The tiny apartments that offered shelters for Jewish people in Shanghai

 

Before China’s Sept. 3 Military Parade to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the victory of the Allies in World War II, the Consulate General of Israel in Shanghai released a public video titled “Thank You, Shanghai” to express gratitude to the city for the aid it provided to Jewish refugees fleeing the Holocaust.

Shanghai sheltered almost 30,000 Jewish refugees during World War II, and this is widely known in Israel. More than a hundred books about Shanghai’s Jewish refugee population have been published in Chinese and foreign languages, and there have been countless articles written on the subject. Even during the Cold War, when China and Israel severed ties, Israeli media continued to praise Shanghai’s acceptance of Jews during World War II.
 

In the course of Chinese history, there has never been widespread anti-Semitic sentiment. On the contrary, a series of Chinese governments and party leaders have showed their support for the Jewish people’s suffering and their efforts to achieve ethnic independence. On April, 1920, Sun Yat-sen, leader of the 1911 revolution that established the Republic of China, wrote a letter to Nissim Elias Benjamin Ezra, leader of the Shanghai Zionist Association, praising the endeavors of the Jewish people and expressing his support for the Zionist cause. In 1933, after Hitler came into power, a delegation from the China League for Civil Rights led by Soong Ching-ling went to the Consulate General of Germany to protest against the Nazi’s mistreatment of the Jews. And many Chinese scholars published a series of articles about the suffering that denounced European anti-Semitism.

China, with its culture of inclusiveness, offered a safe haven to Jewish refugees. This tolerant and broad-minded culture enabled Shanghai citizens to live in harmony with Jews.
 

And the Chinese should also express gratitude to the Jews for their support in the Chinese people’s fight to achieve social progress and fend off the Japanese invasion. In his hard times, Sun Yat-sen received protection and aid from Silas Hardoon, a Jewish businessman and well-known public figure in the early 20th century.
 

Those Jewish friends who had participated in Chinese people’s War of Resistance against Japan and joined the Chinese nationality are highly respected. Among the seven foreign Chinese members of the Sixth National Committee of Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) in 1983, five were Jewish.

 

Yin Gang is the research fellow from the Institute of West Asian and African Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.