(1784-1855)
British communal leader. He was born in Livorno, but grew up in London, where he worked as a broker. An observant Jew, he maintained his own synagogue in Ramsgate from 1833; he was an opponent of Reform Judaism. In 1837 he was sheriff of the City of London, and he was the first Jew to be knighted in Britain. He went on a mission to the Levant with Isaac-Adolphe Cr&nieux in 1840 at the time of the Damascus Affair, and he intervened with their governments on behalf of the Jews of Russia, Morocco and Romania. He visited Palestine on several occasions and worked to improve the conditions under which the Jewish community lived there. From 1838 to 1874 he was president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews.
Dictionary of Jewish Biography. Dan Cohn-Sherbok.