"The JAR was founded in 1934. By 1946 it was clear that very, very few Soviet Jews wanted to go there, for the excellent reason that the end of
the 100+ discriminatory laws under tsarism enabled most of them to feel that where they were was as good as they could expect. As the chapter in
my book you finally got makes clear, they held about 10% of all prestigious positions in the USSR, while being one per cent of the population.
In 1946 I said that to an audience of 600 at the American Birobidjan Committee (Birobidjan is the unofficial name of the JAR) in Los Angeles,
which had brought me across the country for the purpose, and was very disappointed at what they heard.
Today there are about 10,000 Jewish people there, a small minority of
the population of the area still officially the JAR, and only one per cent of the Jews in Russia."