Russia: The district of Birobidzhan in south eastern Siberia was established as a Jewish Autonomous Region which was to cover an area of 14,000 square miles (36,000–square–kilometers). Its official language would be Yiddish. Within two years the government had a change of heart and its Jewish socialist leaders were liquidated. Partly due to its primitiveness and remoteness, it never reached a population of more than 18,000, less than a quarter of the total population of the region.
– Eli Birnbaum