Application for Permit

Due to its own interests, Japan did not accept “Shanghai’s Final Solution” completely. However, Japanese militarists conducted all kinds of persecution to the Jewish people. Japanese authorities announced the establishment of “isolated residential area for stateless refugees”, forcing all the European Jewish refugees to move into the area. Thus, their quiet life, which was obtained a minute ago, fell into chaos again. They lost personal freedom and need a “passport” to enter or leave the isolated area. It was not an easy thing to get a “passport”. The picture is the scene in which the Jewish people lined up to apply their “passports”.

Oil painting, Application for Permit (Photo Credit: CC – BY Zhang Ping, Chinese Jewish Cultural Foundation)

Ghoya, the Japanese head of Hongkew Ghetto (and self-described “King of the Jews”), distributing passes to the refugees who earned their living outside the ghetto (Photo Credit: CC – BY Beth Hatefutsoth, The Nahum Goldmann Museum of the Jewish Disapora ed., Passage Through China, The Jewish Communities of Harbin, Tientsin and Shanghai)

Special thanks to Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum for providing the sources of literature and photo on this topic. Further contact with Chinese Jewish Cultural Foundation (CJCF) via email:postmaster@cjcf.org.cn‍.