Dreyfus Affair

The Dreyfus Affair was a political scandal that convulsed late-19th-century France (c. 1894-1906), revolving around the wrongful conviction for treason of Captain Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish officer, on antisemitic grounds and the subsequent battle for his exoneration. It is treated as a landmark in modern history for exposing antisemitism within the nation-state, anticipating twentieth-century antisemitism, and contributing to the emergence of Zionism.

Claims that use this term

• The Dreyfus Affair prefigured later twentieth-century antisemitism as a dress rehearsal.
• The Dreyfus Affair was the nation-state’s antisemitism reaching its culmination
• The Dreyfus Affair survived two world wars as a living French political cleavage
• The Dreyfus Affair birthed Zionism as the sole Jewish political answer to antisemitism
• The Dreyfus Affair sharply outlined traits that later defined twentieth-century politics.