Vamos, Peter, “‘Home Afar’: the Life of Central European Jewish Refugees in Shanghai During World War II” (2004)

Title : “‘Home Afar’: the Life of Central European Jewish Refugees in Shanghai During World War II”

Author(s) : Vamos, Peter

Year : 2004

Type : Journal article

Subject : History

Keywords : foreigners;war

Journal : Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae [Hungary]

Volume : 57

Number : 1

Start page : 55

End page : 70

Language:Name : English

Support : Print

Abstract : Following its opening to the West in 1843, Shanghai served as a destination for four waves of Jewish immigration. The first Jews to settle in China were Sephardim from Baghdad who migrated eastward in the second half of the 19th century. The second group consisted of Russian Ashkenazim who escaped the pogroms and the Civil War following the Bolshevik revolution. The third group comprised German and Austrian (and in smaller numbers Hungarian, Czechoslovakian, and Romanian) Jews, numbering over 15,000, who barely escaped the Nazi terror in the late 1930's. The fourth group consisted of about a thousand Polish Jews, including the only complete European Jewish religious school to be saved from Nazi destruction, the Mirrer Yeshiva. The International Settlement in Shanghai seemed a viable option for the desperate refugees, in spite of the fact that the Sino-Japanese War broke out in 1937 and the Japanese, allies of Nazi Germany, occupied parts of the city. Japanese policy toward Jews stated that although Japan should avoid actively embracing Jews who had been expelled by its allies, denying Jews entry would not be in the spirit of the empire's long-standing advocacy of racial equality. As a result, between the fall of 1938 and the winter of 1941 some twenty thousand Jewish refugees arrived in Shanghai. During this period most of the newcomers managed more or less to integrate into Shanghai's economy, but following the outbreak of the war in the Pacific and the Japanese occupation of all sections of Shanghai, the economic situation of the refugees significantly worsened. Morevoer, as stability in Shanghai was the most important priority for the Japanese, on 18 February 1943 the military authorities established a restricted area in the Hongkou distrcit for stateless refugees, where they were confined until the Japanese surrender in August 1945. After the end of the war, when they learned about the Holocaust in Europe, most Jewish refugees did not want to return to their homeland. Many left for the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Latin America, and, after 1948, the newly established state of Israel.