A lot of horrible stuff happened but apparently not all was horrible see below.
Fukui: Port city remembers arrival of Jewish refugees | The Japan News (yomiuri.co.jp)
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It would appear these people are from Germany, Austria, Poland and Lithuania, who were able to buy passage from Lithuania after its Soviet takeover in 1940, with exit visas from the Soviets (who would just as soon these jews were out of the way), the visas coming from a ‘rogue’ Japanese diplomat in Lithuania and the Dutch in Curacao. They’d take the train to Vladivostok and then to Japan, then (mostly) to the US.
The Soviets would only allow train passage if the ticket were paid for in US dollars (handy for trade.). The money mostly came from US Jewish aid groups. Once the Jews reached Vladivostok, the Soviets stole most of their belongings and money, and dumped them on ships bound for Japan.
More money from US Jewish Aid societies - in the time before December 1941 - paid for upkeep of Jews in Japan (who arrived with basically nothing.). Just before then, the Japanese deported those who were not already gone to other destinations to Shanghai for the duration. Then the Japanese seized Shanghai after December 7th, and by a convoluted route, the Jews in Shanghai were able to get money to survive from US Jewish aid groups. (For reasons that are not clear to me, the US State Department didn’t block this, even though they blocked any such aid to Jews in Europe.)
So, as with everything else, its complicated… A good article (which concentrates on Polish Jews)
https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/polish-jews-in-lithuania-escape-to-japan
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I have found a Japanese person who used to sign visas to help Jews travel through Japanese territory who is the rouge diplomat in @xfilesfc answer.
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I’ve been to Shanghai and when my parents and I were there, we were taken around the old Jewish areas from the refugees who lived there and formed a community there. Our guide showed us all the key sights including the Synagogue there. It was a truly eye opening tour and we learned a lot. Definitely never knew before that Japan had taken in Jews in Shanghai.
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was that before japan declared war on the allies or did they take jews throughout their warring years (from 1937-1945)?
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The Shanghai ghetto was formed in early 1943 but Jews had been emigrating to Shanghai since the 1930’s…
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