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Burkini v Bikini

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-37082637

BBC
NEWS

France Corsica brawl: Mayor bans burkinis amid tensions

15 August 2016
 From the section Europe

Police could be seen holding back protesters in the Lupino area of Bastia on Sunday

A village mayor in Corsica has banned full-body swimsuits known as "burkinis" after a beach brawl between families of North African descent and local youths.

The ban was imposed at a special council session on Sunday in Sisco amid tensions over the brawl, in which five people were hurt.

Authorities in Cannes and Villeneuve-Loubet, on the French Riviera, also banned Islamic burkinis this month.

Witnesses say hatchets and harpoons were used in the Sisco beach brawl.
The five injured on Saturday were later discharged from hospital, but tensions are simmering in the area.

Tension has grown this summer between local communities and Muslims of North African origin in the south of France, especially following the massacre of 85 people by a lorry driver on the seafront at Nice on 14 July.

Women's rights minister Laurence Rossignol warned that the debate over burkinis was being used for "ulterior motives", especially by the far right. While denouncing the burkini as "profoundly archaic", she said that in order to combat such outdated ideas, politicians had to maintain their composure. "I don't want our society being ignited by these subjects."

A woman in a burkini on a French beach: There is heated debate about such costumes

But Sisco Mayor Ange-Pierre Vivoni was adamant his decision was "nothing to do with racism, it's about protecting people's security". Corsica was "sitting on a powder-keg", he said. The ban, which he had considered for some time, was not against Muslims but aimed at protecting people of North African descent as much as anyone else.

The mayors who imposed burkini bans in Cannes and Villeneuve-Loubet are both in the right-wing Republicans (LR) party, while Mr Vivoni is, like the women's rights minister, a Socialist.
On Sunday a crowd of more than 200 Corsicans tried to march on a housing estate - Lupino - on the southern edge of Bastia, but were blocked by police. The Muslim families of North African origin were believed to be from Lupino.

There were scuffles with police, and some in the crowd chanted "This is our home!", France's Le Monde daily reported (in French). Finally the crowd dispersed.

'Hatchets and harpoons'

The justice authorities have launched an investigation to determine exactly what happened on the beach.

Witnesses say the brawl began after the Muslim families objected to photos being taken by a tourist. When a local teenager, with a group of friends on the beach, also took a photo the brawl erupted. Stones and bottles were thrown. "It wasn't the burkini that started the row," the mayor told French radio. Soon about 40 men from Sisco arrived to defend the youths, witnesses said, and one of the men was slashed with a harpoon blade.

According to Le Figaro newspaper (in French), some of the older men in the bathing party had attacked the teenagers with hatchets. Villagers allegedly then set alight cars belonging to the bathers.

France has a deep-rooted tradition of secularism, making the wearing of religious symbols in public spaces controversial. Islamic headscarves are banned from French schools and niqabs (full-face veils) and burkas (full-body veils) cannot be worn in public.

The head of Corsica's regional executive, Gilles Simeoni, has appealed for calm.

At the end of last month, an outlawed Corsican paramilitary group warned Islamist militants against targeting their island.

Mr Vivoni told France Info radio on Monday that the atmosphere in his community was tense and he appealed for the situation to calm down. "There's a fear but I assure everyone that the community is well protected and in any case I think here we're 'protected from retaliation', so to speak."

A court in Nice has upheld the Cannes ban but a religious group, Collective Against Islamophobia in France (CCIF), has said it will take the case to France's highest administrative court.

A French court in Nice has upheld the ban on burkinis imposed by the mayor of Cannes.

The court said the ruling was legal but many religious groups were outraged.

The Collective Against Islamophobia in France (CCIF) said it would appeal against the decision in France's highest administrative court.

Authorities in Cannes and nearby villages voted to ban full-body swimsuits or burkinis from the end of July.

The court said the ban was legal under a law which prohibits people neglecting common rules on "relations between public authorities and private individuals" on the basis of religion.

The judge noted the ban came "in the context of the state of emergency and recent Islamist attacks, notably in Nice a month ago".

But CCIF lawyer Sefen Guez Guez, said he would lodge an appeal with the Council of State, the highest administrative body in France. "This decision opens the door to a ban on all religious symbols in the public space," he added.

France is on high alert following a series of incidents including July's truck attack in nearby Nice.
Anyone caught breaking the new rule could face a fine of €38 (£33). They will first be asked to change into another swimming costume or leave the beach.

Nobody has been apprehended for wearing a burkini in Cannes since the edict came into force at the end of July.

This is not the first time that women's clothing has been restricted in France. In 2011 it became the first country in Europe to ban the full-face Islamic veil, known as the burka, as well as the partial face covering, the niqab.

Earlier this week a private waterpark near Marseille cancelled a burkini-only day after being subjected to criticism.

The mayor of Cannes in France has banned full-body swimsuits, or "burkinis", from the French city's beaches.

David Lisnar issued the ordinance on the grounds that burkinis, which are popular with Muslim women, "could risk disrupting public order while France was the target of terrorist attacks".

He also said burkinis were a "symbol of Islamic extremism" which are "not respectful of [the] good morals and secularism" upon which the French state was founded.

Muslim women from around the world have been quick to react to news of the ban.

"This is just an Islamophobic attack on Muslim women in Cannes," Aysha Ziauddin, who lives in Norfolk, told the BBC.

"The burkini allows me the freedom to swim and go on the beach, and I don't feel I am compromising my beliefs for that.

"No-one has ever told me to wear it - it's my own choice.

"How is a woman on a beach swimming in a wetsuit with her head covered a symbol of Islamic extremism?

"Even Nigella Lawson wore one!"

"I own a burkini and I love it," Sabrina Akram told the BBC. She grew up in Pakistan, and now lives in the US state of Massachusetts.

"I am a practising Muslim, and I believe there should be a choice," she said.

"I honestly don't like exposing my body in public, and I like to work fashion into my preferences on how I wish to clothe myself.

"A big part of being in a modern society, part of living in freedom, is allowing people to live their life how they want to live it.

"By putting forward this ban [the mayor of Cannes] is infringing upon a human's basic right to live how they wish to.

"It's not the responsibility of a public servant to dictate how I choose to cover my body."

"I don't have a burkini, but I do swim wearing a headscarf, tracksuit bottoms and long T-shirt," Kerry Amr told the BBC. Kerry, who lives in the town of Telford in the west of England, converted to Islam eight years ago, and although she chooses not to wear a burkini, she believes women should be free to choose what to wear when they go to the beach. "I think [the ban is] slightly ridiculous," she said.

"In Victorian times swimmers would wear long baggy trousers, full tops and swimming caps and no-one blinked an eye! "I fail to see how a woman wishing to cover her body with a particular style of costume whilst swimming can possibly be a symbol of Islamic extremism. "I accept that there are some horrendously psychotic people out there proclaiming to be fighting on behalf of one group or another. "However, what a woman chooses to wear on a public beach is not going to make the slightest bit of difference, and just hands ammunition to those who want to... recruit to their twisted ideology."

Maryam Ouiles, from Gloucester, told the BBC she wears the burkini so she can play with her children at the pool and at the beach. "I think it's outrageous that you would effectively be asked to uncover some flesh or leave," she said. "When did it become a crime to cover yourself? "People are always complaining that Muslims should integrate more, but when we join you for a swim that's not right either. "Why is it necessary for us to show off our bodies when we don't want to?"

On this day in 1947 India gains Independence from British rule after near 190 years of Crown rule and joins the Commonwealth of Nations.

http://www.newindianexpress.com/nation/Our-resolve-is-to-turn-Swaraj-into-Surajya-PM-Modi/2016/08/15/article3580752.ece

'Swaraj' versus 'Surajya'

THE NEW INDIAN EXPRESS

Our resolve is to turn 'Swaraj' into 'Surajya': PM Modi

By ANI Published: 15th August 2016 10:03 AM Last Updated: 15th August 2016 10:07 AM

NEW DELHI: On the occasion of 70th Independence Day, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday said the government’s resolve is to turn ‘Swaraj’ (self-rule) into ‘Surajya’ (good rule), adding that it resolved to fulfil the dream of ‘Ek Bharat, Sresth Bharat’.

“Today on this special day, I convey my greetings to 125 crore Indians and the Indian community living overseas. May this energy guide the nation to scale newer heights of progress in the years to come. We remember Mahatma Gandhi, Sardar Patel, Pandit Nehru, countless people who sacrificed their lives so that we attained Swarajya,” Prime Minister Modi said while addressing the nation from the ramparts of the Red Fort here in the national capital.

Prime Minister Modi said India's age is not 70 years, but the journey post colonial rule for a better India is 70-year old.

“From the Vedas to Vivekananda, we have a long history. India is an ancient country with a rich cultural heritage. It is because of our great freedom fighters who laid their live that we are independent,” he added.

He said it was an opportunity to renew and resolve the energy to take the country to new heights.

“Yes, we face several problems. But we are capable to overcome them. The onus is on 125 crore people of India to convert this 'Swaraj' (self-rule) into 'Surajya' (good rule). We will fulfil the dream of ‘Ek Bharat, Sresth Bharat’,” he added.

The Prime Minister said it is easy to keep account of the work done by the government, but it is difficult to have in-depth knowledge of those initiatives.

“From Panchayat to Parliament and from Village Head to the Prime Minister…everybody should understand their responsibilities. Today, more than Karya, I want to talk about Karya Sanskriti on the government,” he added.

He said the meaning of ‘Surajya’ is a qualitative and positive change in the lives of the citizen of India.

“Today I am not talking only about Niyati (policies), but also about Neeyat (intentions). 'Surajya' means a government should be sensitive towards the common man, weaker sections. For this, one needs to give importance to good governance, accountability and transparency in any government is paramount,” he added.

The Prime Minister was received by Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar, Minister of State (MoS) for Defence Dr. Subhash Bhamre, Defence Secretary G. Mohan Kumar and General Officer Commanding (GOC) Delhi area Lt General Vijay Singh.

He inspected the Guard of Honour in the company of Wing Commander K. Srinivas after which he unfurled the national flag.

Limbo

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/14/child-refugees-in-limbo-in-calais-because-of-home-office-delays?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Tweet

The Guardian

Child refugees in limbo in Calais 'because of Home Office delays'
Labour MP Yvette Cooper has written to the home secretary about the plight of child refugees at risk in French camps

Around 20 of the estimated 88,000 unaccompanied child refugees in Europe have so far arrived in the UK, a tiny figure that has prompted harsh criticism.

Jessica Elgot
Sunday 14 August 2016 19.22 BST Last modified on Monday 15 August 2016 01.52 BST
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Hundreds of child refugees have been unacceptably left in limbo in Calais camps by Home Office delays, despite having the legal right to be reunited with families in the UK, Yvette Cooper, the Labour MP, has written in a letter to the home secretary, Amber Rudd.

Just 40 children and teenagers have been been allowed into the UK to be reunited with their families under the EU’s Dublin regulation, with charities identifying more than 200 still waiting in the camps. Only 35 of those are understood to have cases in progress, taken up by different voluntary organisations with the Home Office.

Cooper said the Home Office was given details last month of 110 children and teenagers still in Calais, who have Dublin rights to be reunited with their families in the UK. No action had been taken on their cases, Cooper said.

“At the current rate of progress it would take over a year to reunite every child with their family,” Cooper wrote. “Even when Britain has agreed to the ‘take charge’ request and agreed they can join their family here, there are disgraceful further bureaucratic delays as the children and teenagers are left to wait at risk in the Calais camp for many more weeks before they are finally transferred.”

Another 200 children in the camps in Calais are eligible for sanctuary in Britain under the Dubs amendment to bring child refugees to the UK, brought about by Labour peer Alf Dubs, formerly a child refugee himself.

His amendment in the House of Lords brought a U-turn on the Immigration Act, committing the government to relocate lone child refugees in Europe “as soon as possible”. Though no figure was given, ministers briefed that several thousand were expected to come to Britain.

Around 20 of the estimated 88,000 unaccompanied child refugees in Europe have so far arrived in the UK, a tiny figure that has prompted harsh criticism.

In the letter, Cooper called on Rudd to speed up the process of sanctuary for child refugees, whom she said were at “dangerous risk of trafficking, abuse, exploitation and slavery”.

The letter read: “Right now the government is failing children both under the Dublin agreement and the Dubs commitment. Neither the British nor the French government have put in place a proper process to deal with the Dublin cases in Calais and instead seem to be deliberately adding delays to the work done by charities.”

The 40 children and teenagers from the camps in Calais who have so far been reunited with family in the UK under the Dublin agreement have only arrived as a result of legal cases taken by Citizens UK and and other charities, rather than proactively by the British and French governments, Cooper said.

In her letter, Cooper called for child protection procedures to be immediately applied in the cases where the requests had been agreed, “when with each day that goes by these children and teenagers are at continued risk of abuse, sexual exploitation, trafficking, psychological trauma and disease in the Calais camp”.

Charities working in Calais have also identified a further 200 child refugees who do not have family anywhere in Europe and would be eligible for sanctuary in Britain under the Dubs amendment.

Child refugees at risk of sexual abuse and trafficking in government-run camps in Greece must also be offered sanctuary in Britain, Cooper said. An Observer investigation found children as young as seven had been sexually assaulted in official European refugee camps, according to volunteers working in the camp, including in a former Softex toilet roll factory on the outskirts of Thessaloniki.

The concerns over safety in the camps were raised by Cooper directly with the Home Office in her letter. “Given the concerns I and others have repeatedly raised about lone child refugees in camps and on the street in Greece, where the children’s homes are full and the authorities are struggling to cope, why has there not been urgent UK action to help?”

A Home Office spokesperson said that more than 30 children had been accepted for transfer to the UK under the Dubs amendment, the majority of whom had already arrived in the UK.

“We are consulting with local authorities to confirm available capacity and to ensure appropriate support systems are in place,” the Home Office said in a statement. “We are also in active discussions with the UNHCR and the Italian, Greek and French governments to strengthen and speed up mechanisms to identify, assess and transfer unaccompanied refugee children to the UK and ensure this in their best interests.

“This is in addition to supporting unaccompanied asylum-seeking children who arrive from Europe. Last year there were over 3,000 claims for asylum in the UK by unaccompanied children.”

The Home Office said it had made “significant progress in improving and speeding up the existing processes via Dublin especially since the beginning of the year” and added that as long as someone seeking asylum elsewhere in the EU can demonstrate they have close family members legally in the UK, the Home Office would take responsibility for their claim.

Survival sex

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/13/child-refugees-sexually-assaulted-at-official-greek-camps

The Observer

Refugees

‘Sexual assaults on children’ at Greek refugee camps

Charities claim youngsters and women are too afraid to leave tents after dark at government-run camps

Mark Townsend
@townsendmark
Saturday 13 August 2016 15.11 BST Last modified on Saturday 13 August 2016 23.15 BST

Children as young as seven have been sexually assaulted in official European refugee camps, the Observer has been told. The claims come as testimony emerges suggesting that some camps are so unsafe that youngsters are too terrified to leave their tents at night.

Charities and human rights groups allege that children stranded in supposedly safe camps in Greece that were built to deal with Europe’s migration crisis – many of whom are likely to be eligible to claim asylum in the UK – have been sexually abused.

In one government-run camp, in a former Softex toilet roll factory on the outskirts of Thessaloniki, aid organisations claim that the level of risk of sexual attack is so acute that women are too afraid to visit the camp toilets alone at night.

Yvette Cooper MP, chairwoman of Labour’s refugee taskforce, said the revelations “should shame us all” and called for immediate action to protect vulnerable children.

A series of government camps were built near Thessaloniki after the informal one at Idomeni, near the Macedonian border, was closed in May. Weeks earlier, the European commission had unveiled an extra £71m of humanitarian funding for emergency projects to help the 57,000 refugees stranded in official government camps throughout Greece.

One volunteer serving at the Softex camp, which holds 1,400 mostly Syrian refugees, alleged that some young girls had been effectively groomed by male gangs. He said an Iraqi family had to be moved to emergency accommodation outside the camp after their daughter was attacked.

“The parents are still in disbelief over what happened. A man from one of the ‘mafia’ groups asked their seven-year-old daughter into their tent to play games on his phone and then zipped up the tent. She came back with marks on her arms and neck. Later the girl described how she was sexually abused. It has scarred a seven-year-old child for life,” said the volunteer, who asked to remain anonymous.

Family members, he said, were so demoralised they were planning to abandon their dream of resettling in Europe and return to the country they had fled.

Leader of the Lib Dems Tim Farron joined calls for the British government to honour its pledges by immediately rescuing vulnerable minors who are eligible to be in the UK, saying: “If Theresa May does not act now, she will not only be shaming her government but shaming the country.”

Anita Dullard of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said there had been a rise in incidents of sexual violence in Greece’s refugee camps and that they had alerted the government.

She said they had been forwarding alleged incidents of sexual violence against women and children to the UN.

Anna Chiara Nava of Médecins Sans Frontières in Thessaloniki confirmed that they had heard allegations of children being victims of sexual violence. Nava said they were in regular contact with at least 10 women from the Softex camp who had complained of sexual violence and explained that many occupants, including children, were too afraid to speak out.

“It’s really hard for the unaccompanied minors – 16- and 17-years-olds – to survive. It’s the survival of the fittest in there. In the evening and night it’s impossible to find them [children] because they are hiding in the tents. The women are afraid. They complain that during the night and evening they cannot go to the toilet alone. They have all heard of reports of others being attacked,,” said Nava.

The office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees confirmed it had raised concerns with the Greek authorities. It said: “It is an issue when it comes to Softex and others. UNHCR has been raising concerns about this, specifically about this issue [sexual violence], saying that we don’t think it will be safe for women and for children. We’ve raised the issue of security again and again. This is a problem; it’s under discussion.”

The government coordinator for the refugee crisis, Giorgos Kyritsis, said: “Softex is the camp with the most cases of small criminal behaviour but there was not any case of rape reported to the camp’s staff.”

Of the people in Softex, 60% are believed to be Syrian, of whom around 170 are thought to be children.

A pressing issue for the British government is determining how many of the children are eligible to claim asylum in the UK. Under a clause in the EU’s Dublin regulation covering asylum claims, refugees who have close family members in a particular country can claim asylum there. In the refugee camp at Calais, for instance, 150 minors out of 600 are eligible. In addition, the government promised three months ago to house unaccompanied minors stranded in Greece, Italy and France under the Dublin amendment, with charities under the impression that homes would be found for several thousand.

Despite this, around 20 of the estimated 88,000 unaccompanied child refugees in Europe have so far arrived into the UK under the scheme, prompting fierce criticism.

Cooper said: “The UK government needs to urgently wake up to its responsibility. Parliament passed the amendment exactly because we were worried about child refugees being exploited, trafficked and sexually abused because other countries were overwhelmed with the scale of the problem.”


http://freedomfund.org/wp-content/uploads/Lebanon-Report-FINAL-8April16.pdf

Acknowledgement

We are grateful and humbled by the time and willingness that women, men and children showed in accepting to share their experience with us. We would also like to thank individuals and organisations working on the Syrian refugees crisis for taking time from their busy schedules to share their knowledge and analysis.

Dr Katharine Jones
Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations, Coventry University Contact:

Katharine.Jones@Coventry.ac.uk

Leena Ksaifi
Independent Consultant and Director of The George Ksaifi Organization Contact: l.ksaifi@tgko.org

Executive Summary

Since it began in 2011, the conflict in Syria has devastated the lives of millions of men, women and children. Fearing violence and persecution, families have fled their homes to seek safety in other countries in the region and around the globe. Many crossed the border into neighbouring Lebanon. Few would have expected to find themselves forced into slavery.

While there are a large number of organisations in Lebanon providing services and support to Syrian refugees, including Palestinian Syrians, efforts to curb the growing incidence of slavery and human trafficking are often uncoordinated, limited in their focus and do not always target those most at risk.

This report sets out a pathway to deliver tangible and lasting change. It examines the different ways in which slavery is occurring among Syrian refugees in Lebanon and the multiple factors that combine to force people into situations of slavery. Addressing these risk factors will require the commitment of a broad range of stakeholders, including the Lebanese government, international governments, international organisations, NGOs and donors.

Lebanon, which borders Syria to the west, has been at the front line in responding to the humanitarian
crisis that has unfolded over the past five years. Given the extensive social, economic and
historical ties between the countries, the Lebanese government initially operated an ‘open door’ policy for those fleeing the conflict.

Today, one in five people in Lebanon is a refugee from Syria. With more than 1.2 million refugees living within its borders, no other country in the world hosts more refugees on a per capita basis. Such an influx has, however, placed significant stress on the country.

As a consequence, the Lebanese government has taken steps to effectively close its borders and,
in May 2015, instructed the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to stop registering new refugees from Syria. It has established a sponsorship system to limit the numbers arriving from Syria and has imposed stringent residency renewal regulations. This has left Syrian refugees open to detention and deportation for entering, working and staying in Lebanon without the correct paperwork.

These policies have simply exacerbated an already dire humanitarian crisis for Syrian refugees, manyof whom live in abject poverty. With no opportunity to work legally, and with children unable to go to school, refugees are forced into desperate situations to simply survive.

Syrian refugees often find themselves working in hard, dangerous or exploitative jobs for little or
no money. However, with the ever-present risk of detection and deportation, families are increasingly sending their children out to work, as they can pass more freely through the security check points operated by Lebanese authorities.

Our study found that slavery of Syrian refugees in Lebanon is a rapidly growing concern, which manifests in the following ways:

• Child labour has increased significantly in Lebanon since the start of the conflict in Syria. One leading NGO estimated that between 60 and 70 percent of Syrian refugee children are working, with child labour rates even higher in the Bekaa Valley. There is strong demand among Lebanese employers for child workers and many are pressed into the worst forms of child labour.
• Syrian refugee girls are increasingly forced into early marriages, especially in Bekaa Valley, Akkar (north Lebanon). While the family’s decision is commonly made to secure the girl’s economic future, there is a genuine risk that entering a marriage at such a vulnerable age could result in slavery.
• Evidence strongly suggests that ‘survival sex’ and sexual exploitation is a growing issue for Syrian and Palestinian Syrian female refugees. Women can be forced or coerced into prostitution or providing ‘sexual favours’ to order to provide food and shelter for their families.
• Forced labour is increasingly common as Syrian refugees become more desperate, so much so that it may even constitute the ‘new norm’. With surging prices for food and rent, coupled with the heavy costs associated with residency renewals, refugee families can quickly fall into debt. This leaves them even more vulnerable to exploitation.
• Despite highly sensational media coverage, we did not find any evidence of organ trafficking. Further, despite several high profile arrests by Lebanese authorities, our study did not find evidence of the facilitation of Syrian refugees across the border into Lebanon for the purpose of exploitation.

Slavery and human trafficking should never be condoned or accepted as ‘the norm’. However,
unless we act decisively, this is the grave risk facing Syrian refugees in Lebanon. Without significant and determined intervention, the situation will only worsen.

This report provides a set of targeted and integrated recommendations to counter slavery and human trafficking of Syrian refugees in Lebanon.

The starting point is to ensure that Syrians fleeing conflict and persecution are properly recognised in Lebanon as refugees, that they can legally work and their children can go to school. It is also vital that tackling slavery and human trafficking is a shared priority among every organisation with a responsibility to assist Syrian refugees in the country.

There is a paucity of data currently being collected to document slavery and trafficking of Syrian refugees in Lebanon. It is imperative that we improve data collection systems so that reliable information is available to guide the development of effective interventions.

By taking concerted steps to address the factors that contribute to slavery and human trafficking, Lebanon will be better placed to manage the prolonged humanitarian crisis. It will also develop institutions, laws and policies that are more closely aligned with international human rights standards. This will deliver benefits for everyone within its borders and make it an example to other countries responding to the current refugee crisis.

Extracts from the final report:

“Child marriage is done as a coping strategy. But not only for financial security; also because they perceive the threat of their daughter getting raped if single. The threat comes from living in an environment of abandoned buildings and in tented settlements.” Beirut-based journalist

Slavery in marriage

Many marriages involving children will not amount to slavery, especially those between couples aged 16 to 18 years. However, child marriage can obscure what are actually cases of slavery or slavery-like practices.

Child marriage can be referred to as slavery if the following three elements are present:

The child has not genuinely given their free and

informed consent to enter the marriage;

The child is subjected to control and a sense of

“ownership” in the marriage itself, particularly through abuse and threats, and is exploited by being forced to undertake domestic chores within the marital home or labour outside it, and/or engage in non-consensual sexual relations;

The child cannot realistically leave or end the marriage, potentially leading to a lifetime of slavery.

One Lebanese NGO reported it was aware of two cases of child marriage that had been an entry point to the sex industry. Both marriages were arranged because the family needed money to pay rent and enrol children in school. However, the men who married the young girls paid for neither. Instead, they took the girls to a compound where they joined more than 20 women working in the sex industry.

Given the growing number of early marriages, it is vital that Syrian refugee families are aware of the potential serious risks to child brides.

Sexual exploitation of Syrian refugee women

“There is a pimp who is a powerful man with political connections ... who will provide Syrian refugees with a place to stay in. If they can’t pay up, he will suggest sexual slavery or to sell drugs ... Houses there used to cost around US$200 max. This pimp could charge around US$700 for rent.”
Director, Beirut-based NGO working with Syrian refugees

“I know a Syrian man around 35 years old that pimp around five women for example, that are usually 19-23 years old. You can call him, he then will send you a driver that will pick the customer up and take him to the house where the girl is.” Syrian male refugee

Refugee women and girls in all parts of the world face a heightened risk of gender-based and sexual violence during emergency humanitarian situations, both at the time they flee their homes and after they have settled into their new living environment.

The situation facing Syrian and Palestinian Syrian refugee women in Lebanon is no different. We heard from many different sources that their precarious situation makes them vulnerable to different forms of sexual exploitation.

One interviewee told us that some Syrian women are being trafficked into the sex industry in Beirut, Tripoli, Daher el Ein and Bekaa by Syrian men. However, in 2015, the Lebanese Internal Security Force only identified 19 alleged female victims of sex trafficking, down from the 40 to 50 identified cases in 2012 and 2013.

Without reliable data, it is difficult to determine the full extent to which Syrian refugee women are being sexually trafficked or held in sexual slavery. However, our study collected evidence which strongly suggests that sexual exploitation, including through the use of force and coercion, is a growing issue for Syrian and Palestinian Syrian refugees in Lebanon. We heard that Syrian and Lebanese men were playing the role of pimps.

Representatives from international organisations and international NGOs told us that the dire financial circumstances facing Syrian refugee women led some to engage in ‘survival sex’ to earn money for themselves and their families. Depending on their working arrangements, these women can earn between anywhere between US$13 - US$450 per client.

However, we know little about the level of coercion that may be imposed on Syrian refugee women to engage in survival sex, whether they are able to negotiate the terms and conditions under which they might agree to sell sex, or whether they are likely to end up in an increasingly exploitative situation.

We also heard that Syrian refugee women may be coerced into providing ‘sexual favours’ in return for rent, food or employment. In these cases, the perpetrator is commonly the woman’s landlord or shawish, who might broker a ‘deal’ or himself be the recipient.33 Especially disturbingly, such ‘deals’ may involve the coercion and exploitation of children.

In recent years, the Lebanese government has begun to make progress in tackling cases of sex trafficking, some of which has been achieved in partnership with NGOs.

An anti-trafficking law was adopted in 2011, and the IOM and Lebanese NGOs have delivered training to judicial officials and to Internal Security Force and General Security officials.34 Public awareness campaigns have also been run, including distributing information booklets at Beirut airport.

However, more needs to be done to support and inform Syrian and Palestinian Syrian refugees. 

Despite a Memorandum of Understanding between IOM and UNHCR on identifying and protecting victims of trafficking, almost no anti-trafficking activities have been specifically developed for the refugee population in Lebanon.

Further, while there are a number of interventions targeting sexual and gender-based violence among Syrian refugees, we did not find any interventions specifically designed to counter exploitation in the sex industry. More needs to be done to address this growing problem.

Inside Lebanon’s ‘super nightclubs’

Lebanon’s ‘high end’ sex industry, which includes around 130 ‘super night clubs’, has long been a destination for migrant women from Eastern Europe, Russia and Ukraine who arrive in the country on an ‘artist visa’. Many migrant workers are severely exploited, including being deceived about the nature of the job and having their passports confiscated by the club owner on arrival.35 Some NGOs suspect that an increasing number of Syrian refugee women are joining the industry, helping to fill the gap left by a reduction in the number of ‘artist visas’ being issued for Eastern European, Russian and Ukrainian women. However, no reliable evidence has so far been collected to confirm that this is the case.

“It’s not that they are always standing on the streets. For example, if she comes to work at someone’s house to even get the job she may have to do sexual favours and then to keep the job she may have to get her 13 year old child involved.” ” Lebanese municipality official

http://avezink.livejournal.com/26762.html

From:

Impressions of Shanghai in 1934. Essay by a Russian journalist from Paris.

A taxi girl earns about 2 dollars (12 francs) a day and shares a rented room with two or three girlfriends. Meals are included in the rent, but she needs something to wear. So she is hard-pressed to accept gifts, even though these gifts create obligations and lead to consequences. This occupation is horrid not only because it is immoral, but because the only exit strategy is hope for a miracle. This job is empty and dull, and the monotonous merrymaking takes place in the middle of the depraved marketplace where greedy Europeans are trying to strip China naked and greedy Chinese are trying to grab some money from the Europeans. A Russian woman’s destiny is sad: her misery is laid bare for all the nations to see. Nothing is more depressing to a Russian eye than these entertainment palaces.

How many Russian dancers are there in Shanghai? They say there are many hundreds, but perhaps this is an exaggeration. How many Russians are there total? Even this information varies. The official count is about 10,000, but the real number seems closer to 12,000 or 13,000 or even 15,000. In any case, the number is growing, especially in the last few months. Aside from the steady flow from Manchuria, some have been moving here from Europe.

Russian immigration to Shanghai started relatively late. Harbin Russians have been relocating to Shanghai in waves. The first wave was about six years ago, when the Chinese in Manchuria started to make friends with Bolsheviks; then Russians fled from the Soviet oppression on the East China Railroad. Now people are fleeing Harbin afraid of the impending war and the new order.

http://www.indiana.edu/~psource/PDF/Archive%20Articles/Fall2013/2013%20-%20Fall%20-%206%20-%20Wang,%20Haochen.pdf

FROM: Citizens of No State: Daily Life of Shanghai White Russians, 1920s-1930s

HAOCHEN WANG

The Russian Revolution was an event that affected every segment of Russian society. In terms of their social composition, the refugees were spread out among every social class. A small elites segment was composed of affluent aristocrats, officials, clergy, military officers, landowners, merchants, professionals, intellectuals, and bourgeoisie.11 The vast majority, however, were impoverished White soldiers blindly following their superiors’ orders to retreat to China, and peasants escaping from famine and farm collectivization in the early 1920s.12 Besides ethnic Slavs, a num- ber of Ukrainians, Poles, and Jews also joined the exodus.13

A large number of Russian refugees arrived by sea. In December 1922, Shanghai residents were amazed by the unexpected arrival of an odd fleet, or more specifically, a motley collection of warships, mail ships, tugs, and icebreakers.14 Most of the fourteen vessels were small and battered, with some on the brink of disintegration.15 When John Powell, an American journalist, boarded one of the warships, he encountered a crowd of ill-fed and ill-clothed refugees and found the deck “literally jammed with household equipment, ranging all the way from pots and pans to baby cribs.”16 It was later learned that the flotilla had set sail from Vladivostok. Right before the port fell to the hands of besieging Bolsheviks, Admiral Oskar Victorovich Stark, the flotilla commander, had gathered all available vessels and had evacuated the soldiers, sailors and their families, and civilians who remained loyal to Czar Nicholas II. The voyage was arduous and several ships sank during a storm.17 Other refugees followed a different but equally grueling land route, entering China through the northwestern Xinjiang region and trekking across the immense and barren Gobi Desert.18

Refugees chose Shanghai as their final destination for several reasons. The primary reason was that the city was known for its status as a free port, allowing free entry even for those who did not possess a passport or visa.19 However, the challenges were formidable even for those who made it to Shanghai. Upon their arrival, most refugees were desperately hungry and ragged, with the most urgent task being to feed, clothe, and find proper accommodation for them. In response, the Russian Emigrants Committee (REC) was established as the semi-official executive center for Russian refugees20 under the leadership of Viktor Fedorovich Grosse, a diplomat sent to Shanghai by Imperial Russia in 1911 and a prominent member of the Russian émigré community.21 Grosse was a reasonably competent administrator; however, due to scarce financial and human resources, the REC offered only limited assistance, to the great disappointment of the refugees. The League of Nations, the predecessor to the United Nations, dispatched a commission to investigate the living conditions of war refugees and to collect donations. After conducting a survey among White Russians, the commissioners concluded that the only feasible solutions would be repatriation or emigra- tion. Few, however, wished to return to Russia out of fear of possible persecution, and the Soviet government outright denied any possibility of repatriation for those who desired to return.22 Additionally, most of them were too poor to pay for the transportation costs and almost all nations were reluctant to accept them.23 

Thus, their fate as stateless citizens was virtually sealed. In addition to the loss of their citizenship, a considerable number of expatriates were unable to secure a decent job due to their inability to speak English, the “lingua franca of the foreign community.”24 In general, Republican Shanghai was dominated by a rigid hierarchical system in which prejudice and distrust of foreigners persisted in the various émigré groups. For example, when a well-paid position was available, the Shanghai Municipal Council (SMC) and British firms were only willing to consider British people who were born and educated in England due to the engrained belief that British people who were brought up in Shanghai would inevitably be contaminated by the negative traits of the Chinese, and that therefore their integrity and honesty were to be doubted.25

As a result, many White Russians faced bleak prospects in the job markets and subsequently entered into the low-paid, unskilled workforce. Some veterans worked as dockworkers, janitors, guards, chauffeurs, watchmen, or bodyguards for Chinese dignitaries due to their strong physique and military experience.26 Others, especially women, found less physically demanding job at cafés, cabarets, and dance halls serving as musicians, waiters, waitresses, and dancers.27 In order to support themselves and their families, some desperate females engaged in prostitution, either voluntarily or because they were forced by unscrupulous traffickers. By the 1930s, approximately 8,000 Russians worked in the sex industry.28

One 1929 police report tells the poignant story of a Russian woman by the name of Mary Kuksova and offers a glimpse into the harsh realities that many Russian émigrés faced. Originally from Vladivostok, Kuksova was hired as a nurse by a Russian family and came to Shanghai in 1917. Two years later she was allegedly raped by her master. After that, she took refuge in a shelter and gave birth to her child there. As her social status fell, she was forced to work as a dancer in several cafés and bars, eventually contracting an unspecified disease. Eventually, her health rap- idly declined to a point where she was sent to a country hospital in an unconscious state. When the Shanghai Munici- pal Police (SMP) informed Grosse, he said that he could not do anything for Kuksova except buy her a steamer ticket to have her sent away from Shanghai.29

The presence of the White Russians, especially the beggars and prostitutes among them, became a nuisance to the tranquility of other foreigners in the community. More important, they challenged the foreigners’ entrenched ideology of white superiority, which claimed that Westerners were morally and intellectually superior to the Chinese. The foreign community, therefore, felt entitled to a higher and more prestigious status. The very sight of Caucasian vagrants begging side by side with Chinese ones unsettled and alarmed other foreigners, who regarded them as the parasites who undermined the established social order and ought to be eliminated. As a result, the White Russian was collectively regarded as “emotional, untrustworthy and usually drunk.”30 The hostility felt towards some was some- times unfairly directed against the entire community of White Russians.31

Nonetheless, some organizations did make a genuine effort to help lift Russian émigrés out of their misery. One of these attempts to relieve the oversupply of labor and the chronic unemployment in the community can be found in a 1929 SMP file. According to the report, forty White Russian artisans departed for Brazil on April 6. They were masons and carpenters hired by a Brazilian company to construct a railway. Their contracts and trips were ar- ranged by a representative from the League of Nations and coordinated by the REC. Funds from League of Nations temporarily covered their travel expenses, which were deducted from their own salaries once they started working.32 The file also contained a letter from Grosse to the secretary of the Shanghai Municipal Council in which he explained the recruitment and selection process of prospective workers. It is curious to note that the employment opportunities in Brazil attracted a considerable number of White Russian workers. Although only forty craftsmen were eventually selected, the first day of recruitment attracted more than two hundred applicants.33 The chaotic political and social conditions in contemporary Shanghai were a likely reason for the abnormally high number of applicants.

Despite poverty, discrimination, and language barriers, many Russian expatriates displayed a remarkable degree of determination and resilience. As time passed, some émigrés managed to achieve upward social mobility through personal effort and initiative. This trend was illustrated by the experiences of Gregory Potapoff, a cadet who followed Admiral Stark to Shanghai at the age of eighteen. The SMC housed Potapoff and his fellow cadets in a park shortly after their arrival. One day he met a Russian woman and expressed his desire of finding a job, with the woman replying that there was a vacant assistant position in her husband’s construction firm. He applied for the job and was hired. Later on, Potapoff rose to a prestigious position in the SMC, enjoying a handsome wage, a decent house, and a group of Chinese servants.34 

Similarly, many expatriates reached white-collar position, while highly educated and skilled Russians found their niches in various positions, often working as physicians, professors, lawyers, journalists, and engineers.35 For example, Georgi Sapojnikov, a talented caricaturist, reached the prestigious position of cartoonist for the North China Daily News. A man endowed with the “gift of reducing the complexities of Chinese politics to a single image and of capturing the ebullient, chaotic nature of Shanghai without sentimentality or cynicism,” Sapojnikov worked for the newspaper for more than two decades.36 

In a predominately patriarchal society, educated women possessing practical skills found occupations that were respectable, if not well-paid, including shop assistant, school teacher, governess, nurse, milliner, or hairdresser.37

Following in the footsteps of Potapoff, other White Russians accumulated enough wealth through hard work and prudent investment to enjoy a prosperous and middle-class lifestyle. According to contemporary newspaper ac- counts, Russian émigrés participated in a surprisingly wide range of business and industry, including but not limited to clothing stores (both ready-made and made-to-order), shoe stores, haberdashery, furriers, hair salons, grocery stores, bakeries, dairy sales, butchery, confectionary, brewing, distilling, pharmacy, music shops, and tanning.38 By doing so, they brought “an elegant European atmosphere”39 to Shanghai. Some also worked as skilled carpenters, stonemasons, goldsmiths, cobblers, printers, watchmakers, locksmiths, barbers, mechanics, and painters.40 

The ingenuity and entre- preneurship of Russian artisans was warmly lauded by the North China Daily News:

Russians made jam, salted vegetables and fruits, smoked fish, sausages; by their own special method they salt and smoke ham ... Russians draw ikons, make wax-candles, wafers and all the other neces- sary paraphernalia of the Orthodox church; they hew their own gravestones and monuments, have their own funeral bureaux, are famed in the field of floriculture, maintain hospitals for animals ... in short there is no breach of any artisan or factory labour in which Russians have not made use of their knowledge, experience and energy.41

Most extraordinarily, Russian craftsmen and factory owners usually lacked enough capital, thereby forcing them to use more primitive and crude methods of manufacturing than the foreign companies with which they competed. These foreign companies possessed efficient and advanced production and distribution systems. Nonetheless, the Russians continued to “struggle on, and if they do not actually conquer the competition, they would live off of their business- es.”42

From a cultural perspective, the 1930s “became a rich period”43 for the White Russians. Once settled, the Whites took a special interest in celebrating and promoting their proud heritage, thereby enriching Shanghai culture through various channels. A wide variety of popular art clubs, ranging from ballets and orchestras to jazz and dramas, were founded.44 The literary activities were quite vigorous as well, thanks to the large number of poets and novelists.45 By 1937, Shanghai had become one of the largest publication centers of Russian books, newspapers, pamphlets, and textbooks, surpassing both Paris and Berlin. Additionally, religion became a crucial way to preserve their traditions and forge a sense of unity and belonging among an otherwise loose social group. The grand and magnificent Orthodox churches, once constructed, provided landmarks across Shanghai that served as essential meeting grounds for local Russian immigrants. Some deeply devout Russians found consolation from Orthodoxy and saw it as a powerful shield against the pains of homesickness and a crucial bond that reinforced cultural uniformity and knitted together the social fabric of the White Russian community.46 John Powell noted the rich religious lives of White Russians:

I do not think I ever visited a Russian home without seeing at least one sacred ikon, and often there would be one in every room and usually with a small incense burner and oil lamp attached which was kept burning. Almost the entire foreign community turned out to observe the colorful Russian services at Christmas and Easter.47

In general, White Russians shaped Republican Shanghai history in remarkable ways. In spite of financial hardship, deep trauma originating from dislocation, and the enduring humiliation of low social status and discrimina- tory treatment, the refugees not only survived but also prospered, revealing their astonishing tenacity and flexibility. Today, a visitor to Shanghai will find few physical relics of the White Russians except for the remains of the graceful Orthodox churches and a monument featuring the bust of Pushkin. The rest was destroyed either by the Sino-Japanese war or the Cultural Revolution.48 Nevertheless, based upon scrutiny of the vigorous social, economic, and cultural lives enjoyed by the expatriate community, it can be safely concluded that the White Russians did leave a long-lasting mark and bestowed an indelible legacy upon the city that once accepted and sheltered them.

11 Tatiana Schaufuss, “The White Russian Refugees,” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 203, (May 1939): 45. 12 Ibid.

13 Ristaino, Port of Last Resort, 74-81.

14 Ibid., 39.

15 “The Russian Ships at Woosung,” North China Herald, December 16, 1922.

16 Powell, My Twenty-five Years in China, 57.

17 Ristaino, Port of Last Resort, 39.

18 “Origin and Future of the Local Russian Community,” Shanghai Sunday Times, July 19, 1936. 19 Powell, My Twenty-five Years in China, 58.

20 Marcia R. Ristaino, “White Russian and Jewish Refugees in Shanghai, 1920-44, As Recorded in the Shanghai Municipal Police Files, Na- tional Archives, Washington, DC.,” Republican China 16, no. 1 (November 1990): 54.

21 Ristaino, Port of Last Resort, 37.

22 Schaufuss, “The White Russian Refugees,” 47.

23 “Origin and Future of the Local Russian Community,” Shanghai Sunday Times, July 19, 1936.

24 Marie-Claire Bergere, Shanghai: China’s Gateway to Modernity, trans. Janet Lloyd (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2009), 86. 25 Sergeant, Shanghai, 156.

26 Nicolas R. Clifford, Spoilt Children of Empire: Westerners in Shanghai and the Chinese Revolution of the 1920s (Hanover, New Hampshire: University Press of New England, 1991), 41.

27 Stella Dong, Shanghai: The Rise and Fall of a Decadent City (New York: HarperCollins, 2000), 132.

28 Gail Hershatter, “The Hierarchy of Shanghai Prostitution, 1870-1949,” Modern China 15, no. 4 (October 1989): 473.

29 D. S. Ovsiannikoff, “Report on Miss Mary Kuksova,” September 24, 1929, SMP, reel 79, File D-522.

30 Harriet Sergeant, Shanghai (London: Jonathan Cape, 1991), 39.

31 Ristaino, Port of Last Resort, 15.

32 D. I. Robertson, “Report on Russians Leaving for Brazil,” September 13, 1929, SMP, reel 57, File D-195. 33 Viktor Grosse to S. M. Edwards, Shanghai, April 26, 1929, in SMP, reel 57, File D-195.

34 Sergeant, Shanghai, 44-45.

35 Ristaino, Port of Last Resort, 84.

36 Sergeant, Shanghai, 34-35.

37 Ristaino, “White Russian and Jewish Refugees in Shanghai,” 55.

38 “In the Russian Colony: Russian Traders,” North China Daily News, August 9, 1937. 39 Lu, Beyond the Neon Light, 39.

40 “In the Russian Colony: Russian Traders,” North China Daily News, August 9, 1937. 41 Ibid.

42 Ibid.

43 Ristaino, Port of Last Resort, 81.

44 Ibid., 80-81.

45 Ibid., 84.

46 Ristaino, Port of Last Resort, 85.

47 Powell, My Twenty-five Years in China, 60.

48 James Irwin, “The Ghosts of Russia That Haunt Shanghai,” New York Times, September 21, 1999.

On this day in 1937 the Battle of Shanghai begins.

Women give thanks to Chinese soldiers who held out for days against the besieging Imperial Japanese Army after evacuation of the Chapei native quarter in Shanghai during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Southern China, 1937.

Following the Battle of Shanghai in 1937, the city was occupied by the army of Imperial Japan, and the port began to allow entry without visa or passport. By the time when most German Jews arrived, two other Jewish communities had already settled in the city: the wealthy Baghdadi Jews, including the Kadoorie and Sassoon families, and the Russian Jews. The last ones fled the Russian Empire because of anti-Semitic pogroms pushed by the tsarist regime and counter-revolutionary armies as well as the class struggle manifested by the Bolsheviks. They had formed the Russian community in Harbin, then the Russian community in Shanghai.

Many in the Polish-Lithuanian Jewish community were saved by Chiune Sugihara, the Japanese consul in Kaunas, Lithuania. They managed to flee across the vast territory of Russia by train to Vladivostok and then by boat to Kobe in Japan. The refugees in number of 2,185 arrived in Japan from August 1940 to June 1941. Tadeusz Romer, the Polish ambassador in Tokyo, had managed to get transit visas in Japan, asylum visas to Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Burma, immigration certificates to Palestine, and immigrant visas to the United States and some Latin American countries. Finally, Tadeusz Romer arrived in Shanghai on November 1, 1941, to continue the action for Jewish refugees.[1] Among those saved in the Shanghai Ghetto were leaders and students of Mir yeshiva, the only yeshiva in occupied Europe to survive the Holocaust.

Similarly, thousands of Austrian Jews were saved by the Chinese consul-general in Vienna Ho Feng Shan, who issued visas during 1938-1940 against the orders of his superior the Chinese ambassador in Berlin, Chen Jie.

The refugees who managed to purchase tickets for luxurious Italian and Japanese cruise steamships departing from Genoa later described their three-week journey with plenty of food and entertainment — between persecution in Germany and squalid ghetto in Shanghai — as surreal. Some passengers attempted to make unscheduled departures in Egypt, hoping to smuggle themselves into the British Mandate of Palestine.

The first German Jewish refugees — twenty-six families, among them five well-known physicians — had already arrived in Shanghai by November 1933. By the spring of 1934, there were reportedly eighty refugee physicians, surgeons, and dentists in China. On August 15, 1938, the first Jewish refugees from Anschluss Austria arrived by Italian ship. Most of the refugees arrived after Kristallnacht. 

During the refugee flight to Shanghai between November 1938 and June 1941, the total number of arrivals by sea and land has been estimated at 1,374 in 1938; 12,089 in 1939; 1,988 in 1940; and 4,000 in 1941.[2] In 1939-1940, Lloyd Triestino ran a sort of "ferry service" between Italy and Shanghai, bringing in thousands of refugees a month - Germans, Austrians, a few Czechs. Added to this mix were approximately 1,000 Polish Jews in 1941.[3] Among these, all the faculty of the Mir Yeshiva, some 400 in number, who with the outbreak of World War II in 1939, fled from Mir to Vilna and then to Keidan, Lithuania. In late 1940, they obtained visas from Chiune Sugihara, the Japanese consul in Kaunas, to travel from Keidan, then Lithuanian SSR, via Siberia and Vladivostok to Kobe, Japan.[4] By November 1941 the Japanese moved this group and most of others on to the Shanghai Ghetto in order to consolidate the Jews under their control.[5] Finally, a wave of more than 18,000 Ashkenazi Jews from Germany, Austria, and Poland immigrated to Shanghai until the Attack on Pearl Harbor by Japan in December 1941.[6]

The Ohel Moshe Synagogue served as a religious center for the Russian Jewish community since 1907 (currently the Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum, located at 62 Changyang Road, Hongkou District). In April 1941, a modern Ashkenazic Jewish synagogue was built (called the New Synagogue).[7]

Much needed aid was provided by International Committee for European Immigrants (IC), established by Victor Sassoon and Paul Komor, a Hungarian businessman, and Committee for the Assistance of European Jewish Refugees (CFA), founded by Horace Kadoorie, under the direction of Michael Speelman. These organizations prepared the housing in Hongkou, a relatively cheap suburb compared with the Shanghai International Settlement or the Shanghai French Concession. They were accommodated in shabby apartments and six camps in a former school. The Japanese occupiers of Shanghai regarded German Jews as "stateless persons".[8]

In 1943, the occupying Japanese army required these 18,000 Jews to relocate to a 3/4 square mile area of Shanghai's Hongkou district where many lived in group homes called "Heime" or "Little Vienna".[9]

A Jewish girl and her Chinese friends in the Shanghai Ghetto, from the collection of the Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum

Former site of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee

The authorities were unprepared for massive immigration and the arriving refugees faced harsh conditions in the impoverished Hongkou District: 10 per room, near-starvation, disastrous sanitation and scant employment.

The Baghdadis and later the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) provided some assistance with the housing and food problems. Faced with language barriers, extreme poverty, rampant disease and isolation, the refugees were able to make the transition from being supported by welfare agencies to establishing a functioning community. Jewish cultural life flourished: schools were established, newspapers were published, theaters produced plays, sports teams participated in training and competitions, and even cabarets thrived.[10]

After Japanese forces attacked Pearl Harbor, the wealthy Baghdadi Jews (many of whom were British subjects) were interned, and American charitable funds ceased. As communication with the US was broken, unemployment and inflation intensified and times got harder for the refugees.

The JDC liaison Laura Margolis, who came to Shanghai, attempted to stabilize the situation by getting permission from the Japanese authorities to continue her fundraising effort, turning for assistance to the Russian Jews who arrived before 1937 and were exempt from the new restrictions.[11][12]

As World War II intensified, the Nazis stepped up pressure on Japan to hand over the Shanghai Jews. Warren Kozak describes the episode when the Japanese military governor of the city sent for the Jewish community leaders. The delegation included Amshinover rabbi Shimon Sholom Kalish. The Japanese governor was curious and asked "Why do the Germans hate you so much?"

Without hesitation and knowing the fate of his community hung on his answer, Reb Kalish told the translator (in Yiddish): "Zugim weil wir senen orientalim—Tell him [the Germans hate us] because we are Orientals." The governor, whose face had been stern throughout the confrontation, broke into a slight smile. In spite of the military alliance, he did not accede to the German demand and the Shanghai Jews were never handed over.[13]

"Residences, Businesses of City's Stateless Refugess Limited to Restricted Sector". (Shanghai Herald newspaper, February 18, 1943)

According to another rabbi who was present there, Reb Kalish' answer was "They hate us because we are short and dark-haired." Orientalim was not likely to have been said because the word is an Israeli academic term in modern Hebrew, not a word in classical Yiddish or Hebrew.

On November 15, 1942, the idea of a restricted ghetto was approved. On February 18, 1943, the Japanese authorities declared a "Designated Area for Stateless Refugees" and ordered those who arrived after 1937 to move their residences and businesses within it by May 18, three months later. The stateless refugees needed permission from the Japanese to dispose of their property; others needed permission to move into the ghetto.[14] The English version of the order read:

The designated area is bordered on the west by the line connecting Chaoufoong, Muirhead, and Dent Roads; on the east by Yangtzepoo Creek; on the south by the line connecting East Seward, Muirhead, and Wayside Roads; and on the North by the boundary of the International Settlement.[15]

While this area was not walled or surrounded with barbed wire, it was patrolled and a curfew enforced in its precincts. Food was rationed, and everyone needed passes to enter or leave the ghetto.[14]

Polish Jew's passport registration inside the ghetto (1943)

According to Dr. David Kranzler,

Thus, about half of the approximately 16,000 refugees, who had overcome great obstacles and had found a means of livelihood and residence outside the 'designated area' were forced to leave their homes and businesses for a second time and to relocate into a crowded, squalid area of less than one square mile with its own population of an estimated 100,000 Chinese and 8,000 refugees.[16]

Although a few temporary passes were issued to work and to 16 students of St. Francis Xavier College outside the ghetto, these were granted arbitrarily and were severely curtailed after the first year. But the fact that the Chinese did not leave the Hongkou ghetto meant the Jews were not isolated. Nevertheless, economic conditions worsened; psychological adjustment to ghettoization was difficult; the winter of 1943 was severe and hunger was widespread.[17]

The US air raids on Shanghai began in 1944. There were no bomb shelters in Hongkou as the water table was close to the surface. The most devastating raid started on July 17, 1945, and was the first attack on Hongkou. The bombings by the US 7th Air Force continued daily until the Atomic Bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, which ended the air raids.

Refugees in the ghetto, improvised their own shelters, with one family surviving the bombing under a bed with a second mattress on top, mounted on two desks. Thirty-eight refugees and hundreds of Chinese were killed in the 17 July raid.

Some Jews of the Shanghai ghetto took part in the resistance movement. They participated in an underground network to obtain and circulate information and were involved in some minor sabotage and in providing assistance to downed Allied aircrews.[17] In addition, over 90% of the residents were unable to leave the ghetto until after the liberation in August 1945.

The ghetto was officially liberated on September 3, 1945, after some delay to allow Chiang Kai-shek's army to take political credit for the liberation of Shanghai. With the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 and the fall of Chiang Kai-shek in 1949, almost all the Shanghai ghetto Jews left. By 1957, only 100 remained, and today only a few may still live there.[17]

The Government of Israel bestowed the honor of the Righteous Among the Nations to Chiune Sugihara in 1985 and to Ho Feng Shan in 2001.

1. [Krzysztof Kacperek]. "Kanadyjska Fundacja Dziedzictwa Polsko-Żydowskiego - Tadeusza Romera Pomoc Żydom Polskim na Dalekim Wschodzie". Polish-jewish-heritage.org. Retrieved 2011-07-08.
2. "Avraham Altman and Irene Eber. Flight to Shanghai, 1938-1940: The Larger Setting. p.2/32" (PDF). Retrieved 2011-07-0
3. "Anthony Hughes. Sport and Jewish identity in the Shanghai Jewish Community 1938-1949" (PDF). Retrieved 2011-07-08
4. Shanghai Jewish History Archived August 13, 2006, at the Wayback Machine.
5. "Pamela Shatzkes. Kobe: A Japanese haven for Jewish refugees, 1940–1941. Japan Forum, 1469-932X, Volume 3, Issue 2, 1991, pp. 257–273". Informaworld.com. 1970-01-01. Retrieved 2011-07-08.
6. "Return of a Shanghai Jew". Latimes.com. 2006-01-15. Retrieved 2011-07-08.
7. Encyclopedia of Diasporas. Immigrant and Refugee Cultures Around the World. Vol. I, Jewish Diaspora in China by Xu Xin, p.157, Ember, Melvin; Ember, Carol R.; Skoggard, Ian (Eds.), Springer 2004, ISBN 0-306-48321-1. Books.google.pl. Retrieved 2011-07-08.
8. "Péter Vámos. The Life of Central European Jewish Refugees in Shanghai During World War II. University of San Francisco. Pacific Rim Report No. 23, November 2001". Pacificrim.usfca.edu. Retrieved 2011-07-08.
9. "Feature: Former Jewish refugees revisit Shanghai Ark". English.people.com.cn. 2005-11-11. Retrieved 2011-07-08.
10. The Ghosts of Shanghai by Ron Gluckman.
11. Special Tributes. Laura Margolis, Rescuer of Jews A Testimonial by Ernest G. Heppner, Author of Shanghai Refuge: A Memoir of the World War II Jewish Ghetto
12. "Forgotten Heroes of the Holocaust". Kimel.net. Retrieved 2011-07-08.
13. The Rabbi of 84th Street: The Extraordinary Life of Haskel Besser by Warren Kozak (HarperCollins, 2004) ISBN 0-06-051101-X p.177
14. Shanghai Ghetto Shows a Hidden Piece of WWII History By Kimberly Chun (AsianWeek)
15. English decree cited by Exil Shanghai;[19] modern forms of the old street names according to French.[20]
16. Japanese, Nazis and Jews: The Jewish Refugee Community in Shanghai, 1938–1945 by David Kranzler, p.491
17. Voticky, Anka (2010). Knocking on every door. Toronto: The Azrieli Foundation. p. Kindle loc 1299-1317. ISBN 978-1-897470-20-6

Fridays post

Syria speaks

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/aug/11/sales-of-syrian-culture-anthology-soar-after-woman-held-for-reading-it-on-plane

Faizah Shaheen, who was reported to authorities after been seen with a copy of Syria Speaks on a flight to Turkey.

The Guardian

Sales of Syrian culture anthology soar after woman held for reading it on plane
Syria Speaks, which made headlines after it led to a honeymooning airline passenger being questioned under the Terrorism Act, sees surge of interest

Alison Flood
Thursday 11 August 2016 15.09 BST Last modified on Thursday 11 August 2016 15.22 BST

The publisher of a book about Syrian culture that hit the headlines last week, when a British Muslim woman was detained after being seen reading it on a plane, has rushed through a reprint after sales soared.

Syria Speaks, subtitled Art and Culture from the Frontline, was first published by Saqi Books in 2014. But it received renewed attention last week after psychotherapist Faizah Shaheen was seen reading it by a Thomson Airways crew member on a flight to Turkey, and reported for “suspicious behaviour”. On her return from Turkey, where she had been on honeymoon, Shaheen was detained and questioned by police under Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act.

“The story went viral [and] it was quite frantic last week,” said Lynn Gaspard, Saqi’s managing director. Demand for the book, which showcases the work of more than 50 artists and writers, shot up when Shaheen spoke out about what had happened to her. It climbed to around 300th place in Amazon’s charts, and Saqi has now put through a reprint of 1,000 copies. The publisher has also shipped in 450 copies of the book from the US, and 30 from Beirut. According to sales monitor Nielsen BookScan, it was selling between one and five copies a week in previous months.

“We had to bring over all these copies because we’d sold out by last Friday afternoon,” said Gaspard. “I’m so glad people are still reading this book two years on, although I feel so sorry for Faizah … It’s absolutely horrific what happened to her. I totally understand that we need to be vigilant and careful, and that there is a real problem, but come on, people.”

Shaheen herself retweeted a series of comments from Twitter users who said they had ordered the book from shops and libraries in support. “I’ve been humbled by all your support and encouragement. I’m pleased that sharing the story has raised the issues that need to be addressed,” she tweeted on Friday.

“In a time when Syria’s creative output is more accessible than ever, the west should not dismiss it as something threatening or alien. These are the voices that we should be listening to, as we consider Syria’s future,” co-editor of Syria Speaks, Malu Halasa, wrote in the Guardian on Thursday, while Jo Glanville, director of English PEN, wrote in the Independent that “if you want to protest, start by buying a copy of Syria Speaks – and reading it in public”. Glanville previously said in a statement that “the freedom to read any book, no matter the subject, is a fundamental cornerstone of our liberty”, and that “no one should ever be detained or questioned by the police on the basis of the literature they’re reading”.

Gaspard said that the situation in Syria had moved on since the book was published. “Now it is just total chaos and mayhem, but these people [the artists] are still there [and] their voices are being drowned out,” she said. “It’s such a privilege to be associated with this book, to be able to publish it. It’s never about the money, it’s just important to get these voices, to try to bring them to the mainstream.”

Following last week’s events, a contributor to Syria Speaks, Robin Yassin-Kassab, will now also be appearing on 18 August at the Edinburgh international book festival, at a panel on the subject of refuge, migration, banishment, exile and sanctuary. Saqi said it had been “thrilled with the support among authors and readers”.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/aug/04/british-woman-held-after-being-seen-reading-book-about-syria-on-plane

The Guardian

British woman held after being seen reading book about Syria on plane
Faizah Shaheen was detained after a Thomson Airways crew member reported her for suspicious activity on a flight to Turkey

Sian Cain
@siancain
Thursday 4 August 2016 15.34 BST Last modified on Thursday 4 August 2016 22.00 BST

Free-speech groups have condemned the detention of a British Muslim woman after a cabin-crew member reported her for “suspicious behaviour” while reading a book about Syrian culture on a flight to Turkey.

Faizah Shaheen, a psychotherapist in Leeds, was detained by police at Doncaster airport on 25 July, on her return from her honeymoon in Turkey. A Thomson Airways cabin-crew member had reported Shaheen on her outbound flight two weeks earlier, as she was reading the title Syria Speaks: Art and Culture from the Frontline.

Police officers questioned Shaheen for 15 minutes under Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act, under which the police can detain individuals without grounds for suspicion of involvement in criminal activities, including terrorism.

Shaheen, whose work in the NHS includes efforts to stop radicalisation among young mental health patients, told the Independent she intends to make formal complaints against the police: “I was completely innocent – I was made to feel like a culprit … I couldn’t understand how reading a book could cause people to suspect me like this. I told the police that I didn’t think it was right or acceptable. I do question if … it would be different if it was someone who wasn’t Muslim.”

A collection of essays and writings by more than 50 artists on “challenging the culture of violence” in the country, Syria Speaks was published by British imprint Saqi Books in 2014. It received positive reviews from the likes of musician Brian Eno and author AL Kennedy, who described it as “a wise, courageous, imaginative and beautiful response to all that is ugly in human behaviour.”

Jo Glanville, director of English PEN – which supported the book’s publication with a grant towards translation – said Thomson Airways should be “highly embarrassed about this gross act of misjudgment”.

“The current culture of anxiety around extremism now means that even our reading material has become grounds for suspicion of terrorist activity,” she said. “The freedom to read any book, no matter the subject, is a fundamental cornerstone of our liberty.” Glanville also called Schedule 7 a “continuing problem” and said it was overdue for reform.

Zaher Omareen, the co-editor of Syria Speaks, condemned Shaheen’s detention as a “despicable incident”.

“Judging individuals and even taking measures against them based on their race, their looks, their language, or the printed words they carry is unacceptable and unjustifiable,” Omareen said. “It was enough to carry a book which includes the word ‘Syria’ in its title for its owner to be under suspicion as a potential terrorist. I would like to remind the people and the government that Syria must not be reduced to the politicised and power-constructed soundbites carrying simplistic messages of violence and horror.”

In a statement, a Thomson Airways spokesperson said: “Our crew undergo general safety and security awareness training on a regular basis. As part of this they are encouraged to be vigilant and share any information or questions with the relevant authorities. We appreciate that in this instance Ms Shaheen may have felt that overcaution had been exercised. However, like all airlines, our crew are trained to report any concerns they may have as a precaution.”

Lynn Gaspard, the managing director of Saqi Books said: “If Faizah gets in touch, I would be happy to invite her to our bookshop in west London and offer her any of our titles.”

David Walliams in Come Fly with Me

Come Fly with Me is a British mockumentary television comedy series created by and starring Matt Lucas and David Walliams. Narrated by Lindsay Duncan, the series launched on 25 December 2010 on BBC One and BBC One HD. A spoof of British documentaries Airport and Airline, the series follows the activity at a fictional airport and three fictional airlines: FlyLo (a low-cost airline), Our Lady Air (an Irish low-cost airline) and Great British Air (a major international British airline). Lucas and Walliams portray many of the focal airline and airport staff, as well as some passengers, whose comments and experiences are featured in one or more of the series episodes in the style of a "fly-on-the-wall documentary". Despite the BBC announcing a second series, Walliams confirmed in January 2013 that a second series was not going to air.

Come Fly with Me has received mixed reviews, with the Daily Express calling it "the worst sketch show, or sitcom to have ever gone out on a Christmas Day" and expressed concern over its screening on the day, considering the lack of quality. The Daily Mirror, however, claimed it was a resounding success and the claims of racism and lack of humour made by the Express were unfounded. The show was the most-watched comedy of 2010 with 10 million viewers, but also had thousands of viewer complaints, and criticism for perceived racist content.  It was also the third most-watched show in the UK on Christmas Day.

On this day in 1945 Poles in Kraków engage in a pogrom against Jews in the city, killing one and wounding five.

The Kraków pogrom refers to the violent events that occurred on August 11, 1945, in the Soviet-occupied city of Kraków, Poland, which resulted in the shooting death of Róża Berger while standing behind closed doors by security forces, and the wounding of five others. According to the report prepared for Joseph Stalin by the NKVD in Kraków,[1] it was Polish militiamen who sanctioned the violence.[2]

Around 68,000–80,000 Jews lived in Kraków before the September 1939 German invasion of Poland. Because of the Holocaust and further migration following the arrival of the Soviet Red Army only 2,000 prewar inhabitants of the city were still present after January 1945. Many Jewish refugees returned to Kraków from the Soviet Union, including those who came from the neighbouring villages and towns.[3][4]

By May 1945, the number of Jews in the city reached 6,637. The return of the Jewish population was not always welcomed, especially by the anti-Semitic elements in the populace. The safety of the Jewish community in Kraków was becoming a very serious problem according to the Soviet-installed starosta in the city, even though "no serious antisemitic events were recorded in the rural and small-town regions."[5] In his report for 1–10 August, the Kraków city administrator (starosta grodzki) noted the "insufficient supply of food."[6] In June 1945, the new communist voivode of Kraków described growing tensions in his report in the following way:

In regard to the attitudes of the Polish population towards the Jews, the remnants of Nazi influences acquired during the occupation still linger... Robberies combined with murdering Jews occur: the motives and the perpetrators are usually not found. Nevertheless, their anti-Semitic background is apparent...In the previous month there were no serious anti-Jewish events in the voivodeship, yet there is no evidence that society's attitude towards the Jews has changed ... An utterly insignificant event, or the most improbable rumour can trigger serious riots. The populace's attitude towards the Jews is a serious problem requiring a constant vigilance on the side of the authorities, and proper interaction with lower level offices.[3]

On June 27, 1945, a Jewish woman was brought to a local Milicja Obywatelska police station falsely accused of attempting to abduct a child. Despite the fact that the investigation revealed that the mother had left her child in the care of the suspect, rumours started to spread that a Jewish woman abducted a child in order to kill it.[7] A mob shouting anti-Jewish slogans gathered at Kleparski square, but a Milicja detachment brought the situation under control. Blood libel rumours continued to spread. False claims that thirteen corpses of Christian children had been discovered were disseminated. By 11 August, the number of rumoured "victims" had grown to eighty.[7] Groups of hooligans who gathered at Kleparski Square had been throwing stones at the Kupa Synagogue on a weekly basis.[7] On 11 August an attempt to seize a thirteen-year-old boy who was throwing stones at the synagogue was made, but he managed to escape and rushed to the nearby marketplace screaming "Help me, the Jews have tried to kill me".[8] Instantly the crowd broke in into the Kupa synagogue and started beating Jews, who had been praying at the Saturday morning Sabbath service;[9] and the Torah scrolls were burned.[10] The Jewish hostel was also attacked.[10] Jewish men, women and children, were beaten up on the streets; their homes were broken into and robbed.[8] Some Jews wounded during the pogrom were hospitalized and later were beaten in the hospitals again. One of the pogrom victims witnessed:

I was carried to the second precinct of the militia where they called for an ambulance. There were five more people over there, including badly wounded Polish woman. In the ambulance I heard the comments of the escorting soldier and the nurse who spoke about us as Jewish crust whom they have to save, and that they shouldn't be doing this because we murdered children, that all of us should be shot. We were taken to the hospital of St. Lazarus at Kopernika Street. I was first taken to the operating room. After the operation a soldier appeared who said that he will take everybody to jail after the operation. He beat up one of the wounded Jews waiting for an operation. He held us under cocked gun and did not allow us to take a drink of water. A moment later two railroadmen appeared and one said, "It's a scandal that a Pole does not have the civil courage to hit a defenceless person", and he hit a wounded Jew. One of the hospital inmates hit me with a crutch. Women, including nurses, stood behind the doors threatening us that they were only waiting for the operation to be over in order to rip us apart[11]

During the pogrom some Poles, mistaken for Jews, were also attacked.[12] The centre of these events was Miodowa, Starowislna, Przemyska, and Jozefa Streets in the Kazimierz quarter.[13] The riots were most intense between 11am and 1pm, calming down around 2pm, only to regain strength in the late afternoon when the Kupa synagogue was set on fire.[13] Polish policemen and soldiers actively participated in these events.[14] Among twenty-five of those accused of inciting racial hatred, robberies, and violence against Jews, twelve were officers.[14]

There is one record of a death relating to Kraków events in the archives of the Forensic Medicine Department in Kraków. The victim was 56-year-old Auschwitz survivor Róża Berger, shot while standing behind closed doors.[15][16]

Polish historian Anna Cichopek stated in her university master's degree thesis later published as a book[17] that all historical sources confirmed this one death.[18] However, she also noted that in an archival photo of a funeral there were five coffins visible, thus suggesting that there might have been five fatalities; she also claimed in her book that The New York Times in 1946 had noted a death of a man (Anszel Zucker), and Polska Agencja Prasowa noted a death of another unknown woman (in addition to Róża Berger) and five wounded.[18]

Polish historian, Julian Kwiek, who has published existing Polish documents regarding the Kraków event stated that he is not familiar with the documents quoted by Cichopek from outside the scientific literature. He stated that one death is confirmed in all historical sources, therefore it is questionable whether this event truly falls under the definition of a pogrom,[19] even though most other sources refer to the event as such.[8][9][10][11][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] [34]

Another historian, Dariusz Libionka from the Center for Holocaust Research[35] of the Polish Academy of Sciences, suggested that the photos showing the coffins were taken in the Spring (April 24, 1946) of the following year and came from the Kraków funeral of five Jews shot on April 21, 1946 by partisans of Józef Kuraś "Ogień" near Nowy Targ. In many cases – Libionka suggested – it would have been more appropriate if Anna Cichopek relied on existing studies rather than on archival material. He stated, that Polska Agencja Prasowa noted one dead person and five wounded. Libionka questioned the source of information regarding Anszel Zucker's death. According to him it should have been concluded that the Kraków pogrom resulted in one dead and five wounded victims.[36]

1. Pagacz-Moczarska 2004, Alma Mater.
2. Cichopek 2003, p. 226.
3. : a b Cichopek 2003, p. 223.
4. Adam Dylewski, Where the Tailor Was a Poet... website created under the aegis of the Adam Mickiewicz Institute, Warsaw; chief editor: Dr. Piotr M. A. Cywinski. Editorial assistance: Dr. Anna Marta Szczepan-Wojnarska, and Kaja Wieczorek from Jewish Historical Institute, Warsaw
5. Joshua D. Zimmerman, Contested Memories p. 224
6. Joshua D. Zimmerman, ibidem p.224
7. : a b c Cichopek 2003, p. 224.
8. : a b c Marcin Zaremba Psychoza we krwi. Polityka 05.07.2006 reprint in Onet.pl
9. : a b Joanna Beata Michlic (2006). Poland's threatening other : the image of the Jew from 1880 to the present. Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska Press. p. 220. ISBN 0-8032-3240-3. OCLC 62302216.
10. : a b c David Engel (1998). "Patterns Of Anti-Jewish Violence In Poland, 1944-1946" (PDF). Yad Vashem Studies Vol. XXVI (PDF). Jerusalem: Yad Vashem. Retrieved 2007-04-01.p. 32
11. : a b István Deák; Jan Tomasz Gross; Tony Judt (2000). The politics of retribution in Europe : World War II and its aftermath. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press. p. 111. ISBN 0-691-00953-8. OCLC 43840165.
12. Anna Cichopek, Pogrom Żydów w Krakowie, 11 sierpnia 1945 r., Żydowski Instytut Historyczny, 2000, str. 10.
13. : a b Cichopek 2003, p. 233.
14. : a b Cichopek 2003, p. 230.
15. (Polish) Tomasz Konopka "Śmierc na ulicach Krakowa w latach 1945-1947 w materiale archiwalnym krakowskiego Zakladu Medycyny Sadowej" - "Pamięć i Sprawiedliwość", IPN, 2005, nr 2, p. 148
16. (Polish) 11 sierpnia 1945 roku doszło do rozruchów antyżydowskich. Rozruchy w Krakowie nie były tak tragiczne jak rok później w Kielcach, ale nie obyło się bez ofiary śmiertelnej. 56-letnia Róża Berger zginęła od strzału oddanego przez zamknięte drzwi. Sekcja zwłok, oprócz rany postrzałowej, wykazała wiele ran pochodzących od uderzeń rozbitego strzałem zamka. Tomasz Konopka, "Historia Krakowa pisana protokołami sekcyjnymi" available at www.forensic-medicine.pl [1]
17. Książka jest poprawioną i uzupełnioną wersją pracy magisterskiej, pisanej w 1998 roku w Zakładzie Historii i Kultury Żydów w Polsce Uniwesytetu Jagiellońskiego. Serdecznie dziękuję promotorowi prof. Józefowi A. Gierowskiemu i dr. Krzysztofowi Lincz-Lenczowskiemu za naukową opiekę, liczne wskazówki... Anna Cichopek, Pogrom Żydów w Krakowie, 11 sierpnia 1945 r., Żydowski Instytut Historyczny, 2000, str. 10
18. : a b Cichopek 2003, p. 232.
19. Translation of Magdalena Tytuła, Kielce na Kazimierzu, Gazeta Wyborcza (local 'Gazeta w Krakowie'), August 11, 2000, (English)
20. Bozena Szaynok (2005). "The Role of Antisemitism in Postwar Polish-Jewish Relations". Antisemitism And Its Opponents In Modern Poland. Cornell University Press. p. 272. ISBN 0-8014-8969-5. OCLC 57557379.
21. Norman M Naimark (1992). "Revolution and Counterrevolution in Eastern Europe". In Christiane Lemke. The Crisis of Socialism in Europe. Duke University Press. p. 77. ISBN 0-8223-1197-6. OCLC 23462173.
22. From David Engel: "Patterns Of Anti-Jewish Violence In Poland, 1944-1946." The Polish files are located at AAN-MAP 786-90. [2]
23. Paul R. Carlson (2000). "The Eleventh Commandment". Christianity After Auschwitz: Evangelicals Encounter Judaism in the New Millennium. Xlibris. p. 52. ISBN 0-7388-1583-7. OCLC 46665787.
24. Iwona Irwin-Zarecka (1989). "Poland's Jews - A Memory Void". Neutralizing memory : the Jew in contemporary Poland. Transaction Publishers. p. 48. ISBN 0-88738-227-4. OCLC 17841360.
25. Celia Stopnicka Heller (1977). "Epilogue". On the Edge of Destruction: Jews of Poland Between the Two World Wars. Columbia University Press. p. 297. ISBN 0-231-03819-4. OCLC 2778495.
26. Jan T. Gross (2004). "After Auschwitz: The Reality and Meaning of Postwar Antisemitism in Poland". In Jonathan Frankel. Dark times, dire decisions Jews and Communism. Oxford University Press. p. 214. ISBN 1-4237-2223-X. OCLC 61362769.
27. Joseph J Preil (2001). Holocaust testimonies : European survivors and American liberators in New Jersey. Rutgers University Press. p. 102. ISBN 0-8135-2947-6. OCLC 45024375.
28. David M. Crowe (2004). Oskar Schindler:The Untold Account of His Life, Wartime Activities, and the True Story Behind the List. Westview Press. p. 463. ISBN 0-8133-3375-X. OCLC 55679121.
29. Efrayim Dekel (1973). B'riha: Flight to the Homeland. Herzl Press. p. 176. OCLC 658157.
30. Andreas Hofman (1997). "Die polnischen Holocaust-Uberlebenden Zwischen Assimilation und Emigration". In Fritz Bauer. Überlebt und unterwegs: Jüdische displaced persons im nachkriegs Deutschland (in German). Campus Verlag. p. 57. ISBN 3-593-35843-3. OCLC 38499545.
31. Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung (1954). Politische Studien (in German): 310. ISSN 0032-3462. OCLC 56525037. Missing or empty |title= (help)
32. Julian Grzesik (1989). Alija (in Polish). Lublin : [J. Grzesik?]. p. 79. OCLC 24409205.
33. Roland Brockmann; Dieter Luippold; Rainer Eisenschmid (2006). Polen (in German). Mair Dumont Baedeker. p. 347. ISBN 3-8297-1096-8. OCLC 76749833.
34. Tadeusz Lipinski; Hans Duda (1971). Hans Duda und die Askaris (in German). Tel-Aviv: Hamenora. p. 17. OCLC 10180081.
35. (Polish) Centrum Badań nad Zagładą Żydów Instytut Filozofii i Socjologii Polskiej Akademii Nauk [3]
36. (Polish) Dariusz Libionka's opinion about Cichopek's version in Polish Wikipedia
37.