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Jews have been present in Asia since the beginning of their history. Some examples of ancient Jewish communities in the Mediterranean and Iran (Persian Jews) and Iraq (Iraqi Jews); the Georgian Jews, Bukharian Jews, and Mountain Jews.

Through the centuries, they also established Jewish communities in eastern parts of Asia. There are some Jews who migrated to India, establishing the Bene Israel, the Baghdadi Jews and the Cochin Jews of India (Jews in India); and the former Jewish community in Kaifeng, China.

Here is a partial list of some prominent Asian Jews, arranged by country. Note that those regions of Asia where Arabic or Russian or Turkish predominate are excluded from this list (except for the Baghdadi Jews from India and Southeast Asia); see Middle Eastern Jews, Ashkenazi Jews and Sephardi Jews for information on these populations.

Armenia

Levon Aronian, Armenian chess player (part Jewish)

Azerbaijan

Misha Black, designer; brother of Max Black
Bella Davidovich, pianist
Gavril Abramovich Ilizarov, Soviet physician, known for inventing the Ilizarov apparatus
Lev Landau, physicist, Nobel Prize (1962). Russian-speaking Ashkenazi.
Lev Nussimbaum, writer (a.k.a. Kurban Said)
Vladimir Rokhlin, mathematician. Russian-speaking Ashkenazi.

Afghanistan

A small community of Jews lived mainly in Herat, Afghanistan and Kabul, but they emigrated to Israel, Europe and the United States. In September 2021, the last remaining Jew in Afghanistan, Zablon Simintov, fled Afghanistan's capital Kabul in response to the Taliban takeover several weeks prior.

China

Morris Cohen, bodyguard of Sun Yat-Sen
Misha Dichter, pianist (China-born)
Israel Epstein, journalist, author
Edmond Fischer, biochemist, Nobel Prize (1992)
Jakob Rosenfeld, doctor and general in the People's Liberation Army
Sidney Shapiro, member of the People's Political Consultative Council
Zhao Yingcheng, (Hebrew: Moshe ben Abram), Ming dynasty mandarin

Georgia

David Baazov, Zionist activist and rabbi
Ioseb Bardanashvili, composer
Roman Dzindzichashvili, American chess player
Yasha Manasherov, Israeli Greco-Roman wrestler
Mikhael Mirilashvili, businessman and philanthropist
Tamir Sapir, businessman and investor
Gocha Tsitsiashvili, Israeli Greco-Roman wrestler

Hong Kong

Ellis, Elly, Lawrence, and Michael Kadoorie, businesspeople
Matthew Nathan, Hong Kong governor (1904)
Victor Sassoon, businessman and hotelier

India

Sarah Avraham, Indian-born Israeli, 2014 women's world Thai kickboxing champion
Joseph Rabban, given copper plates of special grants from the Chera ruler Bhaskara Ravivarman II from Kerala in South India
David Abraham Cheulkar, actor
Nissim Ezekiel, poet
J F R Jacob, former Governor of Punjab and Goa; the Chief of Staff of the Indian Army's Eastern Command
Gerry Judah, artist and designer
Anish Kapoor, sculptor (Baghdadi Jewish mother, Indian father)
Samson Kehimkar, musician
Ezekiel Isaac Malekar, Bene Israel Rabbi
Pearl Padamsee, theatre personality (part Jewish)
David and Simon Reuben, businessmen
Nadira, actress of the 1950s and 1960s.
David Sassoon, businessman
Albert Abdullah David Sassoon (1818 – 24 October 1896), British-Indian merchant^[1]
Sassoon David Sassoon (August 1832 – 23 June 1867), Indian-born British businessman and philanthropist^[2]
Solomon Sopher, Jewish community leader
Eli Ben-Menachem, Indian-born Israeli politician^[3]
Ellis Kadoorie and Elly Kadoorie, philanthropists
Horace Kadoorie, philanthropist
Ruby Myers, Bollywood actress of the 1920s, otherwise known as Sulochana
Lalchanhima Sailo, rabbi
Abraham Barak Salem, Cochin Jew Indian nationalist leader
Bensiyon Songavkar, professional cricketer

Iran/Persia

Sa'ad al-Dawla, (c. 1240 – March 5, 1291), Physician and statesman
David Alliance, British businessman
Mashallah ibn Athari, eighth-century astrologer, astronomer, and mathematician
Moses ben Hanoch, rabbi
Yossi Banai, performer
Soleyman Binafard, wrestler
Sahl ibn Bishr, nine-century astrologer, astronomer, and mathematician
Jimmy Delshad, Californian politician
Roya Hakakian, writer
Moshe Katsav, Israeli president
Rita Kleinstein, Israeli singer/actress, known popularly as "Rita"
Janet Kohan-Sedq, track and field athlete
Masarjawaih,^[4]^[5] physician and translator
Mashallah ibn Athari, astrologer and astronomer
Shaul Mofaz, Israeli Minister of Transportation
Bahar Soomekh, American actress
Soleiman Haim, among first compilers of Persian dictionary

Israel

Japan

Alfred Birnbaum
Dan Calichman
Julie Dreyfus
Rachel Elior
Ofer Feldman, University professor
Péter Frankl, Hungarian mathematician
Shaul Eisenberg, businessman
Martin "Marty" Adam Friedman, rock guitarist
Ayako Fujitani, writer and actress, convert
Szymon Goldberg
David G. Goodman, Japanologist^[6]
Karl Taro Greenfeld, journalist and author
Manfred Gurlitt
Jack Halpern, Israeli linguist, Kanji-scholar
Shifra Horn
Hoshitango Imachi, né Imachi Marcelo Salomon
Chaim Janowski
Max Janowski
Charles Louis Kades
Rena "Rusty" Kanokogi, née Glickman
Abraham Kaufman
Michael Kogan, founder of Taito
Fumiko Kometani, author and artist, convert
Setsuzo (Avraham) Kotsuji, Hebrew professor, convert
Leonid Kreutzer, pianist
Yaacov Liberman
Henryk Lipszyc
Leza Lowitz, American Japanologist
Alan Merrill
Sulamith Messerer
Emmanuel Metter
Albert Mosse
John Nathan
Emil Orlík
Klaus Pringsheim Sr.
Roger Pulvers
Ludwig Riess
Joseph Rosenstock, conductor of the NHK Symphony Orchestra
Jay Rubin^{[citation needed]}
Arie Selinger
Ben-Ami Shillony, Israeli Japanologist
Kurt Singer
Beate Sirota Gordon, former Performing Arts Director of Japan Society and Asia Society
Leo Sirota
Zerach Warhaftig

Refugees, short expatriates

Other related people to Judaism and Jews in Japan

Ambassadors

Eli Cohen

Kazakhstan

Alexander Mashkevich, businessman (Kyrgyz-born)

Singapore

David Marshall, first Chief Minister of Singapore, founder and first chairman of the main opposition party the Workers' Party of Singapore

Sri Lanka

Sidney Abrahams, Chief Justice
Hedi Keuneman, political activist
Anne Ranasinghe, poet
Leonard Woolf, British administrative officer and author, later married author Virginia

Tajikistan

Rena Galibova, actress, "People's Artist of Tajikistan"
Meirkhaim Gavrielov, journalist and political opposition leader
Malika Kalantarova, dancer, "People's Artist of Soviet Union"
Fatima Kuinova, singer, "Merited Artist of the Soviet Union"
Shoista Mullodzhanova, shashmakon singer, "People's Artist of Tajikistan" (viewed as the Queen of Tajik music)
Moses Znaimer, TV producer
Rus Yusupov, designer and tech entrepreneur.

Uzbekistan

Ari Babakhanov, musician
Yefim Bronfman, pianist
Lev Leviev, diamond tycoon
Ilyas Malayev, musician and poet
Shlomo Moussaieff (businessman), Israeli businessman
Shlomo Moussaieff (rabbi), co-founder of the Bukharian Quarter in Jerusalem
Gavriel Mullokandov, shashmakom artist, "People's Artist of Uzbekistan"
Suleiman Yudakov, composer and musician, "People's Artist of the Soviet Union"

References

^ p.862 ^{Palgrave Dictionary}
^ p.865 ^{Palgrave Dictionary}
^ "Knesset Members - Eli Ben-Menachem". Knesset.gov.il. Retrieved 4 December 2015.
^ Richard Gottheil, Max Schloessinger. Masarjawaih. Jewish Encyclopedia
^ Hebrew Union College Annual Vol. 81 (2010), pp. 105-126 (22 pages) Published by: Hebrew Union College Press
^ (ja)