HARBIN -- Teddy Kaufman, the 83-year-old chairman of the Israel-China Friendship Society, published the Chinese version of his book "Harbin Jewry in My Heart" in Harbin on Monday.

A leader of the Jewish community in Harbin, capital of northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, Teddy Kaufman recounted the history of Jews living in the Chinese city in the first half of the 20th century.

"The book vividly portrays the religion, economy, culture, customs and education of the Jewish community in a series of valuable pictures and texts. It is an amazing, comprehensive treasury of memories of the Jewish community in Harbin," said Yossi Klein, deputy chairman of the Israel-China Friendship Society and a former Harbin resident.

"It is important to let all Jewry know the place we left to go to Israel because we have inherited traditions, values and customs from the Chinese Jewish community, and transposed them to our new life in Israel." Yossi Klein said.

In the 1920s, Harbin was the biggest resettlement destination of Jews in the Far East, with more than 20,000 people of Jewish origin living in the city at the peak.

"Thousands of Jews who fled persecution in Tsarist Russia and East Europe found a home in Harbin. Harbin showed the world how humanity should behave toward other human beings," said Dr. Yehoyada Haim, the Israeli ambassador to China.

Fourteen years after the founding of New China, the Jewish community in Harbin had come to an end with Jewish people emigrating to other countries. But a number of valuable historic sites, including a cemetery, a Jewish school and a church, are well preserved.