Was the First Crusade a turning point in medieval Jewish history?

Where the debate comes up

• 1095–1097The First Crusade and the Jews of the Rhineland
• 1298 to c. 1350Rindfleisch, Armleder and the Black Death

Statements tied to the debate

1. For all the bloodshed, forced baptisms and martyrdoms, Rhineland's Ashkenazi communities rebounded more swiftly than one might expect. Although many historians have seen in the First Crusade a watershed of medieval Jewish history, it did not permanently halt the growth of Jewish life in northern Europe or begin an era of unbroken persecution. 1
2. Traumatic as the First Crusade surely was, the violence stayed relatively local and subsided fast, and attacks on Jews remained the exception until the close of the thirteenth century. 2