In 1941, an obituary appeared in The New York Times for a journalist who was very much alive. This man had faked his own death to evade Japanese forces. His name was Israel Epstein, and his journey spanned continents and political revolutions.
Born to Polish Jewish parents in Warsaw, he fled global conflicts and embedded himself in the center of China’s major historical events. After escaping a Japanese concentration camp, Epstein would eventually become a naturalized Chinese citizen and an official member of the Chinese Communist Party.
Fleeing Europe and Early Journalism
Israel Epstein was born on April 20, 1915, in Warsaw, then under Imperial Russian control. His father was imprisoned for a labor uprising, and his mother was exiled to Siberia.
They sought refuge in Asia during World War I. Escaping anti-Jewish sentiment, the family settled in Tianjin in 1920. Epstein began his career early, writing for the Peking and Tientsin Times at age 15. He later covered the Japanese invasion of China for Western news agencies, reporting directly from conflict zones.
War Reporting and Evading Capture
By 1938, Epstein joined the China Defense League, established by Soong Ching-ling to enlist international support for the Chinese cause. He met Edgar Snow and became an editor for Snow’s magazine, Democracy. His activities put him at great risk.
Following the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, Japanese authorities placed Epstein in a concentration camp, but he successfully escaped with other prisoners. Before this, he had disseminated misinformation about his death to throw off forces trying to arrest him. He relocated to the United States and published The Unfinished Revolution in China in 1947.
State Publishing in China
In 1951, Epstein returned to China. He co-founded the magazine China Reconstructs, later renamed China Today, serving as editor-in-chief until age 70. He translated the Selected Works of Mao Zedong and became a Chinese citizen in 1957.
In 1964, he became an official member of the Chinese Communist Party, one of the few foreign-born individuals to do so. He also gathered material during multiple regional visits for his 1983 book Tibet Transformed.
Imprisonment and Final Years
During the Cultural Revolution, Epstein was arrested. In 1968, based on false charges of plotting against Zhou Enlai, he was imprisoned. He spent five years in captivity until his release in 1973, when Zhou Enlai formally apologized and restored his privileges.
Epstein lived the rest of his life in China. Throughout his career, he was honored by political leaders, including Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, and Hu Jintao. Israel Epstein died in Beijing on May 26, 2005.