Hi Chaim,
thanks for the answer to my comment about Japan. I completely disagree with you on the matter, but do agree with you that issues pertaining to Japan-related issues are not what unites us at JTF. As far as your answer, I wasn't commenting on Japan's behavior of 60 years ago, which was, of course, deplorable and was significantly contributing to the Holocaust, but I am not certain, more so than that of Britain's.
My comment was, however, Japan of today. Besides, I believe that your comments may hurt our movement in the future - even in JTF a lot of people disagree with you, do you really think a lot of people would agree with you outside of JTF. So, why make a very controversial statement on the non-important to our movement issues - this is, politically, very shortsighted and amateurish.
As far as 1.5 Billion Asian who have ill-fillings towards Japanese - do I really care what Malaysian/Indonesian muslims or Chinese or North Korean communist feel? The Chinese and North Korean, NOW, - not 60 years ago, help our mortal enemies in Iran and other Muslim countries with technology which is designed to obliterate Israel.
But even if we are talking about Japanese 60 years ago, and I am not talking about Chiune Sugiharo, of blessed memory, who lost everything, by acting against his own government policies, to save thousands of Jews. Let's take an example of an extremist Kwantun army which often acted against the Japanese government and who was guilty of many war crimes, including the rape of Nankin - no Jews were ill-treated under its control.
The nazis were appalled by Japanese attrocities?! Please, give me break! Here is a real nazi - a colonel and Gestapo chief Josef Meisinger (the 'Butcher of Warsaw') who, in 1941, tried to influence Japanese to exterminate or enslave approximately 18,000–20,000 Jews who had escaped from Austria and Germany and who were living in Japanese-occupied Shanghai. His proposals included the creation of a concentration camp on Chongming Island in the delta of the Yangtze or starvation on freighters off the coast of China. The Japanese admiral who ran Shanghai would not yield to pressure from Meisinger.
Colonel Norihiro Yasue calmed the violent antisemitism of White Russians, who were known to attack, kidnap or murder Russian Jews. Jews entering and residing in Japan, China, and Manchukuo were treated the same as other foreigners and, in one instance, Japanese officials in Harbin ignored a formal complaint by the German consulate which was deeply insulted by one of the Russian-Jewish newspapers' attack on Hitler.
During the six months following the Five Minister's Conference, lax restrictions for entering the International Settlement, such as the requirement for no visa or papers of any kind, allowed 15,000 Jewish refugees to be admitted to the Japanese sector in Shanghai. Japanese policy declared that Jews entering and residing in Japan, China, and Manchukuo would be treated the same as other foreigners.
From 1943, Jews in Shanghai shared a "Designated Area for Stateless Refugees" of 40 blocks along with 100,000 Chinese residents. Most Jews fared as well, often better than other Shanghai residents.
Again, I don't condone Japanese atrocities in WWII, but we are talking about today, and today Japanese are good people, who deserve our simpathy much more than mentioned by you 1.5 Billion modern Asians. You want my sympathy? - Stop helping Iran and other muslimes.
I have to admit - I admire Japanese. I can only wish and hope that Jews would be more like Japanese - we must learn from them. Israel, besides being a much safer an a more pleasant place to live, would have annexed Sinai and there wouldn't be any talk of surrendering our Holly land and you'd be in the cabinet. I can only dream, can't I?