Odessa: The port that quarantined disease but could not quarantine hatred

COVID taught us a word most of us hoped we could forget: “quarantine.” Now the word has returned to the headlines, with passengers exposed to the Andes strain of hantavirus being flown into the United States and elsewhere for monitoring and isolation. While the risk to the public may be low, the practice is routine: separate those who have been exposed, protect the general population, and wait for the danger to pass.

That headline made me think of Odessa, once part of the Pale of Settlement in the Russian Empire. Odessa was a cosmopolitan port on the Black Sea adjacent to the Ottoman Empire. I...