However, Jews weren’t marching armies into Christian capitals. They were not a threat to the elites in the way the Muslim empires were. Thus, as Richard Southern suggests, it was easy for Christianity to dismiss the Jewish challenge because of the “economic and social inferiority of the Jews.” In other words, Jews did not have the social, economic, or political power to threaten Christendom.

XREF: Relates to the asymmetry between how Christendom treated the Muslim empires (as military-political rivals) versus the Jewish community (as socially inferior), echoing broader patterns of how powerlessness invites dismissal.

Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politi…, loc. 65