Birobidzhan

American  

[bir-oh-bi-jahn] / ˌbɪr oʊ bɪˈdʒɑn /

Or Birobijan

noun

1. the capital of the Jewish Autonomous Region, in E Siberia, in the SE Russian Federation in Asia, W of Khabarovsk.

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Birobidzhan British  

/ birəbidˈʒan /

noun

1. a city in SE Russia: capital of the Jewish Autonomous Region. Pop: 77 250 (2002)

2. another name for the Jewish Autonomous Region

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Example Sentences

After his lonely death, at a pre-trial detention centre in Birobidzhan in Russia’s Far East, the 39-year-old was mourned by only 11 people at his cremation.

From BBC • Aug. 24, 2024

Much later on, he takes a look around Russia’s oblast, or province, of Birobidzhan, “nothing less than the modern world’s first Jewish homeland.”

From Washington Times • Nov. 9, 2015

Judah also travels to Birobidzhan, the improbable Soviet Jewish homeland on the border with China, and finds no sign of a feared Chinese demographic invasion.

From Newsweek • Feb. 28, 2015

In Birobidzhan, close to the Chinese border, Judah finds the Chinese are already farming Russian land.

From The Guardian • Jun. 27, 2013

The so-called Jewish Autonomous Region of Birobidzhan, which Stalin set up as a showplace in Siberia, has only 30,000 Jews in a population of 163,000.

From Time Magazine Archive