Jews leave France in record numbers.

Parent Cafe
1

http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/22/middleeast/france-israel-jews-immigration/index.html

Isn’t this year 2016, not a year almost a century ago?!

This cnn news reminds me of this history (from wiki):

After the Kristallnacht in 1938, the situation became rapidly more difficult for the almost 200,000 Austrian Jews. The only way for Jews to escape from Nazism was to leave Europe. In order to leave, they had to provide proof of emigration, usually a visa from a foreign nation, or a valid boat ticket. This was difficult, however, because at the 1938 Évian Conference 31 countries (out of a total of 32, which included Canada, Australia, and New Zealand) refused to accept Jewish immigrants. The only country willing to accept Jews was the Dominican Republic, which offered to accept up to 100,000 refugees.[4] Acting against the orders of his superior Chen Jie, the Chinese ambassador to Berlin, Ho started to issue visas to Shanghai, part of which during this time was still under the control of the Republic of China, for humanitarian reasons. 1,200 visas were issued by Ho in the first three months of holding office as Consul-General.[5]

At the time it was not necessary to have a visa to enter Shanghai, but the visas allowed the Jews to leave Austria. Many Jewish families left for Shanghai, whence most of them would later leave for Hong Kong and Australia. Ho continued to issue these visas until he was ordered to return to China in May 1940. The exact number of visas given by Ho to Jewish refugees is unknown. It is known that Ho issued the 200th visa in June 1938, and signed 1906th on October 27, 1938. How many Jews were saved through his actions is unknown, but given that Ho issued nearly 2,000 visas only during his first half year at his post, the number may be in the thousands.

The early life of this person is interesting as well: (If I remember it correctly, it is a religious group which sponsored his education.)

Ho Feng-Shan’s father died when Ho was 7 years old. A diligent and hard-working student, he managed to enter the Yali School in the provincial capital of Changsha and later Yale-in-China University. He went to the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich in 1926 and received his doctorate in political economics in 1932.

2

The numbers are still relatively small. But, changes are happening not just in France or in Europe but across the globe.

3

The mother of a Jewish co-worker of mine was one of those folks who escaped to China from Nazi-occupied Europe.

4

I didn’t know about this; it does my heart good to read about people standing up against evil, especially institutionalized evil (the Evian Conference).

5

My grandmother was French Jewish (or Frew as she jokingly called herself). Thank goodness she left France with my grandfather in the 1920s.

are the recent problems because of fear of terrorist attacks? or a fear of being a member of a minority religion in France?

6

Wow, thanks for posting this. Had no idea about the DR or China in the diaspora.

7

One of my great grandfather’s cousins went to China in the late 1800’s when my GG came here. My mom and I were just talking about this the other day. I never knew it. There is a book or maybe a documentary called the Jews of Harbin.

http://kehilalinks.jewishgen.org/harbin/brief_history.htm

8

I recently read a similar story about Jews in Germany leaving because they no longer feel safe there.

9

There has been a tremendous upsurge in antisemitism in France in recent years. And the French government is not doing nearly enough to keep their Jewish citizens safe, so many feel no choice but to leave. I don’t blame them.

10

I remember hearing about a documentary of the Jews in Shanghai a few years ago. Tried to look it up, but there are many of them! Here is a list of seven:

https://audreyfm.■■■■■■■■■■■■■/2011/03/08/seven-films-about-jewish-refugees-in-shanghai/

Also, very strangely, Putin has put out a call welcoming European Jews to Russia in case they don’t feel safe where they are. Hmmmmmmmmm, uh nope!

11

From what I’ve read, France isn’t insanely tolerant of Jews, dependent on where you are. Many feel intimidated by the wave of young Muslims that have entered and the few who become radicalized (e.g. Charlie Hebdo, Paris Attacks). There has also been a lot of anti-Israel demonstrations in the last two years, which usually turned violent between protestors and Parisian Jews (of which there are a lot). Many have moved to Israel or the United States for security or work, just believing that they were no longer welcome in France. It’s disgusting, but they are overall satisfied when they make aliyot.

12

I’m sorry to say it, but moving to Israel seems like “out of the frying pan, into the fire” to me.

I wonder how difficult it is for them to emigrate to the US?

13

Pope Francis is specifically doing some leadership things to show the world that Catholics stand behind all those in the world struggling with fears due to religion, and recent visits to Jewish assemblies in Rome.

Oh man, Putin is so evil - totally agree with you @greenwitch.

France and England have the potential populations of young Muslims that could be radicalized, and now other European countries as well. We have hot spots in our country too.

There is a very devote core of Jews in Israel, but a huge % of their population is now Atheist or Agnostic (85%) according to Fr Mitch Pacwa on EWTN (and as a Jesuit who has traveled a number of years in Israel and has a beautiful book “The Holy Land, an Armchair Pilgrimage”) I believe him but the numbers seem pretty incredible.

14

I worked in my father’s shop in the early 80s. One of our customers was a gentleman who was one of the Jewish refugees from Germany that made it to Shanghai. Not many people know that China was one of the very few countries that willingly accepted Jewish refugees from Germany.

15

Many of the Jews issued those China visas never went to China and never intended to go. They’d used the visa to leave Europe but traveled through other countries and, gee, just never continued on to China.

Another interesting figure was John Rabe, who was a nazi but living in Nanking. He saved a lot of Chinese and Europeans when the Japanese invaded. There is a good documentary about him on Netflix.

16

North Korea did the same thing to South Koreans right after the Korean War, when things in South Korea weren’t so hunky dory. Many South Koreans lived to regret their decision.

17

I guess when Dr. Ho issued the visa, he knew very well many of them just used the visa to get out of Austria.

A little bit more info about him:

http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/righteous/stories/ho.asp

18

FYI, there was a Japanese diplomat also wrote visas for Jews. Chiune Sugihara issued 6000 visas for Jews in Lithuania.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/24/chiune-sugihara-japanese–jews-holocaust_n_2528666.html

It’s always good to hear of those who tried to stand up to evil against all odds.

19

My grandmother was the only Holocaust survivor in her immediate family. She went to the US with an uncle (I think she was passed off as his kid) with the intention of her family following. It never happened, they were murdered.

I saw this story on CNN and couldn’t bring myself to read it. Listening to politicians even here in the US hint at “marking” people of certain minority religions, I really have to wonder if this is how my ancestors felt in Germany nearly a century ago.

It all just makes me sick.

20

I once met a colleague who immigrated to the US recently. He told me he had been working for some company in Israel for 4-5 years before he immigrated to the US. It seems he did not attend a college (UG or grad school) in the US first.

When I met him, he was in his late 30s, and single and seems to had led a quite lonely life (e.g., no GF, no family except for his sister who took a job as a journalist who was always traveling all over the world.) He adopted a cat. I learned a little of life in Israel from him. (e.g., he thought that some segment of their citizens might not be really very loyal to the country, the country really can not rely on them to help defend the country, and the government had to spend a lot of financial resources to pamper them in the form of welfare or “bribe for political reasons.”.) He is quite a gentle person but he could sometimes say something that is sometimes not very politically correct. I remember one of his sayings: The majority of engineers who grew up and received education in the US are only interested in becoming some kind of managers as soon as they can but are not interested in keeping doing engineering work.)