BIRZULA

BIRZULA (from 1935, Kotovsk), town in Ukraine. Until May 1903 it was a village, and under the "Temporary Regulations" of 1882 (see may laws ) Jews were prohibited from settling there. The Jewish inhabitants engaged in trade and crafts. They were attacked in a pogrom on October 24, 1905. In 1919, 50 Jews were massacred in Birzula by the followers of simon petlyura . The Jewish population numbered 2,507 in 1926 (25% of the total) and 2,735 in 1939. In the Soviet period they earned their living as blue-collar workers, artisans, and clerks. Birzula was occupied by the Germans on August 6, 1941. In the same month, with the help of the Romanians, they murdered 113 Jews. A ghetto was established, and in November the Jews were marched toward Dubossary, with 650 murdered on the way. Hundreds of Jews from Bessarabia and Bukovina were deported to the area; most were killed or died of starvation or disease. Only 95 were alive on September 1, 1943. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Judenpogrome in Russland, 1 (1909); E.D. Rosenthal, Megillat ha-Tevaḥ, 1 (1927); Jewish Colonization Association, Rapport pour l'année 1925, (1927), 160–243. ADD. BIBLIOGRAPHY: PK Ukrainah, S.V. (Shmuel Spector (2nd ed.)