anti-semitism abounds

but in China?

The least surprising generic reaction following the Israeli responses to Hamas’ 7 October attacks are the videos of an anti-Semitic mob in Russia last the weekend. Russian pogroms are tragically as fundamental to Jewish history as the hunger for security.

Vladimir Putin met with leadership of the Russian Orthodox Church a few days before a mob stormed an airport in Dagestan, a small Republic in the Caucusus region within the Russian Federation. As we have discussed over the past year, Putin’s nationalist obsession over Ukraine is intertwined with his close affiliation with those religious leaders. Putin’s variant of ‘Christian nationalism’, in this case Orthodox Nationalism, has always raised the specter of the anti-Semitic waves throughout the centuries.

Dagestan, predominantly Muslim, retained few members of its long-standing Jewish community following the disintegration of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s.. Dagestan is hardly unique as Jews departed many regions of the vast Russian sphere when they could but the vociferous nature of the horde seeking Jews on a plan from Tel Aviv reminds us of the thread of generically blaming Israelis for the woes in the MIddle East. That blame rests on their origins and faith. I fear this is only the beginning in this particular place but hardly in an increasingly anti-Semitic world.

More surprising are reports of an explosion of anti-Semitism online in China. China’s Jewish experiences began centuries ago as the DIsapora spread around the globe to find safety and survival. The Silk Road threading the west, through Central Asia, into a Chinese world beginning at Xi’an, brought merchants from literally hundreds of communities, constituting much of the Chinese interaction with Jews for several centuries.

Small concentrations of Jews living in China were most intriguingly encapsulated in the history of Kaifeng where Sephardic (non-European) Jews intermarried with Chinese to evolve into the Chinese Jews over many hundreds of years. This commercial crossroads attracted the Jews both for trade and the openness of multiple cultures interacting. Judaism is not a proselytizing faith but expanding the population through conversion is not prohibited. The intermarriages and relative isolation allowed the two thousand Jews in this interior city surviving as a community well into the modern era. Kaifeng’s community ultimately succumbed to the changes underway in the twentieth century such as transportation and economic diversification.

China’s reluctant opening to foreigners during the ‘Century of Humiliation’ drew Jews to the western enclaves grafted into the ‘treaty ports’ after 1842. The International Settlement within Shanghai, for example, had a significant Jewish presence, exemplified by the Sassoons. The immigrants departed Baghdad or other Middle Eastern locations before relocating for perhaps a generation in India during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries before joining the British role in China. In addition to Shanghai, Jews contributed to the economic growth of Harbin, along the Russian border, and Guanzhou on the Pearl River Delta north of the burgeoning Hong Kong colony.

The final major influx of Jews resulted from the Russian Revolution as many fled across Siberia to enter the fragmented, volatile China after 1917. Jew sought refugee status in the aforementioned Harbin, a land-locked city embodying the historic interplay between Russia and China. Thousands more, from Russia and elsewhere, moved further south into Shanghai, arguably the most international Jewish safe haven anywhere as Fascist governments began endangering Jews across Europe.

The advent of a Communist China in 1949, however, made Jews less secure yet again. The anti-religious bent of Marxism, even with Chinese characteristics, coincided with the founding of the Jewish state in Israel which led almost all Jews (regardless of their reason for arrival) to depart China. One of the founding analysts of the People’s Liberation Army, the late Ellis Joffe of Hebrew University, was a Shanghai Jew before making Aliyah to Israel as a teenager in the late 1940s.

In sum, after centuries of residence in China in various places, China’s Jews departed almost en masse. It leads to what is the basis to the offensive Chinese explosion of anti-Semitism? Jews are virtually unknown in today’s China, except through state propaganda.

It’s difficult to see why anti-Semitism is roiling the Chinese web but evidence is that the Party enables these hateful actions. While censors watch for, then immediately act upon anti-CCP themes, they constantly and diligently monitor all social media activity. The censors, as state agents, reinforce and advance the aims of the vast state media. And that media currently supports attacks on Jews and Israel to advance China’s goals of appealing to the Islamic world. China wants to undermine Israel’s role in the region and as a partner of the United States.

What are China’s and Xi’s goals here? Does China have inherently more coincident interests with the Palestians? No, it does not. China abhors terrorism, fearing any of it at home destabilising the PRC.

Instead, it’s a matter of convenience. Xi Jinping wants to have his cake and eat it, too. Xi seeks to assert China rather than the United States can ameliorate events in the Middle East, avowing his willingness to serve as peacemaker. Xi craves the credibility and respect, always respect, that he anticipates by showing China’s peaceful intentions as so many nations publicly decry Beijing’s genuine intentions.

This is a dangerous game. China will continue unleashing anti-Semitic stories stoking the nationalist fervour we have seen under Xi Jinping. There is no straight-lining where this MIddle Eastern conflict will go. Chinese interests could well fall prey to currently unseen forces as the shifting dynamics evolve. Additionally, China fears passion which can turn on the regime.

Anti-Semitism was already dramatically rising after the global financial crisis of 2008. Attacks on Jewish sites and individuals occur all-too-regularly around Europe and the United States. It is so dangerous because it targets the most fundamental of any human’s beliefs and identity. It isn’t better that we are seeing increased Islamophobia, either. We are broken in the twenty-first century as words lead to violence which is a trend we have seen repeatedly.

Thank you for reading Actions Create Consequences. I welcome your thoughts—especially solutions.

Be well and be safe. FIN

Chinese Jewish Institute, ‘Chinese Jews’, retrieved 31 October 2023 at https://www.chinesejews.com/kaifeng-jews

Emily Olson, ‘Hundreds stormed an airport in Russia’s Dagestan, Looking for Passengers from Israel’, nprnews.org, 30 October 2023, retrieved 31 October 2023 at https://www.npr.org/2023/10/30/1209388876/dagestan-airport-riots-israel-palestine

Yaqui Wang, ‘Chinese Social Media Platforms Are Now Awash With Anti-Semitism’, thediplomat.com, 23 October 2023, retrieved on 31 October 2023 at https://thediplomat.com/2023/10/chinese-social-media-platforms-are-now-awash-with-antisemitism/