page_title: History of Jews in China
section_title: World War II
hierarchical_section_title: History of Jews in China / Modern times / World War II
caption_attribution_description: English: Jakob Rosenfeld and Liu Shaoqi (left) and Chen Yi (right) taken at the New Fourth Army Headquarters in Yancheng of Jiangsu, China 中文: 罗生特(中)与刘少奇(左)陈毅(右)合影
context_page_description: Jews and Judaism in China are predominantly composed of Sephardi Jews and their descendants. Other Jewish ethnic divisions are also represented, including Ashkenazi Jews, Mizrahi Jews and a number of converts.
  The Jewish Chinese community manifests a wide range of Jewish cultural traditions, and it also encompasses the full spectrum of Jewish religious observance. Though a small minority, Chinese Jews have had an open presence in the country since the arrival of the first Jewish immigrants during the 8th century CE. Relatively isolated communities of Jews developed through the Tang and Song Dynasties all the way through the Qing Dynasty, most notably the Kaifeng Jews.
  In the 19th and early 20th centuries, Jewish merchants from around the world began to trade in Chinese ports, particularly in the commercial centres of Hong Kong, which was for a time a British colony; Shanghai; and Harbin. In the first half of the 20th century, thousands of Jewish refugees escaping from the 1917 Russian Revolution arrived in China.
context_section_description: Another wave of 18,000 Jews from Germany, Austria, and Poland immigrated to Shanghai in the late 1930s and early 1940s. Shanghai was an open city at the time and it did not have restrictions on immigration, and some Chinese diplomats such as Ho Feng Shan issued "protective" passports and the Japanese diplomat Chiune Sugihara issued transit visas with which refugees could go to Shanghai after a short stay in Japan. In 1943, the occupying Japanese army required these 18,000 Jews, formally known as "stateless refugees," to relocate to an area of 0.75 square miles (1.9 km²) in Shanghai's Hongkew district (today known as the Hongkou District) where many lived in group homes called "Heime". The total number of Jews who entered Shanghai during this period equaled the total number of Jews who fled to Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand and South Africa combined. Many of the Jews in China later moved to found the modern state of Israel.
  Shanghai was an important safe-haven for Jewish refugees during the Holocaust, since it was one of the few places in the world where one didn't need a visa. However, it was not easy to get there. The Japanese, who controlled the city, preferred to look the other way. However, some corrupt officials also exploited the plight of the Jews. By 1941, nearly 20,000 European Jews had found shelter there.
  Notable Jews during the Second Sino-Japanese War include Dr. Jakob Rosenfeld, Stanisław Flato, Ruth Weiss, Eva Sandberg (photographer and wife of Communist leader Xiao San), and Morris Abraham Cohen.
  Late in the war, Nazi representatives pressured the Japanese army to devise a plan to exterminate Shanghai's Jewish population, and this pressure eventually became known to the Jewish community's leadership. However, the Japanese had no intention of further provoking the anger of the Allies after their already notorious invasion of China and their additional invasion of a number of other Asian nations, so they delayed the German request until the War ended. With the intercession of the Amshenower Rebbe and the translation skills of Leo (Ariyeh) Hanin, the Japanese ultimately kept the Jews of Shanghai safe.
  In general, in the period from 1845 to 1945, more than 40,000 Jews came to China to do business or in search of a safe haven.
caption: Jakob Rosenfeld, a doctor for the New Fourth Army, between Liu Shaoqi (left) and Chen Yi (right).
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