Talk:History of the Jews in Finland

Protection

Could someone please explain why this page is semi-protected? There is no history of vandalism here. --JJay 00:04, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Someone kept changing the external links to read "Jewry in Finland," which violates Wikipedia:No personal attacks.--Gephart 16:17, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

• Jewry is a standard term for the jewish community [1]. Please try to be better informed before accusing others of "personal attacks". --JJay 17:54, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Copyright violation

The original version of this page, created by Freddieandthedreamers was copied and pasted straight from http://virtual.finland.fi/netcomm/news/showarticle.asp?intNWSAID=26476

Here is the current version of the wikipedia article, with the copyvio text in bold:

The History of the Jews in Finland began when the Jews first settled in the Kingdom of Sweden-Finland in the 18th century, during the tolerant reign of King Gustavus III. They were allowed to reside in a few towns in Swedish parts of the kingdom, such as Marstrand, Stockholm, Gothenburg, Norrköping and Karlskrona, but not in the Finnish part. The ancestors of the Jews of Finland came to Finnish towns, which were then under Russian rule, at the end of the 18th century. The first Jew said to have settled on Finnish soil was Jacob Weikam, later Veikkanen, in 1782, in the town of Hamina which was by then already under Russian rule. During the period of Finnish autonomy (1809-1917) more Russian Jews established themselves in Finland as tradesmen and craftsmen. As Jews were in principle prohibited from dwelling in Finland, almost all these Jews were retired soldiers from the Imperial Russian army. Being cantonists, forced into the Russian army in childhood, they were required to serve at least 25 years. After their term expired, they had, however, the right to remain in Finland regardless of Finnish ban on Jewish settlement, a right forcefully defended by the Russian military authorities. It was only after Finland became independent that Jews were granted full rights as Finnish citizens. That was in 1918, when they were given the right to obtain Finnish citizenship.

During the Continuation War (1941-1944), in which Finland fought alongside Nazi Germany, Finnish Jews were not persecuted, and even among extremists of the Finnish Right they were tolerated, as many leaders of the movement came from the clergy. Many Finnish Jews fought in the War alongside the German Army. The field synagogue operated by the Finnish army was probably a unique phenomenon in Europe. (See external links for more information). Approximately five hundred Jewish refugees arrived in Finland, though about three hundred and fifty moved on to other countries. About forty of the remaining Jewish refugees were sent for work service in Salla in Lapland in March 1942. The work and conditions were difficult (they were made to work until their fingers bled and did not have clothing sufficient for the very cold conditions) and they were exposed to German troops. The refugees were moved to Kemijärvi in June and eventually to Suursaari island in the Gulf of Finland. It was believed that here they would not be able to have easy contact with influential Finnish Jews. In November 1942, eight foreign Jewish refugees were handed over to Nazi Germany[1], a fact for which Finnish prime minister Paavo Lipponen issued an official apology in 2000.[2]

Approximately 2600-2800 prisoners of war were exchanged for 2100 Finnish prisoners of war with Germany. About 2000 of them joined the Wehrmacht, but among the rest there were about 500 political officers or politically dangerous persons, who most likely perished in concentration camps. Based on the a list of names, there were about 70 Jews among the extradited, though they were not extradited based on religion.

The number of Jews in Finland in 2006 is approximately 1,300. The Jews in Finland are best regarded as a religious minority and cultural minority, because ethnically and linguistically they are a heterogeneous group. The Jews are well integrated into Finnish society and are represented in nearly all sectors of it. Their educational level is high. The Jews, in common with Finland's other traditional minorities, as well as immigrant groups, are represented on the Advisory Board for Ethnic Relations (ETNO). In contrast to some other countries, such as Germany and Hungary, the Jews of Finland have had no objection to being considered a national minority. There are two synagogues, in Helsinki and in Turku as well as a local Chabad Lubavitch Rabbi based in Helsinki.

I am going to remove the copy-and-pasted sections and try to replace them with text covering the same time periods. Justinep 23:10, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Potentially useful sources of material

• "The Jews in Today’s Finland" and "The many languages of the Finnish Jews"
• Finland commemorates 100 years of Synagogue
• The Virtual Jewish History Tour: Finland
• JEWISH HERITAGE EUROPE: FINLAND
• LESSONS FROM INTEGRATION OF ALIENS IN FINLAND 1917-1944
• The Nation-State and Cultural Diversity in Finland
• Statistics on intermarriage in Finland and Scandinavia
• Jewish Encyclopedia (now out of copyright)
• Finland's Tarnish Holocaust Record
• A Short but Convoluted History for Finland's Jewish Community (covers the Holocaust)
• (also [http://virtual.finland.fi/netcomm/news/showarticle.asp?intNWSAID=26476%7C

National Minorities of Finland, Jewry in Finland] as previously plagiarised)

• Vignettes from Finland: Or Twelve Months in Strawberry Land, pages 68 and 69 (available in the 'search inside' preview on Amazon.com)

Requiring access to academic journal websites:

• RINTALA, MARVIN, Extremism in Interwar Finland, East European Quarterly, 2:1 (1968:Mar.) p.45
• Cohen, William B., Finland and the Holocaust, Holocaust and Genocide Studies, 9:1 (1995:Spring) p.70

Justinep 20:09, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Progress updates and comments on replacing the copyvio text

Pre-independence section

The plagiarised article stated that Jews could settle in Marstrand, Stockholm, Gothenburg, Norrköping and Karlskrona (prior to Finnish Independence) but other online sources - [2] and [3] specify that Jews could only settle in three places. Unfortunately these are not named. I am unable to verify whether or not the original author named these five towns as examples of towns in Swedish territory, or named them as places Jews could settle. For this reason I am diluting the original statement. Perhaps a future editor can add more detail. Right now all I am trying to do is leave something reasonable behind when I remove as much copyright violating text as possible. Justinep 23:36, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Obscure passage: POW Exchange with Germany

The passage states that POW where exchaged with Germany. I'd suspect this happend after the Finno-German confrontation that followed the Finno-Russian armistice at the end of the continuation war, as before that I can't really imagine Finland and Germany capturing each other's personnel - but that would be a guess.

When did that happen?

Moreover: the German POWs held by Finland would have included about 500 "political officers or politically dangerous persons". This means that either these "undesirables" had been members of the Wehrmacht (and not been filtered out as such) or that they were not, in which case they could not have been POWs but civilian internees of some sort.

Either way, how could they really become POWs?

Spamhog (talk) 07:21, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

The POW exchange took place in about 1942. Both the Finns and the Germans had taken a large number of Soviet POWs. These Soviet POWs were exchanged between Finland and Germany based on their nationality. The Germans gave a number of Soviet POWs with Karelian, Ingrian, Finnish or Estonian nationality. In exchange, a corresponding number of non-Fennic POWs were handed over to the Germans. The reason for this was two-fold: first, the Finns wished to recruit a part of the Fennic POW contingent into the Finnish army. Second, they wanted to remove these persons from German camps, the bad conditions of which were already known to some extent by the Finnish state police personnel.

In contrast, the Finns gave a large number of Soviet POWs to the German side. Some 500 of these were Soviet political officers or otherwise active communists, which were considered undesirable by the Finnish POW camp leadership. In Germany, most of them were killed, most likely, due to notorious Kommissarbefehl. --MPorciusCato (talk) 10:59, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Now I get it! Spamhog (talk) 18:33, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Wearing kippahs in public

" In November 2012, a security officer in the Helsinki community said that six to ten antisemitic incidents were taking place every month, and advised Jews to avoid wearing their kippahs in public.[16]"

Looks like this story was unfounded. http://www.iltasanomat.fi/kotimaa/art-1288515962813.html

84.250.209.89 (talk) 23:55, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

External links modified

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Sissy Wein Hoax

"In addition, the most popular Finnish singer of the time, Sissy Wein, entertained Finnish troops during the war, and became known as the "soldier's sweetheart" or the Finnish Vera Lynn. She refused to sing for German soldiers" ... I hate to break it to you, but no such person ever existed - the story is a fake. I haven't been able to find out where this hoax originated, but it has spread far and wide: The Telegraph (UK), National Post (Canada), and even to the Newsletter of the American Society for Yad Vashem. A hoax it is all the same. --Janneman (talk) 18:45, 11 August 2019 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:History of the Jews in Abkhazia which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 05:06, 5 June 2020 (UTC)