ottoman
military.^45 La Buena Esperansa publicly called upon a certain “Madame
Joselin,” resident in Izmir, explaining that “during the time of the Russo-
Turkish War, she had been the president of a Jewish women’s charitable
society and at numerous times expressed her sympathy with the soldiers
of the imperial army.”^46 The author of the article, explaining that he did
not understand why Madame Joselin had failed to heed the call of duty
this time, apparently compelled her to take action: a subsequent issue
announced that she had managed to bring her society back together and
that the group had already sewn 100 shirts for the Ottoman soldiers sta-
tioned in the region.^47
As with the appeals for sermons and police surveillance to counter
displeasing behavior among the local Jewish community, here too the
paper made use of its coercive power in order to mold the behavior of
its audience. While the irresponsible actions of Jewish youths in Salonica
and Izmir had drawn severe criticism and elicited calls for harsh mea-
sures, highly respected and influential members of the community were
not immune to receiving public lessons in propriety, patriotism, or both,
through the pages of the Ladino press. Even the esteemed “Madame Jo-
selin” had been publicly singled out and scolded, however indirectly and
gently, when her activities did not match up with those which her com-
munity’s journalists had in mind for her and her philanthropic society.
Perhaps even more striking is the fact that, as in Salonica, there would
also come a moment for the Jewish community of Izmir when, in the
midst of the Greco-Ottoman conflict of 1897, the patriotism of the local