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IN CORONAVIRUS-STRICKEN CHINA, JEWS ADOPT NEW, HI-TECH WAYS TO WORSHIP

Jewish leaders adapt to serve a small, tight-knit community — under lockdown at home or dispersed around the globe — with virtual activities and modified programming (March 2020)

HE WANTED TO ENCAPSULATE BEIJING’S JEWISH COMMUNITY, COVID-19 COMPLICATED THAT

Jewish community leader and artist, Leon Fenster has created a Beijing Haggadah but will wait for next year to fully debut it. (March 2020)

RABBI HEADS TO CHINA, GETS LOOK AT JEWISH LIFE ABROAD

Rabbis often assume pulpits far from home. Rabbi Sara Rae Perman went 7,300 miles. Weeks ago the Greensburg resident and rabbi emerita of Congregation Emanu-El Israel returned from officiating high holiday services and a b’nai mitzvah ceremony in Shanghai, China. (November 2019)

TEENS IN TOKYO - APJ TEEN SHABBATON

The Jewish Community in Tokyo (JCJ) was excited to host the November teen shabbaton of Asian Progressive Judaism (The Asian Congregations of the UPJ of Australia, New Zealand and Asia). Eighteen young people (plus their young feeling chaperones) from Beijing, Hong Kong, Hiroshima, Shanghai and Tokyo came together to celebrate and experience both Tokyo and the diversity of teen Jewish life in Asia. (November 2019)

A TORAH FINDS A NEW HOME — AND INVIGORATES A CONGREGATION — IN SHANGHAI

Smuggled to Brazil from Germany in 1939, the scroll was donated to Kehilat Shanghai and used during Rosh Hashanah services in the former Ohel Moishe synagogue. (September 2015)

THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE JEWS FROM SHANGHAI

A small but important trail of refugees fleeing the Nazis took an unusual detour through China. A new exhibit in Brooklyn marks the journey.

KEHILAT SHANGHAI: A VITAL REFOTM JEWISH PRESENCE FROM CHINA TO NORTH AMERICA

Welcome to Kehilat Shanghai where seeing Israel, Mexico, Brazil and China in the same paragraph (read: same room) is normative. Add North America, the U.K., France, South Africa, and the list goes on. Only five years old, Kehilat Shanghai, among the newest members of the WUPJ, is the only liberal presence in Shanghai, China, home to approximately 3,000 Jews.

A LOOK AT JEWISH LIFE LATELY IN SHANGHAI, CHINA

Kehilat Shanghai, the dynamic Progressive congregation located in China’s largest city, has been a hub of many activities lately, catering to a wide variety of ages and interests.

JEWISH LIFE IN SHANGHAI’S GHETTO

While much of the city’s Jewish Quarter has disappeared in the years since the end of World War II, the Ohel Moshe Synagogue is a constant reminder of how this Chinese city saved tens of thousands of Jews fleeing the Holocaust.

SHANGHAI’S FORGOTTEN JEWISH PAST

In the 1930s and 40s, the Chinese city hosted a large, vibrant community of refugees fleeing persecution in Europe. Can survivors, rabbis, and historians preserve this heritage?

REFUGE IN SHANGHAI (1938-1953), JDC ARCHIVES

The Nazi “Anschluss,” the annexation of Austria by Germany in March 1938, touched off a great tide of refugee migration to Shanghai, and some 17,000 residents of Central Europe streamed to the city from 1938-1939.

JEWISH REFUGEE MUSEUM

There's not loads to see in this former synagogue, but if you're interested in the lives of the 30,000 Jewish refugees who settled in Shanghai before and during the Second World War, this is the place to go.

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