The Global Jewish Population Has Decreased to 14 Million

The global Jewish population has decreased to approximately 14 million, which is less than the number of Jews before the Nazi regime in Germany and the events of the Holocaust. According to the latest report prepared by the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics, published on October 10 on the Ynet website, the number of Jews worldwide is 14 million and 310 thousand, while before the Holocaust, there were 16 million and 600 thousand Jews living in the world. Jews say that during the Nazi regime, more than six million Jews were killed. However, seventy years after World War II, the number of Jews worldwide has only increased by about four million and 300 thousand. In 1914, when World War I began, the number of Jews worldwide was 13 million and five hundred thousand; the latest statistics show that the current number of Jews in the world is almost equivalent to the number of Jews at the beginning of World War I. The new report from the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics states that in 1882, when the first count of residents in this land was recorded, there were 24 thousand Jews living in these territories. In 1882, the number of Jews worldwide was seven million and 800 thousand; meaning less than one percent of the Jews in the world at that time lived in the disputed land of Jews and Palestinians. By 1914, at the beginning of World War I, the Jewish population in this land had increased to 50 thousand. In 1939, at the beginning of World War II, 449 thousand Jews, which constituted three percent of the world's Jews, lived in the disputed land. In May 1948, when David Ben-Gurion declared the independence of Israel based on the UN resolution of November 1947 on the last day of British mandate over this land, the number of Jews in these territories reached 650 thousand, which was six percent of the eleven and a half million Jews remaining in the world. However, according to 2015 statistics, six million and 219 thousand Jews live in Israel, which is 43 percent of the Jews. The new report also indicates that only the number of Jews living in Israel has increased, while birth rates among Jews worldwide have significantly declined. After Israel, the United States has the largest number of Jews, totaling five million and 700 thousand; three million of them reside in New York State. The new report states that while the lowest number of Jews immigrated to Israel during the 1970s and periods like the 'Al-Aqsa Intifada' in the early 2000s, in 2014, Jewish immigration to Israel increased by fifty percent, especially due to the rise of anti-Semitism in European countries, Latin America, and Russia. Five percent of the new immigrants are over 65 years old. The highest level of immigration to Israel was in 1949, one year after the establishment of Israel, when nearly 240 thousand Jews moved to Israel. In the last five years, with the rise of anti-Semitism in countries like France, Jews from this country have immigrated to Israel more than from other places, but severe security crises between Israel and the Palestinians, such as the recent crises, not only deter Jews from immigrating to Israel but also prompt some residents of Israel to consider emigrating from the country. Since French Jews, despite immigrating to the United States, Canada, and Israel, maintain their French citizenship, official statistics still indicate that 467 thousand residents of France in 2015 were Jewish, which is a small percentage compared to about eight million Muslims living in France. In many countries around the world, from Japan to African countries, there are no Jews. Afghanistan has only one Jew. The number of Jews in Iran has also decreased to the lowest levels in recent decades, with conflicting figures ranging from 9 thousand to 25 thousand regarding their numbers in recent years.