Al-Hakim orders Jews to wear a wooden block around their necks and heavy crosses for Christians; synagogues razed and property confiscated

The measures of al-Hakim were not limited to buildings. The caliph imposed on the Jews of Cairo and his empire the wearing of a wooden block around the neck, and on Christians a heavy cross, so that they could be recognized in the street and at the baths; he forbade them noble mounts, wine, and certain administrative functions.

Synagogues were razed, property confiscated, conversions obtained by coercion. The community of Cairo, which at that time comprised Rabbanites and Karaites living side by side, was severely afflicted: the correspondence of the Genizah affords a glimpse of departures toward Palestine and toward Ifriqiya.

Toward the end of his reign, al-Hakim reversed his edicts and authorized those converted by force to return to their religion — a reversal as abrupt as the persecution had been, and one which chroniclers, both Arab and Christian, attributed to the sovereign's derangement. He disappeared shortly afterward in the hills of Mokattam, his body never found.