Escape to Manila: From Nazi Tyranny to Japanese Terror by Frank Ephraim

By Frank Ephraim
Foreword by Stanley Karmow

In this book Frank Ephraim, who fled to Manila with his parents, gathers the testimonies of thirty-six refugees. Combining these accounts with historical and archival records, Manila newspapers, and U.S. government documents, Ephraim constructs a detailed account of this little-known chapter of world history. The Jews who escaped to Manila recall the long, dangerous trek from Europe to the Philippines and the elaborate series of permits, visas, and travel tickets it required. They describe the lives they built in Manila upon their arrival and the events surrounding the Japanese invasion. Under the Japanese occupation the Jews, barely settled, were faced afresh with oppression, imprisonment, torture, and death. With the rise of Nazism in the 1930s more than a thousand European Jews sought refuge in the Philippines, joining the small Jewish population of Manila. When the Japanese invaded the islands in 1941, the peaceful existence of the barely settled Jews filled with the kinds of uncertainties and oppression they thought they had left behind. Escape to Manila gathers the testimonies of thirty-six refugees, who describe the difficult journey to Manila, the lives they built there, and the events surrounding the Japanese invasion. Combining these accounts with historical and archival records, Manila newspapers, and U.S. government documents, Frank Ephraim constructs a detailed account of this little-known chapter of world history.

Hardcover: 248 pages
Publisher: University of Illinois Press; 1st Printing edition (August 12, 2003)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 025202845-7
ISBN-13: 978-02-5-202845-8
Product Dimensions: 6 x 1 x 9 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds