Jewish refugees helped shape the Refugee Convention. We should honour their legacy

If I asked Jewish News readers about the modern ideas, discoveries, and institutions our community has helped shape, what answers might come to mind? Perhaps Einstein and the theory of relativity, Rosalind Franklin’s role in discovering the structure of DNA, or the impact of cultural figures from Kafka to Spielberg.

But one of our community’s most profound contributions remains less well known, even though it has helped save millions of lives.

I’m talking about the 1951 Refugee Convention. In the week of its 75^th anniversary, it remains a remarkable commitment to protection.

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Forged in the shadow of the horrors of the Holocaust, it was initially limited to protecting refugees in Europe in the aftermath of the Second World War. In 1967 it was expanded to protect people around the world; today it remains vital for those fleeing persecution and conflict.

While it is a secular document, moulded by a broad array of states, institutions, and experts, it bears too the influence of Jewish jurists and leaders. In many cases, their personal and often traumatic history of requiring refuge helped shape important aspects of the convention.

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Those figures included Paul Weis, who was interned at Dachau before fleeing to the UK after his release in 1939, and Rabbi Dr Isaac Lewin, an Orthodox rabbi who escaped Łódź ahead of the Nazi invasion that same year. Their stories – and the role played by other Jewish legal figures including Louis Henkin, Jacques Rubinstein, and Jacob and Nehemiah Robinson – should inspire our community’s continuing commitment to social justice.

Because it was not just lived experience that shaped their work, but Jewish teaching too. I think that is still clear now: for me, the spirit of the Refugee Convention reflects so strongly the repeated command to “welcome the stranger”.

And from a rabbinic perspective, parallels between the Convention’s principled moral stance and Jewish thought do not stop there. Take, for example, the principle of non-refoulement, outlined in Article 33 of the Convention. This foundational concept prohibits a state from returning a person to a place where they would face persecution or harm.

I was fascinated to learn recently that Rabbi Lewin, who played a vital role in drafting this element of the Convention, argued that this principle could be traced back to biblical Jewish law. He pointed to the Book of Amos, where God condemns Tyre for expelling Jewish refugees into harm at the hands of the Kingdom of Edom.

That Jewish involvement in the foundations of modern refugee protection should be a real source of pride. But where are we left today?

The legacy those jurists and thinkers have left us has rarely been more relevant. Worldwide, almost 118 million people are forcibly displaced. There is something deeply sobering about marking this anniversary while so many people still depend on the protections it enshrines.

Yet at this same time, governments around the world are trying to circumvent their obligations under the Convention.

Just look at the UK. This country was an original signatory in 1951: yet recent policy changes sit in direct conflict with those commitments.

Sadly, the examples are not limited. Take Article 31, which says states must not penalise refugees for irregular entry. Why, then, is the UK government acting to bar people forced into such journeys – in the absence of safe routes – from ever becoming citizens?

Or consider Article 34, which says states must “as far as possible facilitate the assimilation and naturalization of refugees”. Nevertheless, the Government has scrapped permanent refugee status, replacing it with 30-month temporary protection, and is introducing 20- and 30-year routes to settlement. These changes will only undermine integration and weaken social cohesion.

So what are my aspirations for the next 75 years of the Convention? Above all, that by 2101, it is no longer needed. But with a changing climate and deepening conflict, that feels more like a hope than a conviction.

What is required, then, is a recommitment to the values that the Convention embodies. That should be a defining mission for our new government: a return to compassion, responsibility, and welcome.

And it is also a challenge for British Jewry. In the face of increasing division and rising populism, I am concerned that some of the attitudes once directed towards displaced Jews are now espoused by parts of our community.

Let our history move us forward instead: to speak out for refugees, condemn hate, and continue the extraordinary work Jewish communities across the country carry out alongside displaced people.

That would be a fitting tribute to those Jewish refugees who helped secure for others the protection they themselves once so desperately needed.

Rabbi David Mason is the Executive Director of HIAS+JCORE