World Jewish Population, 2021
Sergio DellaPergola
The Avraham Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Jerusalem, Israel
sergioa@huji.ac.il

Recommended Citation
Sergio DellaPergola. “World Jewish Population, 2021,” in Arnold Dashefsky
and Ira M. Sheskin. (Editors) The American Jewish Year Book, 2021,
Volume 121 (2021) (Cham, SUI: Springer) pp. 313-412.

1

The American Jewish Year Book 2021
The Annual Record of the North American Jewish Communities Since 1899
This Report derives from Chapter 8 of the American Jewish Year Book, 2021.
Since 1899, the American Jewish Year Book has documented the current status of North
American Jewry: its demography, its institutions, and its accomplishments. It is thepremier place for leading academics to publish in-depth review chapters on topics ofinterest to the North American Jewish communities. Cyrus Adler, Milton Himmelfarb,
Henrietta Szold, and other prominent American Jews are among its former editors. In
2008, the Year Book, which had been published by the American Jewish Committee,
ceased publication, a casualty of the 2008 economic recession.
From 2012 to the present, the Year Book has been published by Springer, a major
worldwide scientific publisher. The editors of the Year Book are Arnold Dashefsky of the
University of Connecticut and Ira Sheskin of the University of Miami, both accomplishedsocial scientists of American Jewry. The Year Book is published in cooperation with the
Association for the Social Scientific Study of Jewry (ASSJ) and the Berman Jewish Data
Bank. Current funding comes from the University of Miami and the University ofConnecticut.
The Year Book consists of lengthy review chapters on topics of general interest, chaptersreviewing important events in the North American Jewish communities, chapters on the
US, Canadian, and world Jewish population, lists of Jewish organizations (both local andnational), Jewish scholarly resources, major events in the Jewish community, Jewish
honorees, and obituaries of notable Jewish individuals. This volume has been asignificant and prestigious annual resource for academic researchers, practitioners at
Jewish institutions and organizations, the media, and others for basic, up-to-date
information about the North American Jewish communities.
Almost all books on the history of North American Jewry cite the Year Book. The Year
Book helps to preserve the current record for future generations.
Obtaining The American Jewish Year Book, 2021
Hard bound and Kindle copies are available at www.amazon.com.
Persons with access to University libraries that offer Springer’s eBook Collection canobtain a soft cover copy or an electronic copy.
Citing this Report
Springer is permitting us to post this Report on line with open access, but requests thatthe citation be to the American Jewish Year Book itself:

2

Table of Contents from the American Jewish Year Book, 2021
Part I Review Articles

1 Overview of Jewish Americans in 2020
Becka A. Alper and Alan Cooperman (Pew Research Center)
2 Forum on the New Pew Survey, Jewish Americans in 2020
Arnold Dashefsky, Ira M. Sheskin, and Amy Lawton, with Judit Bokser-Liwerant,
Sergio DellaPergola, Sylvia Barack Fishman, Harriet Hartman, Samuel Heilman,
Debra Kaufman, Ariela Keysar, Laurence Kotler-Berkowitz, Bruce Phillips,
Jonathan D. Sarna, Leonard Saxe, Michelle Shain, Emily Sigalow, and Jennifer
Thompson
3 America and the Holocaust: Reflections on Three Quarters of a Century andthe Development of Holocaust Consciousness in American Society
Michael Berenbaum
4 American Jews and the Domestic Arena (July 2020-July 2021): Not Like All
Other Years
Sylvia Barack Fishman
5 American Jews and the International Arena (August 2020-July 2021): The US,
Israel, and the Middle East
Mitchell G. Bard
6 United States Jewish Population, 2021
Ira M. Sheskin and Arnold Dashefsky
7 Canadian Jewish Population, 2021: Focus on Occupational and Social
Integration
Robert Brym
8 World Jewish Population, 2021
Sergio DellaPergola

3

Part II Jewish Lists
9 Local Jewish Organizations
Ira M. Sheskin, Arnold Dashefsky, and Sarah Markowitz
10 Jewish Museums and Holocaust Museums, Memorials, and Monuments
Ira M. Sheskin, Arnold Dashefsky, and Sarah Markowitz
11 Jewish Overnight Camps
Ira M. Sheskin, Arnold Dashefsky, and Sarah Markowitz
12 National Jewish Organizations
Ira M. Sheskin, Arnold Dashefsky, and Sarah Markowitz
13 Jewish Press
Ira M. Sheskin, Arnold Dashefsky, and Sarah Markowitz
14 Academic Resources
Arnold Dashefsky, Ira M. Sheskin, Amy Lawton, Sarah Markowitz, and Kimberly
Soby
15 Transitions: Major Events, Honorees, and Obituaries
Ira M. Sheskin, Arnold Dashefsky, Helen Chernikoff, Amy Lawton, and Sarah
Markowitz

4

AJYB 2021 was produced with the generous support of:•

The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Connecticut (Dean
Juli Wade)•

Center for Judaic Studies and Contemporary Jewish Life at the University ofConnecticut (Avinoam Patt, Director)•

The Sue and Leonard Miller Center for Contemporary Judaic Studies (Haim
Shaked, Director) and its Jewish Demography Project (Ira M. Sheskin, Director);
and The George Feldenkreis Program in Judaic Studies (Haim Shaked, Director)•

College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Miami (Dean Leonidas Bachas
and Senior Associate Dean Kenneth Voss)•

The Fain Family Endowed Chair in Judaic Studies at the University of Miami(Professor William Scott Green, former Senior Vice Provost and Dean ofUndergraduate Education)•

Mandell “Bill” Berman (z”l) and the Mandell and Madeleine Berman Foundation

We acknowledge the cooperation of:•Berman Jewish DataBank, a project of The Jewish Federations of North
America (Mandell Berman (z”l), Founding Chair; David Manchester,
Director).

•

The Association for the Social Scientific Study of Jewry (Judit Bokser
Liwerant, President)

For more information about the American Jewish Year Book:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_jewish_year_book
http://www.springer.com/series/11193

5

World Jewish Population, 2021
Sergio DellaPergola
The Avraham Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Jerusalem, Israel
sergioa@huji.ac.il

Recommended Citation
Sergio DellaPergola. “World Jewish Population, 2021,” in Arnold Dashefsky
and Ira M. Sheskin. (Editors) The American Jewish Year Book, 2021,
Volume 121 (2021) (Cham, SUI: Springer) pp. 313-412.

6

WORLD JEWISH POPULATION, 2021
Sergio DellaPergola

On January 1, 2021, the world’s Jewish population was estimated at 15,166,200—
an increase of 89,100 (0.59%) above the 2020 revised estimate of 15,077,100(DellaPergola 2021a). The estimate is based on a review of Jewish populations in
102 countries and territories with at least 100 Jews. The world's total population
increased by 1.1% in 2020 (Population Reference Bureau 2020). The rate of increase ofworld Jewry hence amounted to about half of that of the world’s total population. All
Jewish population data in this report reflect an upward correction of 300,000 following the
Pew Research Center’s 2020 survey and Jewish Americans in 2020 report, published in
2021 (Pew Research Center 2021). The new adjustment in the US, and thus world
figures, entailed retroactive corrections for several previous years—an exemplary
demonstration of the paradox of the permanently provisional nature of Jewish population
estimates.
This report, as in previous years, examines the world Jewish population’s size,
geographical distribution, alternative definitions, changes over time, and selected
determinants of such changes. Section 1 examines the main methodological issues in the
study of Jewish populations globally, such as definitions and data sources. Section 2
presents a picture of Jewish population size and distribution by major areas of the world.
Section 3 analyzes major patterns and trend in Jewish population distribution. Section 4
focuses on the two largest Jewish populations—the State of Israel and the United Statesof America. Section 5 deals with major cities and metropolitan areas. Section 6 reviews
some major determinants of demographic change. An Appendix details the criteria andtechnical issues involved in estimating Jewish populations globally, keeping in mind theneed for producing comparable data across different countries.

Section 1 Assessing Jewish Population
Fig. 1 details the original and revised estimates in the world Jewish population, in Israel,and in the aggregate in the rest of the world (the Diaspora)—as well as changes in theworld's total population between 1945 and 2021. The world's core Jewish population was
estimated at 11 million in 1945. The core Jewish population concept addresses a humancollective whose identification is mutually exclusive with respect to other subpopulations(see below). While this is the main definition employed in this report for addressing how
Jews are defined, the number of people who carry multiple cultural and religious identities
tends to increase in contemporary societies (Josselson and Harway 2012). The
adjudication of group identities (without double counts) becomes increasingly difficult as
recent Jewish population studies in the US clearly demonstrate. One important issue inthe current predicament is whether (Jewish) corporate identities can only be acquired orwhether they can also be lost (see below). In any case, from a socio-demographic
perspective, unlike the situation in the past, a clear-cut binary division of the world7

population between Jews and non-Jews is no longer possible. Operational decisions must
be made in order to reasonably estimate current Jewish population size (DellaPergola
2014b, 2015b).
After the tragic human losses of World War II and the Shoah (Holocaust), 15 years
passed before the Jewish population increased by one million, from 11M to 12M(DellaPergola et al. 2000). Another 35 years were needed to for an increase of anothermillion from 12M to 13M. From the 1970s for nearly 20 years, world Jewry stagnated withnearly zero population growth for nearly 20 years, but some demographic growthoccurred since the 1990s, mostly reflecting accelerating population growth in Israel. It
then took about 15 years to add another million from 13M to 14M, and about ten more
years to add the next million reaching 15M in 2019, according to the revised data reported
here. From an historical perspective and based on comparable definitions, world Jewish
population has not yet recovered its size of 16.5M on the eve of World War II, and it may
still take a few more decades before that milestone is reached.

Fig. 1 World total population and core Jewish population, 1945-2021 – Revised data

World Jewish population size reflects a combination of two very different demographic
trends in Israel and in the rest of the world—the Jewish Diaspora. Israel's Jewish
population increased linearly from an initial half a million in 1945 and 630,000 in 1948, tonearly 6.9M in 2021. The Jewish population of the Diaspora, from an initial 10.5M in 1945,
was quite stable until the early 1970s, when it started decreasing, reaching 8.2-8.3M
around 2000 and subsequently remaining relatively stable. During the same period, theworld's total population increased more than threefold from 2.3 billion in 1945 to 7.7 billion
by mid-2020. Thus, the share of Jewish population relative to the world’s total population
steadily diminished from 4.75 per 1,000 in 1945 to 1.95 per 1,000 currently—or one per
every 513 inhabitants in the world.

8

Two countries, Israel and the US, accounted for over 85% of the 2021 Jewish
population total; 23 countries, each with 10,000 Jews or more, accounted for another
14%, and another 77 countries, each with Jewish populations below 10,000, accounted
for the remaining 1%. Fig. 2 shows the size of the 20 largest core Jewish populations in
2021.

Fig. 2 Twenty largest core Jewish populations, 2021 – Revised data

Map 1 shows the geographical distribution of the 20 largest Jewish communities
worldwide.
Israel’s core Jewish population reached 6,870,900 in 2021, out of Israel's total legal
population of 9,293,300 (Israel Central Bureau of Statistics monthly). This core Jewish
population figure does not include 464,800 people who were not recorded as Jews in the
Ministry of Interior's Population Register but who are members of families initially admitted
to Israel under the Law of Return. The 6,870,900 corresponded to 45.3% of the revised
total world Jewry estimate by the core definition and represented a Jewish population
increase of 97,500 (1.44%) in 2020. Israel’s rate of population increase was remarkably
slower than in previous years as a direct and indirect consequence of the COVID-19
pandemics (see below). In the same year, the total Jewish population of the Diaspora(revised following the Pew Research Center’s 2020 survey and Jewish Americans in 20209

report published in 2021) was estimated to have decreased by 8,400 from 8,303,700 to
8,295,300 (-0.10%).

Map 1 Countries where 99% of world core Jewish population live, 2021

Based on our interpretation of the 2020 Pew study (Pew Research Center 2021), wereassessed the US core Jewish population at 6 million (versus a previous estimate of 5.7
million) constituting 39.6% of world Jewry in 2021. Core Jews in the US increased
moderately since the year 2000, including an estimated 5,000 increase in 2020. A detailed
explanation of the rationale for the new estimate follows below.
The Jewish population in the rest of the world—outside Israel and the US—wasassessed to be 2,295,300 in 2021 (15.1% of world Jewry), compared with 2,308,700 in
2020. The decline of 13,400 among Diaspora Jews outside the US amounted to an annual
loss of -0.58% in the aggregate for those countries. With respect to the total world
population, growth in 2020 was 1.4% in less developed countries and there was no growthin the more developed countries where most Jews live.
After critically reviewing all available evidence on Jewish demographic trends, it isplausible to claim that Israel hosts the largest core Jewish community worldwide. Other
population estimates (Saxe and Tighe 2013; Saxe et al. 2021; Pew Research Center
2021; Sheskin and Dashefsky in this volume) are mostly based on different definitions of
the target population. Since Israel's independence in 1948, demography has produced atransition of singular importance to the Jewish historical experience—the return of theJews to a geographical distribution significantly rooted in Israel, their ancestral homeland.
This has occurred through daily, slow, and diverse changes reflecting births and deaths,
geographical mobility, and the choices of millions of people to express or to deny a Jewish
collective identification not subordinated to—nor split with—other explicit religious or
ethnic identifications. Concomitantly, Jewish majority status in Israel faces a significant
demographic challenge given the growing Palestinian Arab population within the officiallyrecognized boundaries of the state as well as in the West Bank and Gaza.
Jewish population estimates are subject to the fundamental demographic equation
which holds that population size at a given time reflects an uninterrupted chain of events
that may change the size of that population from an earlier to a later date. Of the three10possible determinants of population change, two are relevant to all populations: (a) thebalance of vital events (births and deaths) where in many countries low Jewish birth rates
and an increasingly elderly population generate higher death rates and an overall deficit;
and (b) the balance of international migration (immigration and emigration) which can behighly variable across countries. The third determinant consists of identification changes(accessions and secessions)—in this case passages to and from a Jewish identity—andapplies to all subpopulations defined by some cultural, symbolic, or other specificcharacteristic, as is the case for Jews. Identification changes do not affect people’s
physical presence but rather their willingness or ability to identify with a particularreligious, ethnic, or otherwise culturally-defined group.
Israel’s current Jewish population growth—although slower than during the 1990s—
reflects a continuing substantial natural increase generated by a combination of relatively
high fertility and a relatively young age distribution. These two drivers of demographic
growth do not simultaneously exist in any other Jewish population worldwide, including
the US. Other than a few cases of growth due to international migration (for example
Canada and Australia and, until recently, the US and Germany), and possibly some local
natural increase (plausibly in the UK and Mexico, and minimally in Austria and Australia),
the total number of Jews in Diaspora countries tends to diminish at varying rates.
All this holds true regarding the core Jewish population, which does not include nonJewish members of Jewish households, Jews who also maintain another religious
identification, people of Jewish ancestry who profess identification with anothermonotheistic religion, other non-Jews of Jewish ancestry, other non-Jews with family
connections to Jews, and other non-Jews who may be interested in Jewish matters (seefurther discussion below). The detailed mechanisms and supporting evidence of Jewish
population change have been discussed extensively in previous issues of the American
Jewish Year Book (AJYB) and interested readers may explore those discussions in thoseissues (see DellaPergola 2015a through 2021a; for a detailed report on Jews in Europe
see DellaPergola and Staetsky 2020).
Jewish population size and composition reflect the day-to-day interplay of various
factors that operate from within and beyond the Jewish community. The continuing
realignment of world Jewish geography toward the major centers of economic
development and political power provides a robust yardstick for further explanation andprediction of Jewish demography (DellaPergola et al. 2005; DellaPergola and Sheskin2015; DellaPergola 2017a; DellaPergola and Staetsky 2020).
The 2021 Jewish population data reported here were updated from 2020 and previous
years in accordance with known or estimated vital events, migrations, and Jewish
identification shifts. The world and regional Jewish population estimates result from thesum of national estimates. While individual country estimates can be obtained fromnationwide sources and sometimes also from the sum of local sources, in the case of theworld's total, given the lack of a global population census, no alternative exists to thesummation of individual country figures. In each of the country update procedures, whendata on intervening changes were available, empirically ascertained or reasonably
assumed, effects of change were applied accordingly and consistently added to or
subtracted from previous estimates. If the evidence suggested that intervening changes
balanced one another in a particular country, Jewish population size was not revised. This
procedure has proven highly effective over the years of our monitoring of the world Jewish
11population. Most often, when improved Jewish population estimates reflecting a new
census or socio-demographic survey became available, our annually updated estimates
proved to be quite on target. Where needed, previous estimates were adjusted
retrospectively based upon newer, more rigorous evidence.
Perhaps more importantly, the research findings reported here tend to confirm acoherent and conceptually robust interpretation of the trends prevailing in world Jewish
demography (Bachi 1976; Schmelz 1981, 1984; DellaPergola 1995, 1999, 2001, 2011a).
While allowing for improvements and corrections, the 2021 population estimates highlightthe increasing complexity of socio-demographic and identification factors underlying
Jewish population patterns. This complexity is magnified at a time of extensive internal
and international migration as well as increasing transnationalism, sometimes involving
bi-local residency and leading to double counting of people on the move or who
permanently share their time between different cities, states, and even countries. In thisstudy, special attention is paid to avoiding double counts of nationally and internationallymobile bi-local persons. Estimates become even more complex when considering thatsome hold more than one religious, ethnic, or cultural identity and may periodically shift
from one to the other. Available data sources only imperfectly allow for the documentationof these complexities; hence, Jewish population estimates are far from perfect.
Thankfully, the quality of the estimates can always be corrected retrospectively, as
demonstrated in this report.

Section 1.1 Definitions
It goes without saying that Jewish population definitions critically impact upon population
estimates. A major problem with estimates produced by several individual scholars or
Jewish organizations is a lack of uniformity in definitional criteria when defining the Jewish
population, as well as data quality. This problem is magnified when attempts are made toestimate the Jewish population globally, providing a coherent and uniform definitionalframework for Jews who live in very different institutional, cultural, and socioeconomic
environments. For analytical purposes, it would not be acceptable to employ different
definitional standard for different countries, although in the daily conduct of Jewish
communal affairs such differences across countries are the reality.
In such an open, fluid, and somewhat unclear environment, the very feasibility ofundertaking a valid and meaningful study of the Jewish collective—let alone the use ofparticular quantitative tools—generates debates between different intellectual
standpoints facing Jewish population studies (DellaPergola 2014d). In particular, thestudy of a Jewish population (or of any other subpopulation) requires three main problems
to be addressed:
1) Defining the target group on the basis of conceptual or normative criteria aimed atproviding the best possible description of that group—which in the case of Jewry is nominor task in itself.
2) Identifying the target group thus defined based on tools that operationally allow for
those who belong to it to be distinguished from all others. This is primarily achieved by
the systematic canvassing of populations and directly ascertaining personal
identifications—typically through national censuses or representative sample surveys.
12

Identification is also often performed by means of membership lists, distinctive Jewish
names, areas of residence, or other random or non-random procedures.
3) Covering the target group through appropriate field work—through face-to-faceinterviews, by telephone, mail, Internet, or suchlike. Most often in the actual experienceof social research, and contrary to ideal procedures, the task of defining is performed at
the stage of identifying, and the task of identifying is performed at the stage of actual
fieldwork.
It should be emphasized that the quantitative study of Jewish populations relies
predominantly on operational social scientific, not prescriptive rabbinical or legal,
definitional criteria. The main conceptual aspects, besides being rooted in social theory,heavily depend on practical and logistical feasibility—not the least, available researchbudgets. The ultimate empirical step—obtaining relevant data from relevant people—
crucially relies on the readiness of people to cooperate in the data collection effort. In
recent years, as response rates and cooperation rates have significantly decreased insocial surveys—in particular, those undertaken through telephone interviews (Keeter et
al. 2017), the amount, content, and validity of information gathered have been affected
detrimentally. New field work strategies must be continuously devised to avoid
deterioration in the number and quality of responses. Response rates for Jewish surveys
tend to be highly than those of general surveys, and Jews are possibly readier than others
to respond to surveys generally, but data quality constitutes a topic of growing concern incontemporary social research.
No perfect method exists to counter decreases in response and cooperation rates, or
self-selection biases in participation readiness. Research findings therefore reflect withvarying degrees of sophistication only that which is possible to uncover; namely,
respondents’ degree of involvement with or indifference to feeling Jewish. Sometimes,
things which cannot be uncovered directly can be indirectly estimated through various
indirect techniques. However, there exist unsurmountable limits to what researchmethodologies can deliver. For example, large representative samples and small
qualitative studies are not interchangeable regarding the answers they may provide to
specific research questions. Research methods should be finely tuned to research goals.
Beyond that, we enter the realm of narratives, beliefs, hopes and fears, myths, andcorporate interests. No perfect methodology exists to demonstrate the actual nature ofsome of these biases—at least not within the limits of non-fiction and non-advocacy
studies such as these. Keeping these limits in mind, four major definitional concepts arepresented here to provide rigorous comparative foundations to the study of Jewish
demography worldwide (Fig. 3):(a) the core Jewish population (CJP): the group that considers Judaism theirmutually exclusive identification framework, including both those who do and do
not see religion as a relevant avenue for identification (in Fig. 3: Circle 1: Jewish
only, religion; and Circle 2: Jewish only, no religion).
(b) the population with Jewish parent(s) (PJP): including those who say they are
partly Jewish because their identity is split between two or more different
identification frameworks (Circle 3), and those who say they are not Jewish but
13

have at least one Jewish parent (Circle 4). Taken together Circles 3 and 4 may
also be referred to as the Jewish-connected population.
(c) the enlarged Jewish population (EJP): including those who say they have Jewish
background but not a Jewish parent (Circle 5), as well as all non-Jewish household
members who live in households with Jews (Circle 6).
(d) the Law of Return population (LRP): the Law of Return is the State of Israel’s
legal instrument for determining eligibility of Jews and their families for immigration,
citizenship, and all related prerogatives (Circle 7).
A further important conceptual term is the net Jewish population (NJP) used by the
Pew Research Center to define their main target population in their 2013 and 2020
surveys about US Jews (Pew Research Center 2013, 2021). The NJP includes the core
Jewish population as defined above plus those who define themselves partly Jewish(circles 1, 2, and 3 in Fig 8.3). In other words, the NJP defines a group which isconceptually and numerically intermediate between the CJP and the PJP. Further
discussion about these definitions may be found in the Appendix.

Law of Return

LRP 25,336,100

Non-Jewish household members
4-5 Jewish connected

EJP 22,626,000
Partly Jewish
Jewish only,
no religion

PJP 19,937,600

Jewish only,
by religion

CJP 15,166,200

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

1-3 Net Jewish Population
1-4 With Jewish parent(s)5-7 No Jewish parent(s)Fig. 3 Configuring and defining contemporary Jewish populations, 2021 – Revised data (see key on next page)

14

Key to Fig. 3
1-2 = Core Jewish population (CJP)
1 to 4 = Population with Jewish parent(s) (PJP)
1 to 6 = Enlarged Jewish population (EJP)
1 to 7 = Law of Return population (LRP)
Note: Areas represented are not proportional to actual population sizes

This typology is relevant not only because it is distinguished from alternative
population definition approaches, but because it also delineates different analytic paths
grounded in alternative social theories as well as different possible Jewish institutional
strategies in designating the respective catchment constituencies. It is important to realizethat the categories in Fig. 3 are not static whereas in fact continuous passages which
occur across the different circles, from center to periphery and vice-versa, and from thewhole configuration outside, and into it. Further definitional extensions (not shown in Fig.
3) may address those additional non-Jewish people who feel some degree of affinity
with Judaism, sometimes because their more distant ancestors were Jewish or becauseof other personal, cultural or social connections with Jews. These forms of affinity havearoused growing interest in recent years in different regional contexts like Latin America(Torres 2017), Africa (Miles 2019), and the Western countries (Vincze 2020), due toattempts made to set up organized communities who claim forms of affinity to Judaism
and ask to be recognized as such by various rabbinical or institutional authorities in Israelor other countries.
Relatedly, some studies may have reached people whose ancestors were everJewish, regardless of the respondents' present identification. Indeed, socio-demographic
surveys sometimes ask about the religio-ethnic identification of parents. Some population
surveys even ask about more distant ancestry. Historians may wish to engage in the studyof the number of Jews who ever lived or of how many people today are descendants of
those Jews—for example, Conversos who lived in the Iberian Peninsula during the Middle
Ages, or the descendants of Jews who lived during the Roman Empire, or the Lost Tribes(Parfitt 2002; Parfitt and Fisher 2016; Israel Ministry of Diaspora Affairs 2018; Gross etal. 2019). The early Jewish backgrounds of some population groups have been
uncovered in recent studies of population genetics (Hammer et al. 2000; Behar et al.
2004; Behar et al. 2010; Carmi et al. 2014; Tian et al. 2015). These long-term issues andanalyses are beyond the purpose of the present study.
The adoption of increasingly extended definitional criteria by individual researchers
and by Jewish organizations tends to stretch Jewish population definitions with an
expansive effect on population estimates beyond usual practices in the past as well as
beyond the limits of the typical core Jew population definition. These decisions may reflect
local needs and sensitivities but tend to limit the comparability and efficacy of research
into specific Jewish populations over time and Jewish populations in different locales at
one given time. As noted, a more coherently comparative approach is followed here,
historically and geographically. The estimates presented below of Jewish population
distribution worldwide and in each continent, country, and major metropolitan area—
unless differently specified—are consistently anchored to the concept of core Jewish
population. The core definition is indeed the necessary starting point for any broader
definition such as the population with Jewish parents, the enlarged definition, or the Law
of Return definition (see detail in the Appendix).
15

All Jewish population estimates presented here refer to the total number in a given
geographical unit, not only the affiliated or those who are religiously observant.

Section 1.2 Data Sources
The estimates for major regions and individual countries reported below reflect a
prolonged and continuing effort to scientifically study the demography of contemporary
world Jewry. Data collection and comparative research on current population estimateshave benefited from the collaboration of scholars and institutions in many countries,
including access to unpublished databases. It should be emphasized, however, that theelaboration of worldwide estimates of the number of Jews in the various countries is besetwith difficulties and uncertainties (Schmelz 1981; Ritterband et al. 1988; DellaPergola
2014c, 2014d). The problem of data consistency is particularly acute, given the very
different legal systems and organizational provisions under which Jewish communities
operate in different countries. In spite of our keen efforts to create a unified analytic
framework for Jewish population studies, data users should be aware of these difficulties
and of the inherent limitations of Jewish population estimates.
Over the past decades, the data available for a critical assessment of the worldwide
Jewish demographic picture have expanded significantly. These data consist of national
population censuses, national population registers, national and international public andprivate sponsored surveys, and national or Jewish community records of vital statistics,
migration, and conversions. Some of this ongoing data compilation is part of coordinatedefforts aimed at strengthening Jewish population research by the Division of Jewish
Demography and Statistics at the Avraham Harman Research Institute of Contemporary
Jewry of The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. This new evidence generally confirmed
our previous estimates, but sometimes suggested upward or downward revisions.
Jewish population projections undertaken by the author in light of available data, also
helped in the current assessment. It is quite evident that the cross-matching of more than
one type of source about the same Jewish population, although not frequently feasible,
can provide either mutual reinforcement of, or important critical insights into, the ongoing
trends. Other existing estimates of total world Jewish population and of its geographicaldistribution (Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life 2012; Johnson and Zurlo 2014; Pew
Research Center 2015a) provide findings quite close to ours. Unlike our review ofhundreds of local and international sources, the Pew comparisons often rely on
percentages of Jews from larger general studies. In the latter case, as Jews are usuallyan extremely small fraction of the total, the resulting Jewish population estimates may beaffected by large sampling errors. A full list of the types and quality of documentation uponwhich our Jewish population estimates are based is reported in the Appendix Table
below.

16

Section 2 World Jewish Population Size and Distribution by Major Areas
As noted, in our current estimates, we corrected previously published Jewish population
data in light of new information. In 2021, the most significant correction was an additionof about 300,000 Jews in the US following the Pew Research Center’s most recent study(Pew Research Center 2021). This revision generated retrospective revisions of thewhole annual series of data for the US, the total Diaspora, and World Jewry since 2000.
Table 1 provides a synopsis of world Jewish population estimates for 1945 to 2021, as
first published each year in the AJYB, and as retroactively corrected in the light ofaugmented information also adjusting all revisions that had been introduced in previous
years. These revised estimates depart, sometimes significantly, from the estimatespublished by other authors until 1980 and in this report since 1981. Thanks to thedevelopment of an improved database, these new revisions are not necessarily the samerevised estimates that appeared annually in the AJYB in the past based on the informationthat was available on each date. It is possible that further retroactive revisions may
become necessary reflecting ongoing and future research.
Table 1 World core Jewish population estimates: original and revised, 1945-2021
Year
World Jewish Population
World Population
Original
RevisedAnnual % Total
Annual %estimatea
estimatebchangec(millions)dchange1945, May 1
11,000,000
11,000,000
2,315
1950, Jan. 1
11,303,400
11,297,000
0.57
2,526
1.76
1960, Jan. 1
12,792,800
12,079,000
0.67
3,026
1.82
1970, Jan. 1
13,950,900
12,585,000
0.41
3,691
2.01
1980, Jan. 1
14,527,100
12,819,000
0.18
4,449
1.81
1990, Jan. 1
12,810,300
12,868,000
0.04
5,321
1.74
2000, Jan. 1
13,191,500
13,250,000
0.29
6,127
1.42
2005, Jan. 1
13,034,100
13,620,000
0.55
6,514
1.23
2010, Jan. 1
13,428,300
14,049,000
0.62
6,916
1.20
2015, Jan. 1
14,310,500
14,551,600
0.71
7,336
1.19
2020, Jan. 1
14,787,200
15,077,100
0.71
7,689
1.09
2021, Jan. 1
15,166,200
0.59
7,774
1.10

Jews per1000 of total
population
4.75
4.47
3.99
3.41
2.88
2.42
2.16
2.09
2.03
1.98
1.96
1.95

a As published in the American Jewish Year Book, various years. Some estimates reported here as of Jan. 1 were originally published as of Dec.
31 of the previous yearb Based on updated or corrected information. Original estimates for 1990 and after, and all revised estimates: The A. Harman Institute ofContemporary Jewry, The Hebrew University of Jerusalemc Based on revised estimates, except most recent yeard Mid-year estimates. Source: United Nations Population Division (2020), Population Reference Bureau (2020)

The time series in Table 1 incorporates the newly revised estimates. It portrays thedecreasing rate of Jewish population growth globally between the 1960s and the 1990s.
Based on a post-Shoah world Jewish population estimate of 11,000,000, an increase of
1,079,000 occurred between 1945 and 1960, followed by increases of 506,000 in the
1960s, 234,000 in the 1970s, 49,000 in the 1980s, and 282,000 in the 1990s. Since 2000,
the trend of Jewish population growth has somewhat recovered, with an increase of
899,000 in the decade to 2010, reflecting the robust demographic trends in Israel andIsrael's increasing share of the world total. Between 2010 and 2020, world Jewry
increased by 1,027,000, Israel's Jewish population increasing by 1,069,000 while the total
Diaspora Jewish population decreased by 42,000. Table 1 also demonstrates the slower
17

world Jewish population growth rate compared to global population growth, and thedeclining Jewish share of the world population. In 2021, the share of Jews among theworld population (1.95 per 1,000) was 41% of the 1945 estimate (4.75 per 1,000).
Table 2 offers an overall picture of the Jewish population by major geographicalregions at the beginning of 2021, compared with 2020. The originally published estimatesfrom the 2020 American Jewish Year Book (DellaPergola 2021a) were revised reflecting
retroactive corrections due to improved data. These corrections resulted in a net increaseof 289,900 people in the 2020 world Jewry estimate, reflecting a net increase of 295,000
for the United States, and a decrease of 4,000 from the previous estimate for Argentina,
1,000 for Belarus, and 100 for Latvia (see below).
Looking first at global trends, the number of Jews in Israel increased from 6,773,400
at the beginning of 2020 to 6,870,900 at the beginning of 2021, an increase of 97,500, or
1.44%. Of this increase, 89,500 derived from the balance of births (129,860, about 3,400
less than in 2019) and deaths (40,369, about 1,800 more than in 2019) (Israel Central
Bureau of Statistics monthly). Less births and more deaths reflected some of the effectsof the Covid-19 pandemic in Israel (see below). New immigrants to Israel and tourists whochanged their status to immigrants diminished by half, from 33,096 in 2019 to 16,696 in
2020. Israel's net migration balance diminished accordingly after factoring-in the balanceof returning Israelis, Israeli citizens born abroad who entered Israel for the first time, andIsraeli residents who left the country and had not returned after one year of permanent
residence abroad. In 2020, therefore, internal demographic change produced most of thetotal Jewish population growth in Israel.
In contrast, the estimated Jewish population in the Diaspora decreased from therevised estimate of 8,303,700 in 2020 to 8,295,300 in 2021—a decrease of 8,400, or 0.10%. These changes reflect continuing Jewish emigration from the former Soviet Union(FSU), and to a lesser extent from France, South Africa, the small remnants of Jewish
communities in Muslim countries, and other countries, and the internal decrease due toan excess of deaths over births, which is typical of the majority of Diaspora Jewry.
According to these estimates, the Jewish Diaspora’s estimated decrease of 8,400 was
mostly explained by an aggregate negative migration balance compared with Israel. Thisestimate leaves room for minimal decrease due to other causes, which likely
underestimates the actual negative vital balance in most countries. As a consequence,
Jewish population estimates for the total Diaspora might require future downward
adjustments. It should be noted, however, that the total Diaspora population estimate in2020 resulted from an assumed increase of 5,000 in the US and a decrease of 13,400 inother countries.
Recently, there has been an increase in instances of conversion, accession, or“return” to Judaism which have been observed with respect to Israel’s absorption of
immigrants from the FSU, Ethiopia, Latin American countries like Peru, India, and to aminor extent from Sub-Saharan Africa. To some extent this same phenomenon of returnor first-time accession to Judaism occurs throughout Diaspora communities as well,sometimes without a formal conversionary rite of passage. The addition of suchpreviously non-belonging or unidentified people contributes both to the slowing of a
population decrease in those Diaspora Jewish populations and to a minimal increase in
the Jewish population in Israel (Fisher 2015, 2019; DellaPergola 2017c; Nissim 2018).

18

Table 2 Estimated core Jewish population, by continents and major geographic regions, 2020 and 2021a
Region2020 Revisedb
2021
Percentage Jews perchange1000 total
Estimate
Percentc
Estimate
Percentc
2020-2021
populationin 2021
World total

15,077,100

100.0

15,166,200

100.0

0.59

1.95

Diaspora

8,303,700

55.1

8,295,300

54.7

-0.10

1.07

US

5,995,000

39.8

6,000,000

39.6

0.08

18.19

Other Diaspora

2,308,700

15.3

2,295,300

15.1

-0.58

0.31

Israeld

6,773,400

44.9

6,870,900

45.3

1.44

739.34

Americas, total

6,757,900

44.8

6,761,300

44.6

0.05

6.63

Northe6,388,100

42.4

6,393,600

42.2

0.09

17.36

Central, Caribbean

57,4000.4

57,500

0.4

0.17

0.26

South

312,400

2.1

310,200

2.0

-0.70

0.72

Europe, total

1,328,300

8.8

1,317,500

8.7

-0.81

1.58

European Unionf

788,700

5.2

785,600

5.2

-0.39

1.76

FSUg

209,400

1.4

201,900

1.3

-3.58

1.00

h

330,200

2.2

330,000

2.2

-0.06

1.80

Asia, total

Other West, Balkans

6,808,500

45.2

6,905,300

45.5

1.42

1.52

Israel

6,773,400

44.9

6,870,900

45.3

1.44

739.34

FSU

14,8000.1

14,200

0.1

-4.05

0.15

Other Asia

20,3000.1

20,200

0.1

-0.49

0.00

Africa, total

56,8000.4

56,500

0.4

-0.53

0.04

Northerni

3,300

0.0

3,300

0.0

0.00

0.01

Sub-Saharanj

53,5000.4

53,200

0.4

-0.56

0.05

Oceaniak

125,600

0.8

125,600

0.8

0.00

2.91

a Jewish population: January 1. Total population: mid-year estimates, 2020. Source: United Nations Population Division (2020), Population
Reference Bureau (2021)
b Compare the revised with the original estimates in DellaPergola (2021). The corrections reflect newly available data for the US (+300,000),Argentina (-4,000), Belarus (-1,000), and Latvia (-100)
c Minor discrepancies due to rounding
d Including Jewish residents in East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights
e US and Canada
f EU Including the Baltic countries (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania). Not including the UK
g FSU excluding the Baltic countries. Asian parts of Russia included in Europe
h Including the UK. Asian parts of Turkey included in Europe
i Including Ethiopia
j Including South Africa and Zimbabwe
k Including Australia and New Zealand

In descending order by continents, 45.5% of world Jewry in 2021 lived in Asia, theoverwhelming majority being in Israel (Table 2 and Appendix Table). Asia is defined
herein to include the Asian republics of the FSU, but not the Asiatic areas of the RussianFederation and Turkey. Jewish presence in Asia is mostly affected by trends in Israel
which accounts for more than 99% of the continental total. The former republics of the
FSU in Asia and the aggregate of the other countries in Asia account together for lessthan one-half of one percent of the total. Rapid economic development in Asian countries
like Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and especially China, is attracting Jewish
professionals, businesspeople, and skilled technical workers. The numbers are still small
but are they are growing. As to Muslim countries, Turkey has the largest remaining Jewish
community but is included here in Europe since most Jews live on the European side of
the Turkish Straights.
19

The Americas are home to 44.6% of the world’s Jews, of whom 42.2% live in North
America. The Jewish population in the Americas, estimated at 6,761,300 in 2021, ispredominantly concentrated in the US (6,000,000, or 89% of the total Americas), followed
by Canada (393,500, 6%), South America (310,200, less than 5%), and Central America
and the Caribbean (57,500, 1%). Since the 1960s, the Jewish population has been
generally decreasing in South America, reflecting emigration motivated by recurring
economic and security concerns (Schmelz and DellaPergola 1985; DellaPergola 1987,
2008a, 2011b). Central American countries such as Mexico and Panama were theexceptions, absorbing Jewish migrants from other countries in Latin America. In the Miami
Jewish community alone, the number of members of households containing a Jewish
adult from Latin American countries increased from roughly 18,000 in 2004 to 24,500 in2014 (Sheskin 2015b). In neighboring Broward County, the same pattern was evident,with an increase from 5,300 in 1997 to 26,500 in 2016 (Sheskin 2017). Between 2001
and 2020, the total number of immigrants from Latin America to Israel surpassed 26,000(Israel Central Bureau of Statistics), including many people who are highly educated andhighly involved in Jewish life, albeit also including recently converted people (Bokser
Liwerant et al. 2015; Torres 2017). Outside the mainstream of established Jewish
communities, increased interest in Judaism has appeared among real or alleged
descendants of Conversos, whose ancestors left Judaism and converted to Christianity
under pressure of the Inquisition in Spain and Portugal in the 15th and 16th centuries.
Some of these Converso communities have been trying to create permanent frameworks
to express their Jewish identity, in part locally, in part through formal conversion to
Judaism and migration to Israel. This tends to lead to some expansion of the Jewish
population, especially in smaller communities in the peripheral areas of Brazil, Peru,
Colombia, as well as other countries (Israel Ministry of Diaspora Affairs 2018). People
with such backgrounds are also migrating to Israel (Torres 2017). A significant downward
correction was introduced for Argentina (-4,000) in light of a new evaluation of Jewish
death records for the past several years. Recorded burials covered the mostly Ashkenazi
Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) facility in Buenos Aires, the smaller
cemeteries of other Sephardi and non-Orthodox communities, and those buried in nonJewish cemeteries. Argentina also continued to experience a revival in migration to Israel
and possibly countries, including the US, which contributed to further population decline.
Steady decline also continued in the already diminished community in Venezuela.
Europe, including the Asian territories of the Russian Federation and Turkey,
accounted for 9% of world Jewry (DellaPergola and Staetsky 2020). The Jewish
population in Europe, estimated at 1,317,500 in 2021, is increasingly concentrated in thewestern part of the continent, within the European Union (EU). The EU, comprising 27
countries after the secession of the UK, had an estimated 785,600 Jews in 2021 (60% of
the continent’s total). The momentous political transformations since the fall of the Berlin
Wall in 1989 and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 brought about significant
changes in the geographical distribution of Jewish communities in Europe. Revitalizationof Jewish community life in western European countries had occurred over the priordecades through immigration mainly from North Africa and the Middle East, as well as
the FSU. More recently, however, economic recession and rising perceptions ofantisemitism across the continent brought about growing Jewish dissatisfaction andemigration (DellaPergola 2017b; Staetsky 2017; Staetsky et al. 2013; European Union
20

Fundamental Rights Agency-FRA 2013, 2018; DellaPergola 2020b). Total emigrationfrom the EU to Israel, including the three Baltic republics, rose from 13,635 in 2005-2009
to 19,134 in 2010-2014, and 23,098 in 2015-2019. In 2020, the total emigration was
2,876, below the yearly average for the past 10 years. In spite of the unifying project of
the EU, Europe is much more politically fragmented than the US, making it more difficult
to create a homogeneous Jewish population database. Nevertheless, several studies
have attempted to create such analytic frames of reference (Graham 2004; Kovacs andBarna 2010; DellaPergola 1993, 2010b; Staetsky et al. 2013; Staetsky and DellaPergola
2019; DellaPergola and Staetsky 2020, 2021).
The EU’s initially expanding format symbolized an important historical landmark anda promising framework for the development of Jewish population. However, in recent
years, the EU concept and ideal found itself under major stress, demonstrated by the UK
Brexit. Disagreements about migration policies facing large Muslim population increases
in different European locales highlighted the long-standing dilemma of defining Europe’s
own cultural identity and geopolitical boundaries. Other European countries which are notpart of the EU or the FSU, including the UK (from 2020) and Turkey, have an estimatedtotal of 330,000 core Jews (25% of the European total, of which 22% live in the UK and
3% elsewhere). We also revised the Jewish population estimates for Latvia (-100).
The four former Soviet republics in Europe (Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and Moldova,
but excluding the Baltics) had a combined Jewish population of 201,900 (15% of thecontinental total). The FSU is the area where Jewish population has diminished the mostin absolute numbers since 1991 (Tolts 2008, 2014, 2015; Konstantinov 2007). Jewish
population decrease continued, reflecting emigration, a continuing excess of Jewish
deaths over Jewish births, high intermarriage rates, and low rates of Jewish identification
among the offspring of the intermarried. The ongoing process of demographic decrease
is being alleviated to some extent by the revival of Jewish educational, cultural, andreligious activities supported by American and Israeli Jewish organizations (Gitelman
2003; Remennick 2007). Nevertheless, total migration to Israel from the FSU steadily
continued: 14,471 in 2016, 16,122 in 2017, 18,887 in 2018, 24,146 in 2019, and 10,976
in 2020—representing more than half of the 19,696 new immigrants to Israel (56%). Our
2021 assessment of the total core Jewish population for the 15 FSU republics in Europe
and Asia was 224,500, of whom 210,300 were in Europe (including the 8,400 in the three
Baltic republics already accounted for in the EU) and 14,200 in Asia. The many nonJewish household members created an enlarged Jewish population nearly three times aslarge as the core (Tolts 2006, 2007, 2011, 2015). The estimate for Belarus was
downwardly revised (-1,000) based on the latest census.
A little more than 1% of the world’s Jews live in Africa and Oceania combined. The
Jewish population in Africa is mostly concentrated in South Africa whose estimatedJewish population constituted about 92% of the continental total, after a significant
downward reassessment based upon a 2019 survey (Graham 2020). Immigration
continued to keep the Jewish population in Oceania stable, where Australia accounts for
94% of the total (Graham 2021).
Overall, in 2020, the Jewish population size increased primarily in Israel, and to amodest extent in North and Central America. The Jewish population decreased to varying
degrees in South America, the European Union, other Western European countries
including the Balkans, the FSU (both in Europe and Asia), the rest of Asia, and Africa.
21

Section 2.1 Implications of alternative Jewish population definitions
In Table 3, we evaluate the Jewish population's world and regional distribution
according to several alternative definitions, as also outlined in Fig. 3. Updated and revisedcore Jewish population estimates (CJP in Table 3) are presented, along with the total of
those who have Jewish parents regardless of their current identity (PJP); the enlarged
Jewish population including non-Jewish household members (EJP); and the population
as defined by the Law of Return (LRP). Detailed country estimates are reported in the
Appendix Table. The main purpose of these alternative population boundary definitions
is to promote and facilitate comparisons across countries. In light of the preceding
discussion of definitions, it is clear that Jewish investigators and/or community leaders in
different countries sometimes follow local definitional criteria that may differ from thecriteria used in other countries. This may help explain why Jewish population size in the
US or Canada is evaluated quite differently in this and in other reports in this series(Sheskin and Dashefsky; Brym). In other words, criteria that may be preferred in one
country may not be meaningful or acceptable in another country. But in a global study
such as this, maximum comparability can be ensured only if the same criteria are appliedconsistently for all countries. The prime choice unavoidably must fall on a minimum
common denominator. By showing the implications of different definitions for Jewish
population evaluation, however, we offer readers additional ways to understand ongoing
population trends in their countries.
Starting from the core Jewish population estimate of 15,166,200 (CJP) worldwide in
2021, if we add people who state they are partly Jewish and people who are currently not
Jews but have one or two Jewish parents, a broader global population estimate of
19,937,600 (PJP) is obtained. By adding non-Jewish members of Jewish households, wearrive at an enlarged estimate of 22,626,000 (EJP). Finally, under the comprehensive
three-generation and spouse provisions of Israel's Law of Return, the total Jewish andnon-Jewish aliyah (immigration to Israel)-eligible population can be roughly estimated at
25,336,100 (LRP). All these estimates include those who already live in Israel. The US
has a significantly larger Jewish parents population (PJP) living in households with Jews
or other people with immediate Jewish background than Israel—9,800,000 million
compared with Israel’s 7,103,300.
These results, although tentative, provide interesting indications about the total sizeand geographical distribution of populations that are more or less closely attached to thecore Jewish population. The global total of those who have a Jewish parent (PJP),
regardless of their own identification, is 4,771,400 higher than the world core Jewish
population. The total number of household members who have at least one core Jew inthe household (EJP) is estimated to add an additional 2,668,400 people. Finally, the total
number eligible for the Law of Return (LRP) involves an additional 2,710,100 people. The
difference between the global Law of Return population (LRP) and core Jewish population(CJP) estimates is 10,169,900. Of these approximately 10 million partly Jewish,
somewhat Jewish-connected, or otherwise included non-Jewish members of Jewish
households, 76% live in North America, 7% in the EU, 7% in the FSU Republics in Europe
and Asia, about 5% in Israel, 3% in Latin America, 1% in other European countries, and
1% in the Rest of Asia, Africa and Oceania.

22

Table 3 Jewish population by major regions, core definition and expanded definitions (rough estimates), 1/1/2021
RegionDifferenceCore
Population
Enlarged
Law of
LRP – CJP
Jewishwith Jewish Jewish
Returnpopulationa parentsb
populationc populationd
Percent
CJP
PJP
EJP
LRP
Numberdistributione
World total
15,166,200
19,937,600
22,626,000
25,336,100
10,169,900 100.0
Israelf
6,870,900
7,103,300
7,335,700
7,335,700
464,800
4.6
Diaspora, total
8,295,300
12,834,300
15,290,300
18,000,400
9,705,100
95.4
North America
6,393,600
10,250,200
12,050,300
14,100,400
7,706,800
75.8
Latin America
367,700
504,300
605,200
716,300
348,600
3.4
European Uniong
785,600
1,011,000
1,273,100
1,517,700
732,100
7.2
g
FSU in Europe
201,900
430,800
632,500
843,000
641,100
6.3
Rest of Europeg
330,000
378,000
425,000
472,100
142,100
1.4
FSU in Asia
14,20025,70037,10050,50036,300
0.4
Rest of Asia
20,20023,90028,40032,40012,2000.1
Africa56,50071,70083,90097,10040,6000.4
Oceania
125,600
138,700
154,800
170,900
45,3000.4

Percent
expansion
LRPover CJP
67
7
117
121
95
93
318
43
256
60
72
36

a Including all persons who, when asked, identify themselves as Jews, or, if the respondent is a different person in the same household, areidentified by him/her as Jews, and do not have another religion. Also includes persons with a Jewish parent who claim no current religious or
ethnic identity
b Sum of (a) core Jewish population; (b) persons reported as partly Jewish; and (c) all others not currently Jewish with a Jewish parentc Sum of (a) core Jewish population; (b) persons reported as partly Jewish; (c) all others not currently Jewish with a Jewish parent; and (d) allother non-Jewish household members (spouses, children, etc.)
d Sum of Jews, children of Jews, grandchildren of Jews, and all respective spouses, regardless of Jewish identificatione The Former Soviet Union Baltic republics (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania) are included in the European Union. UK not included
f Including Jewish residents of East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights
g The UK included in the Rest of Europe. The Former Soviet Union Baltic republics are included in the EU

The relative impact of these population definitions linking the core Jewish population(CJP) and the Law of Return population (LRP) is quite different in the three main
geographical divisions considered in Fig. 4: Israel, the US, and the rest of Diaspora Jewry.
Since the impact of intermarriage is much lower in Israel than elsewhere, the extensions
beyond the core in Israel are quite limited and primarily reflect immigration of intermarriedhouseholds and, more recently, births in Israel from these households. With respect tothe rest of the Diaspora populations (excluding the US), the graphic portrays thesignificant expansion of population aggregates beyond the CJP. Note that with theemigration—mainly to Israel—of core Jews, the number of other people connected insome way to Judaism does not necessarily diminish across these other Diaspora Jewish
communities. The propensity of non-core Jews to change their country of residence may
be actually lower than among core Jews, but they remain nonetheless an often invisible
part of the global Jewish population configuration. On the other hand, with the passing oftime, as more Jews across all definitional categories die, the more distant circles may
eventually lose awareness of their connection to the core collective. The lower part of Fig.
4 confirms the growing dominance of US Jewry when Jewish populations are extended
beyond the core Jewish population to include the more expansive identification circles.
In sum, it is important to keep in mind that the recent research experience indicatesthat people may change their identities over time across the different circles of the core
Jewish definition, and between different core and non-core Jewish identification statuses.
It is not uncommon to see those shifts across the boundary identifying as Jewish and as‘something else’ and vice versa in response to the particular context or moment when the23question about identity is asked. At any particular moment, then, there will be a countable
Jewish population, which is not necessarily the same as any prior or future point in time.
14,000,000

LRP Law ofReturn pop.

12,000,000
10,000,000

EJP Enlarged J.
pop.

8,000,000

PJP Pop. with
J. parents

6,000,000
4,000,000

CJP Core J.
pop.

2,000,000
027,500,000
25,000,000
22,500,000
20,000,000
17,500,000
15,000,000
12,500,000
10,000,000
7,500,000
5,000,000
2,500,000
0USIsrael

15%

Other

17%

18%

Other

15%
40%

49%

51%

53%

45%

36%

32%

29%

CJP

PJP

EJP

LRP

U.S.
IsraelFig. 4 Core and extended Jewish populations in the US, Israel, and other countries, number and percent, 2021 –Revised data

24Section 3 Major Patterns and Trends in Jewish Population Distribution

Section 3.1 Socioeconomic development and the Jewish presence
Reflecting moderate growth in the global Jewish population, accompanied byincreasing concentration in a few countries, in 2021 84.9% of world Jewry lived in Israel
and the US, with 96.6% concentrated in the ten countries with the largest Jewish
populations. Thus, the aggregate of just a few major Jewish population centers virtually
determined the assessment of world Jewry’s total size and trends.
In 2021, 99.1% of world Jewry lived in the largest 25 Jewish communities, eachestimated as having populations of 10,000 or more. Excluding Israel, 98.4% of Diaspora
Jewry lived in the 24 largest communities of the Diaspora, including 72.3% in the US(Table 4). Besides the two major Jewish populations (Israel and the US), each comprisingat least six five million people, another seven countries each had more than 100,000 Jews
but less than half a million. Of these, three were in Western Europe (France, the UK, andGermany); one in Eastern Europe (Russia); one in North America (Canada); one in SouthAmerica (Argentina); and one in Oceania (Australia). The dominance of Westerncountries in the global Jewish population distribution is a relatively recent phenomenon
and reflects the West's relatively more hospitable socioeconomic and politicalcircumstances toward the Jewish presence.
The growth, or at least the slower decrease, of Jewish population in the moredeveloped Western countries is accompanied by the persistence of a higher share ofJews in the total population. Indeed, the share of Jews in a country's total population(albeit small) tends to be directly related to the country’s level of socioeconomic
development (Table 5). Regarding core Jewish populations in 2020, in Israel (including
Jews in East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights, but excluding
Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza) the share of Jews out of the total population
was 739.3 per 1000. Israel's high rate of Jewishness obviously reflects its special
positioning in Jewish identity perceptions, but Israel also has become a developed
country, and, as such, attractive to prospective migrants. In the US, the core Jewish
population represented 18.2 per 1000 of the total population; Jews comprised on average
3.6 per 1000 total population in the other seven countries with over 100,000 Jews; 0.7
per 1000 on average in the next 16 countries with 10,000 or more Jews; and virtually nil
in the remaining countries which comprise the overwhelming majority (80.2%) of the world
total population.
To further illustrate the increasing convergence between the Jewish presence and thelevel of a country’s socioeconomic development, Table 5 reports the latest available
Human Development Index (HDI) for 189 countries in 2019 (United Nations Development
Programme 2020). The HDI—a composite measure of a society's level of education,
health, and income—provides a general sense of the context in which Jewish
communities function, although it does not necessarily reflect the actual characteristics
and proximate environments of the members of those Jewish communities. Of the 25
countries listed, five are included among the top ten HDIs among 189 countries ranked(Switzerland, Germany, Sweden, Australia, and the Netherlands). Another sevencountries are ranked 11th to 25th (the UK, Belgium, Canada, the US, Austria, Israel, andSpain), five more are between 26th and 50th (France, Italy, Hungary, Chile, and Argentina),
25

seven are between 51st and 100th (Russia, Turkey, Uruguay, Panama, Mexico, Ukraine,and Brazil), and one (South Africa) is ranked 114th, pointing to lesser development in thehost society. Remarkably, all of the nine largest Jewish populations, comprising 96% ofworld Jewry, live in countries with HDIs among the top 52. The average ranking of theseven countries with 100,000 to 500,000 Jews was 24th, and the average of countries
with 10,000 to 100,000 Jews was 44th. During the past year the country HDI rank
somewhat worsened for several countries with the largest Jewish populations: the US
passed from 15th to 17th, Canada from 13th to 16th, Argentina from 46th to 48th, Germany
from 4th to 6th, and Australia from 6th to 8th. Among countries whose ranking improved,
Israel passed from 22nd to 19th, and the UK from 15th to 13th.
Table 4 25 Countries with core Jewish populations of 10,000 and more, 1/1/2021
JewishCountryCore Jewish % of total Jewish Population
population
population
In the world
rank%
Cumulative %a1Israel6,870,900
45.3
45.3
2
United States
6,000,000
39.6
84.9
3
France446,000
2.9
87.8
4Canada393,500
2.6
90.4
5
United Kingdom
292,000
1.9
92.3
6
Argentina
175,000
1.2
93.5
7
Russia150,000
1.0
94.5
8
Germany
118,000
0.8
95.2
9Australia
118,000
0.8
96.0
10Brazil
91,5000.6
96.6
11South Africa
52,0000.3
97.0
12Hungary
46,8000.3
97.3
13
Ukraine43,0000.3
97.6
14Mexico40,0000.3
97.8
15Netherlands
29,7000.2
98.0
16
Belgium
28,900
0.2
98.2
17
Italy
27,2000.2
98.4
18
Switzerland
18,4000.1
98.5
19Uruguay
16,400
0.1
98.6
20
Chile
15,9000.1
98.7
21
Sweden14,9000.1
98.8
22Turkey14,500
0.1
98.9
23
Spain
12,9000.1
99.0
24
Austria
10,3000.1
99.1
25
Panama10,0000.1
99.1

In the diaspora%
Cumulative %
b

b

72.3
5.4
4.7
3.5
2.1
1.8
1.4
1.4
1.1
0.6
0.6
0.5
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.3
0.2
0.2
0.2
0.2
0.2
0.2
0.1
0.1

72.3
77.7
82.5
86.0
88.1
89.9
91.3
92.7
93.8
94.5
95.0
95.5
96.0
96.4
96.7
97.1
97.3
97.5
97.7
97.9
98.0
98.2
98.3
98.4

a Including Jewish residents of East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights
b Not applicable

Fig. 5 demonstrates the relationship that prevails between Jewish population size
and the respective countries' human development. The horizontal axis shows the average
HDI rankings of countries regrouped by broad categories of Jewish population size (as in
Table 5). The vertical axis indicates the Jewish population size of those same groups ofcountries. It appears that a country's level of development allows or stimulates conditions
promoting more than proportionally the size of the local Jewish population. The statistical26

relationship between the HDI and the total number of Jews by average population size is
extraordinarily powerful, as indicated by an explained variance of 84% when including
Israel, and 85% when excluding Israel. The slight loss of explanatory power following
Israel's inclusion means that the strong Jewish presence in Israel cannot be exclusively
Table 5 25 largest core Jewish populations per 1,000 country's total population and Human Development Indices, 1/1/2021
JewishCountryCore
Total
Jews per2019
population
Jewishpopulation
1000 total
HDI
rank
population
populationranka
1Israelb
6,870,900
9,293,300
739.3
19
2
United States
6,000,000
329,900,000
18.2
17
3
4
5
6
7
8
9

FranceCanadaUnited Kingdom
Argentina
RussiaGermany
Australia
Total 100,000-450,000

446,000
393,500
292,000
175,000
150,000
118,000
118,000
1,692,500

64,900,000
38,200,000
67,200,000
45,400,000
146,700,000
83,300,000
25,800,000
471,500,000

6.9
10.3
4.3
3.9
1.0
1.4
4.6
3.6

26
16
13
46
52
6
8
24

10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25

BrazilSouth Africa
Hungary
UkraineMexicoNetherlands
Belgium
Italy
Switzerland
Uruguay
Chile
SwedenTurkeySpain
Austria
PanamaTotal 10,000 to 100,000
Rest of the worldc

91,50052,00046,80043,00040,00029,70028,90027,20018,40016,40015,90014,90014,50012,90010,30010,000472,400
130,400

211,800,000
59,600,000
9,800,000
41,800,000
127,800,000
17,500,000
11,500,000
60,300,000
8,600,000
3,519,000
19,500,000
10,400,000
83,700,000
47,600,000
8,900,000
4,300,000
726,619,000
6,236,208,700

0.4
0.9
4.8
1.0
0.3
1.7
2.5
0.5
2.1
4.7
0.8
1.4
0.2
0.3
1.2
2.3
0.7
0.0

84
114
40
74
74
8
14
29
2
55
43
7
54
25
18
57
44
> 100

a HDI The Human Development Index, a synthetic measure of health, education, and income (measured as US dollar purchase power parity)
among the country’s total population. See: United Nations Development Programme (2020)b Total Jewish population of Israel includes the Jewish residents of East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights. Total population
includes all residents of Israel, including East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, but only the Jewish residents and non-Jewish members of Jewish
households of the West Bank
c Average HDI rank for group of countries

explained by the environmental circumstances of high socioeconomic development, andlikely draws on deeper historical, cultural, and religious determinants. But in general terms
the relationship between Human Development and Jewish presence is certainly evident.
As a caveat, it is worth repeating that Jewish communities may display social andeconomic profiles significantly better than the average population of their respective
27

countries. Nonetheless the general societal context does affect the quality of life of eachindividual, Jews included, everywhere. Changes in the quality of life in individual countries
foreshadows changes in Jewish population distribution worldwide mostly throughinternational migration. Country ranking shifts in development levels should be monitored
carefully as they may critically affect the world Jewish population distribution.
Total Jewish population with Israel
7,000,000

Israel6,000,000

U.S.

5,000,000
4,000,000
3,000,000

Other 100,000& over2,000,000
1,000,000
0

Other 10,000
R² = 0.8399& overRest of world
120

100

80

60

40

20

HDI RANK 2019

Less developed0More developed

Total Jewish population without Israel
7,000,000

U.S.

6,000,000
5,000,000
4,000,000
3,000,000

Other 100,000& over2,000,000
1,000,000
0Rest of world
120

Less developed

100

80

Other 10,000& overR² = 0.8519

60

20

HDI RANK 201940

0More developed

Fig. 5 Major groups of countries by Human Development Index (HDI) and total core Jewish population, 2021 –Revised data

28

Section 3.2 Time comparisons
The current Jewish population distribution worldwide has been shaped by dramaticchanges in the geographic, socioeconomic, and cultural profile of world Jewry—
particularly since the independence of the State of Israel, but also since the June 1967
war in Israel. As an illustration of the intervening changes, we report the world distributionof core Jewish population by major geographical regions at four points in time: 1948,
1970, 2000, and 2021 (Fig. 6).

Fig. 6 Core Jewish populations by major regions, 1948, 1970, 2000, 2021, thousands – Revised data

Two opposing trends emerge from this comparison covering more than 70 years: onthe one hand, Israel’s Jewish population increased from being a small community in 1948
to being the main home of the world’s Jewish population by 2021; on the other hand, we
see the decline, and in some cases the disappearance, of the major Jewish population
centers in Eastern Europe and the Balkans, the FSU in Europe and the FSU in Asia, andthe Islamic countries of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Declines of a lesser
scale are also evident in Latin America and Southern Africa. North America, and to alesser extent Western Europe, maintained relatively stable Jewish population sizes,
although in the latter case through a significant turnaround of immigration and emigration
streams. As already noted, the tendency over time was a much greater consolidation ofworld Jewry in the two major centers, the US (shown together with Canada in Fig. 6) and29

Israel, compared with a much more dispersed Jewish population worldwide shortly afterWorld War II.
A more detailed picture of the changes intervening between 1970 and 2021 appears
in Table 6. Here we compare the numbers and ranks for the 33 countries with a Jewish
population of at least 20,000 in 1970—based on revised estimates and using the detailed
country list that emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union (FSU), Yugoslavia, andCzechoslovakia. Striking changes occurred in size and global ranking of countries’ Jewish
populations during the 51 years between 1970 and 2021. Seven countries had a larger
Jewish population in 2021 than in 1970. Quantitatively, the most remarkable finding isthat Israel's Jewish population more than doubled from 2,581,000 to 6,870,900(+166.2%). The greatest percentage growth occurred in Germany (+293.3%). Absolute
population increases were also recorded in Australia (+81.5%), Canada (+37.6%), Mexico(+14.3%), the US (+8.8%), and Brazil (+1.7%). The other 26 countries witnessed Jewish
population decreases, with nine countries losing more than 90% of their 1970 population(Ethiopia, Morocco, and the seven former Soviet republics of Moldova, Georgia,
Uzbekistan, Belarus, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Lithuania). Five more countries lost 80%
to 90% of their 1970 Jewish populations: Iran, Romania, and the FSU republics of Latvia,
Azerbaijan, and Russia. Other countries that lost more than 50% of their 1970 Jewish
population included Turkey and South Africa. An entirely different ranking of the major
communities consequently emerged. The top five in 1970 were the US, Israel, Russia,
Ukraine, and France; in 2019 they had become Israel, US, France, Canada, and the UK.
Ethiopia lost 51 positions in the global ranking of Jewish populations, Georgia lost 33 andMoldova 32. Germany gained 19 rank positions, Switzerland 15, and the Netherlands 13.
Yet while the country that ranked 33rd in 1970 (Switzerland) had 20,000 Jews, in 2021 thecountry with the same rank (India) had 4,800 Jews.
The geographical realignment of world Jewry reflects past suffering from political
discrimination, persecution and lack of democracy, as well as inferior socioeconomic
development and economic opportunities in countries that lost their Jewish populations.
The consequent mass migration from those countries generated large Jewish population
declines, mostly in Eastern Europe, Asia, and Africa. On the other hand, countries thatoffered greater freedom and a wider range of socioeconomic opportunities witnessed
steady Jewish population growth or at least stability (DellaPergola 2020b). This resulted
in a huge westernization of world Jewry.

Section 3.3 Dispersion and Concentration
In 2020, 102 countries had at least 100 Jews (Table 7). Two countries had Jewish
populations of 6 million or more each (Israel and the US), another seven countries had
more than 100,000 Jews (but less than 500,000), two had 50,000 to 99,999, six had
25,000 to 49,999, eight had 10,000 to 24,999, seven had 5,000 to 9,999, 28 had 1,000 to
4,999, and 42 had 100 to 999. The 77 communities each with less than 10,000 Jews
together accounted for less than 1% of world Jewry.

30

Table 6 Countries with at least 20,000 Jews in 1970, and core Jewish population in 2021
Country
United States
IsraelRussiaUkraineFranceUnited Kingdom
CanadaArgentina
BelarusSouth Africa
Uzbekistan
Moldova
BrazilIran
Hungary
Romania
Australia
Georgia
MoroccoAzerbaijan
TurkeyLatviaMexicoBelgium
Uruguay
Italy
Germany
Netherlands
Chile
Kazakhstan
Ethiopia
Lithuania
Switzerland

1970

Rank

2021

Rank

%
changeRank
diff.

5,515,000
2,581,000
807,900
777,100
530,000
390,000
286,000
282,000
148,000
118,000
102,900
98,10090,00072,00070,00070,00065,00055,40045,00041,30039,00036,70035,00032,50032,00032,00030,00030,00030,00027,70025,00023,60020,000

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33

6,000,000
6,870,900
150,000
43,000446,000
292,000
393,500
175,000
7,200
52,0002,800
1,700
91,5009,400
46,8008,800
118,000
1,400
2,100
7,000
14,5004,300
40,00028,90016,40027,200118,000
29,70015,900
2,400
100
2,300
18,400

2
1
7
13
3
5
4
6
25
11
37
44
10
28
12
26
9
51
46
29
22
45
14
15
19
16
8
15
20
43
82
45
18

8.8%
166.2%-81.4%-94.5%-15.8%-25.1%
37.6%-37.9%-95.1%-55.9%-97.3%-98.3%
1.7%-86.9%-33.1%-87.4%
81.5%-97.5%-95.3%-83.1%-62.8%-88.3%
14.3%-11.1%-48.8%-15.0%
293.3%-1.0%-47.0%-91.3%-99.6%-90.3%
-8.0%

-1
1
-4
-9
2
1
3
2
-16
-1
-26
-32
3
-14
3
-10
8
-33
-27
-9
-1
-23
9
9
6
10
19
13
9
-13
-51
-13
15

a Ranked as of 1970. In bold Jewish population that increased in absolute size. The following countries had Jewish populations among the 33
largest in 2020, but not in 1970: Sweden, Spain, Austria, Denmark, Panama, New Zealand, Venezuela, and India

In only five Diaspora countries did Jews constitute at least 5 per 1000 (or 0.5%) of thetotal population. In descending order by the relative share (not size) of their Jewish
population size, they were Gibraltar (22.9 Jews per 1000 inhabitants), the US (18.2),
Monaco (17.5), Canada (10.3), and France (6.9). The case of Israel is very different, witha core Jewish population that represents 73.9% of the total legal population, and an
enlarged Jewish population that represents 78.9% of the total population. In both Israel
and the Diaspora, the percentage of Jews out of the total population has been decreasing.

31

Table 7 World core Jewish population distribution, by number and proportion per 1,000 total population, 1/1/2021
Number of coreJews per 1000 total population
Jews in country
Total
Less than 1.0 1.0-4.9
5.0-9.9
Number of countries
Totala10272
24
1100-9994236
41,000-4,999
28
26
25,000-9,999
7
52
10,000-24,999
8
2
6
25,000-49,999
62
450,000-99,999
2
1
1
100,000-999,999
75
11,000,000 or more
2
Jewish population distribution (number of core Jews)
Totalb15,166,200
344,900
1,108,700
446,000
100-999
11,8008,900
1,400
1,000-4,999
66,60060,5006,100
5,000-9,999
51,30037,40013,90010,000-24,999
113,300
27,40085,90025,000-49,999
215,600
67,200148,400
50,000-99,999
143,500
143,500
100,000-999,999
1,692,500
853,000
446,000
1,000,000 or more
12,870,900
Jewish population distribution (percent of world core Jewish population)
Totalb
100.0
2.3
7.3
2.9
100-9990.1
0.1
0.0
1,000-4,999
0.4
0.4
0.0
5,000-9,999
0.3
0.2
0.1
10,000-24,999
0.7
0.2
0.6
25,000-49,999
1.4
0.4
1.0
50,000-99,999
0.9
0.9
100,000-999,999
11.2
5.6
2.9
1,000,000 or more
84.9-

10.0-19.9

20.0+

4
2
1
1

1
1

6,395,000
1,500
393,500
6,000,000

6,870,900
6,870,900

42.2
0.0
-

45.3
-

2.6
39.6

45.3

a Not including countries with fewer than 100 core Jews
b Grand total includes countries with fewer than 100 core Jews, for a total of 700 core Jews. Minor discrepancies due to rounding
Israel including Jewish residents of East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights

By combining the two criteria of Jewish population size and percentage of Jews, we
obtain the following taxonomy of the 24 countries with Jewish populations over 10,000(excluding Israel). Three countries have over 100,000 Jews and at least 5 Jews per 1000
total population: the US, Canada, and France. Five more countries have over 100,000
Jews and at least 1 Jew per 1,000 of the total population: Australia, the UK, the RussianFederation, Argentina, and Germany. Ten more countries have 10,000 to 99,999 Jews
and at least 1 Jew per 1000 of the total population: Ukraine, Hungary, Belgium, theNetherlands, Switzerland, Chile, Uruguay, Sweden, Austria, and Panama. Six countries
have 10,000 to 99,999 Jews and less than 1 Jew per 1000 total population: South Africa,
Brazil, Mexico, Italy, Turkey, and Spain.
32

Over the past decades, the basic size-and-density typology of Jewish communities
throughout the world did not change as much as the underlying changes witnessed byindividual countries. Table 8 shows the configuration of Jewish populations in 2021 ascompared to 1984, the first year for which such tabulation is available (Schmelz andDellaPergola 1986). The 1984 data are reported here unrevised and in the original formatof the countries and territories that existed then.
Table 8 World core Jewish population distribution, by number of Jews in country, 1984 and 2021
Number of Jews
in a country
Totala100-999
1,000-4,999
5,000-9,999
10,000-49,999
50,000-99,999
100,000-999,999
1,000,000-4,999,999
5,000,000 or more

N. of countries
1984
2021
74
23
17
7
16
2
6
2
1

102
42
28
7
14
2
7
0
2

Jewish population
1984
12,963,300
11,00041,90043,800362,400
136,500
1,616,000
5,046,700
5,705,000

2021

15,166,200
11,80066,60051,300328,900
143,500
1,692,500
012,870,900% of world's Jews
1984
2021
100.0
0.1
0.3
0.3
2.8
1.1
12.4
38.8
43.9

100.0
0.1
0.4
0.3
2.2
0.9
11.2
0.0
84.9

a Number of countries does not include countries with fewer than 100 core Jews. Population and percent figures include countries with fewer
than 100 core Jews, for a total of 700
Sources: Schmelz and DellaPergola (1986); Table 7 above

The number of countries with at least 100 Jews increased from 74 to 102, following
the dissolution of the USSR, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, and several more countries
with very small Jewish communities reaching the 100-person threshold. The greatest
increase was in the number of countries with less than 1,000 Jews, from 23 in 1984 to 43
in 2020. At the top of the distribution, two countries in 2020 had 6M Jews or more, while
in 1984 one country had more than 5M and two had between one and five million: Israel
and the USSR. In the meantime, Israel increased and the USSR split into 15 states andlost most of its Jews through emigration.
Countries with between 100,000 and one million Jews comprised 12.4% of total
Jewish population in 1984 compared with 11.2% in 2021. Of the 15 republics of the FSU,
only Russia had more than 100,000 Jews in 2021. Brazil and South Africa had more than
100,000 Jews in 1984, but fewer in 2021. Germany and Australia had fewer Jews in 1984
but more in 2021. France, Canada, the UK, and Argentina were included in the countries
with more than 100,000 Jews for both dates, but the gap between Canada and Argentina
had more than trebled, from 65,000 in 1984 to 218,500 in 2021.
Communities with populations of between 10,000 and 100,000 Jews comprised 3.9%of the world Jewish population across 18 countries in 1984, compared with 3.1% of theworld Jewish population across 16 countries in 2021. Among the smaller Jewish
communities, those with less than 10,000 Jews comprised—both 1984 and 2021—lessthan 1% of world Jewry; in 1984, however, they were distributed across 47 countries andin 2021 they were distributed across 77 countries. The apparent stability of the overall
distribution reflected a strong concentration of Jewish populations in a few countries at
the top and a wide dispersion of very small numbers in many countries at the bottom. The
transition from a concentration of Jews in one dominant and two secondary centers, to aconfiguration based on two main centers reflected the quite revolutionary changes
experienced by world Jewry in the transition from the 20th to the 21st century.
33Section 4 Jewish Population in Major Individual Countries
In previous volumes of the AJYB, we provided short profiles of the demographic trends
for each of the largest Jewish populations in individual countries or regional areas. In
2020 and 2021, several of these countries undertook a national census, whose results
were not yet available at the time of writing. Pending such updates, and given thegenerally gradual and slow motion of demographic change, we shall not repeat here thedetailed descriptions of sources and patterns that appeared in previous volumes of the
AJYB and refer readers to those volumes (DellaPergola 2021a). In what follows below,
we shall only review in some detail to the demographic trends and updates concerning
the two largest Jewish populations, Israel and the United States.

Section 4.1 Israel
8.4.1.1 General
Since the end of the first decade of the 21st century, Israel is the country with the largest
core Jewish population worldwide. It is also the only country with a substantial rate of
population growth—1.44% in 2020. With a Total Fertility Rate (TFR) of 3 children currently
born per Jewish woman in 2020, and a relatively young age composition (27.1% underage 15 vs.13.7% age 65 and over), Jews in Israel display the highest fertility among
Jewish populations worldwide (Israel Central Bureau of Statistics). Fertility is largely
above generational replacement and continues to sustain a share of children about twicethat of the elderly among the total Jewish population. Israel’s current Jewish fertility rate
is higher than the fertility for the total population in any other developed country(Population Reference Bureau 2021) and twice or more the current average of Jewish
children among women in most Diaspora Jewish communities (alternatively, the effective
Jewish fertility rate). This reflects not only the large family size of the more religious
Jewish population, but also a diffused and persistent desire for children among themoderately traditional and secular, especially among the upwardly mobile (DellaPergola
2009c, 2009d, 2015b). A moderately positive international migration balance also helps
Israel's Jewish population to increase. Information on religion is mandatory in official
population data regularly collected through the permanent Population Register
maintained by the Ministry of Internal Affairs (Israel Population and Migration Authority)and published by the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS).
Annual data derive from periodic censuses and detailed accountancy of intervening
events (births, deaths, arrivals to the country including immigrants, departures from thecountry including emigrants, and changes of religion). In the case of Jews and Judaism,
the defining concept is a combination of religion and ethnicity according to rabbinic law(Halakhah). At the beginning of 2021, Israel’s core Jewish population reached 6,870,900,
compared with 6,773,400 in 2020, this figure excluding people who had been absent fromthe country for one year or more. These figures refer to all Jews who live within Israel’s
internationally recognized boundaries, in East Jerusalem, in the West Bank, and on theGolan Heights. The core population combined with the addition of 464,800 Others—nonJewish members of households who immigrated under the Law of Return and their Israelborn children—formed a Law of Return Jewish population of 7,335,700 in 2021, of whichthese Others constituted 6.3% (Israel Central Bureau of Statistics). We assume about34

half of the members of Jewish households who are not recognized as Jewish by the
Rabbinate have one Jewish parent. The Jewish parent population of Israel is thus
estimated at 7,103,300 for 2021.
For the past several years, the main component of Jewish population growth in Israel
has been the natural increase resulting from an excess of births over deaths. In 2020,
129,860 Jewish births and 40,369 Jewish deaths produced a net natural increase of
89,491 Jews. This represented 87% of Israeli Jews' total growth in 2020. Fig. 7
demonstrates the changes in birth rates and death rates for Jews and Muslims in Israel
between 1955 and 2020. The two birth rate lines in a sense mirror each other, withperiodic increases and periodic decreases. A major adjustment toward lower natality, orbirthrate, has occurred among Israel's Muslims since the end of the 1990s, with aconcomitant increase among Jews. Aside from different fertility levels, this largely
reflected differences and changes in age compositions and age at first marriage in therespective populations (Staetsky 2019a). Death rates tended to be low and decreasing
among both populations, but for most of the second half of the 20th century they werelower among Muslims due to their comparatively younger age composition. For example,
in 2020 the overall birthrate of Jews and others was 18.5 per 1000 population (19.0 for
Jews only), versus 21.8 per 1000 for all Arab and other Muslims, Christians, and Druze(23.1 for Muslims only). The death rate was 5.8 per 1000 Jews and others (5.9 for Jews
only), compared with 3.2 per 1000 for Arabs and others (3.0 for Muslims only). Such
differences significantly affected the respective rates of natural increase: 12.7 per 1000
Jews and others (13.1 for Jews only) compared with 18.6 per 1000 Arabs and others(20.1 for Muslims only). The consequence—as demonstrated in Fig. 7, particularly forJews and Muslims—was that in 2020 the Arab population continued to grow at a rate
more than 0.5% than the Jewish population.

Fig. 7 Births and deaths per 1000 population among Jews and Muslims in Israel, 1955-202035

Regarding the whole complex of components of population change, of the 21,000 new
immigrants and immigrant citizens in 2020—including Israeli citizens born abroad whoentered the country for the first time—13,000 were Jewish. This means that 8,000 (38%)
were not recorded as Jewish. The net balance of Jewish migrants was 11,200 also
comprising Jewish Israelis leaving the country and returning to the country after aprolonged period abroad. Therefore, an estimated 1,800 Jews (13,000 - 11,200) joined
the pool of those who resided abroad permanently or for the long term. This is a singularly
low figure, probably related to the traveling restrictions imposed by the Covid-19
pandemic. The total number of Israelis—Jews and non-Jews—permanently residing
abroad was estimated at 563,000 to 601,000 at the end of 2018 (Israel Central Bureau of
Statistics 2020). Regarding the Others (not classified as Jewish by religion), in 2020 there
were 7,900 immigrants, and the net migration balance was the same, implying a zero net
balance between returning and leaving veteran Israeli residents recorded as Others.
These data about Israel's international migration balance point to a moderate to low levelof immigration compared with other historical periods, but also to extremely low levels of
emigration from an historical perspective. In 2020, the total number of new immigrants—'olim hadashim, Jewish and non-Jewish, not including immigrant citizens—diminished to
16,696, compared with 33,096 in 2019 (discussed further below).
The number of converts to Judaism remained low and comprised only a tiny
percentage of the non-Jewish members of Jewish households in Israel, especially among
recent immigrants (Fisher 2013, 2015, 2019; Waxman 2013). In fact, the number of
Others increased from 447,300 in 2020 to 464,800 (+3.9% compared with a total Jewish
population increase of 1.44%). Israel's Central Rabbinate pursued a rather rigid
conversion policy and did not adopt proposals to develop a unified conversion programthat would pertain to all denominations (Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs 1998-99; Nissim
2018). In 2020, the net balance of conversions to and from Judaism was nil (Israel Central
Bureau of Statistics annual). The balance of movement to and from those eschewing
religious status was minimally negative, -700. The beneficiaries were Islam (+600) andChristian denominations (+100). Some religious intermarriages probably underpin thesefigures, although in Israel the levels of ethnoreligious marriage were overall quite low(DellaPergola 2017d).
Section 4.1.2 Israel and Palestinian Territory
Turning now to the territorial aggregate of Israel and of the Palestinian Territories(West Bank and Gaza—WBG), Table 9 reports the numbers of Jews, Others (i.e., nonJewish people who are members of Jewish households and Israeli citizens by theprovisions of the Law of Return), Arabs, as well as foreign workers, undocumented
tourists, and refugees. Each group's total is shown for different territorial divisions: theState of Israel within the pre-1967 borders, East Jerusalem, the Golan Heights, the West
Bank, and Gaza. The percentage of Jews (by the Law of Return definition) in each division
is also shown. At the beginning of 2021, of a total 6,870,900 core Jews, 6,168,800 lived
within Israel's pre-1967 borders; 232,400 lived in neighborhoods of East Jerusalem thatwere incorporated after 1967; 23,900 on the Golan Heights; and 445,800 lived in the WestBank. The Jerusalem figure was revised in light of updated information (Jerusalem
Institute for Policy Research 2021). Over the years, the pace of Jewish internal migrationfrom Israel's pre-1967 area (including in this case also East Jerusalem) to the West Bank36

was significantly correlated with levels of unemployment and emigration from Israel(DellaPergola 2021b). In 2020, for the first time, the Jewish migration balance between
the West Bank and the main area of Israel was negative: compared with 36,000 new
entries, 37,900 people left (Israel Central Bureau of Statistics annual). There are today
as many Jews in the West Bank as in France.
In 2021, core Jews represented 74.3% of Israel’s total legal population of, 9,293,300
inclusive of 1,957,600 Arabs and others, but excluding 197,300 foreign workers,
undocumented tourists, and asylum seekers (Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, Monthly).
On 1/1/2021, the 197,300 had diminished by nearly 10,000 compared with the previous
year, and comprised 98,188 legal foreign workers, 18,136 undocumented foreign
workers, 48,600 tourists whose visas had expired, 1,909 asylum seekers, and 30,511
illegal entrants (Israel Population and Migration Authority 2021). Israel's Law of Return
Jewish population of 7,335,700 in 2021 represented 78.9% of the state's total legal
population. Israel's Arab population, including East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights,
comprised 21.1% of the total legal population. As shown in Table 9, the Law of Return
Jewish population represented 77.3% of total residents within pre-1967 borders (including
foreign workers and refugees), 39.9% in East Jerusalem, 49.2% in the Golan Heights,
and 14.5% of the West Bank's total population. Since 2005, no Jewish population remains
in Gaza.
Table 9 Core and enlarged Jewish population, Arab population, foreign workers and refugees in Israel andPalestinian Territory by territorial divisions, 1/1/2021a
Area

Core Jewish
population(1)
Grand total
State of Israele
Thereof:Pre-1967 borders
East Jerusalemf
Golan Heights
West Bank
Palestinian Territory (WBG)
West Bank
Gaza

OthersLaw ofReturnpopulationb

Arabpopulationand others

Foreignworkersandrefugeesc

Total

6,870,900
6,870,900(2)464,800
464,800(3)
7,335,700
7,335,700(4)
6,626,500
1,957,600(5)
197,300
197,300(6)
14,159,500
9,490,600

6,168,800
232,400
23,900445,800

445,600
7,300
1,900
10,0006,614,400
239,700
25,800455,800

1,570,100
360,900
26,600

197,300-

8,381,800
600,600
52,400

i

i

0

i

0

0

g

4,668,900
2,688,900
1,980,000-

455,800
4,668,900
2,688,900
1,980,000

a Revised rounded figuresb Sum of columns 1 and 2c All foreign workers, undocumented residents and refugees were allocated to Israel within pre-1967 borders. Source: Israel Population and
Migration Authority (2021)
d Column 3 divided by column 6e As defined by Israel's legal system
f Estimated from Jerusalem Institute for Policy Research (2021)
g Included under Palestinian Territory
h Percent of Jews and others out of total population in the West Bank under Israeli or Palestinian Authority jurisdiction
i Included under State of Israel
Sources: Israel Central Bureau of Statistics; Israel Population and Migration Authority; PCBS Palestine Central Bureau of Statistics; United
Nations Population Fund; and author's estimates

37

Percent of
Law ofReturnpopulationd
(7)
51.8
77.3
78.9
39.9
49.2
14.5h
-

Regarding the Palestinian population in WBG, in November 2017 the PalestinianCentral Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) undertook a new census which enumerated
4,705,600 people, of whom 1,875,300 lived in Gaza and 2,830,300 in the West Bank—
including 281,200 in East Jerusalem. The census results were about 250,000 lower thanthe estimated projection of 4,952,168 available from the PCBS' website (PCBS 2018).
The PCBS Jerusalem's population estimate was a clear undercount because of theirlimited access to the city (PCBS 2008, 2009a, 2009b, 2018). This would imply an annual
growth rate of 1.84% since 2007 in the West Bank (not including East Jerusalem) and
2.84% in Gaza—as opposed to 2.40% for Muslims in Israel (including East Jerusalem)
during the same period (Israel Central Bureau of Statistics annual). These growth rates
were much lower than in the past and pointed to significant differentiation within the
Arab/Palestinian population. The total rate of growth of Israeli Jews was 1.44% in 2020
with immigration, and 1.31% without immigration. The Palestinian population's growthrate in WBG was decreasing as well due to net emigration. According to Israel's IDF
Civilian Administration in Judea and Samaria (2018), the total of Palestinians recorded in
the West Bank population register surpassed 3 million, but this figure did not discountsufficiently for Palestinian residents permanently living abroad. Keeping in mind the data
in Fig. 8, among the Arab population both birthrates and death rates probably continued
to be somewhat higher in the Palestinian Territory than in Israel, and significantly higher
than among the Jewish population. There was a minor internal migration flow from Gaza
to the West Bank, estimated at 2,671 people as of mid-2019 (Hass 2019), which
continued in 2020. In the process, most Christian Palestinians had left Gaza because
they felt persecuted (Casper 2020).
Our adjusted population estimates for WGB at the beginning of 2021 is 4,668,900, ofwhom 2,688,900 live in the West Bank and 1,980,000 in Gaza. These figures (always
excluding East Jerusalem) are lower than the Palestinian census because they exclude
people, students, and others, who actually resided abroad for more than one year. The
Palestinian CBS displays further contradictory figures for 2020. One result from a
population projection was 5,101,100 within their own definition of the total Palestinian
Territory (including Jerusalem), of which 3,053,100 live in the West Bank, and 2,048,000
in Gaza. The other can be deduced by combining absolute numbers of births and deaths
with the reported birth and death rates per 1000 population. This would give a total of
4,331,500, of which 2,851,200 live in the West Bank and 1,480,300 in Gaza. Some of thegap may be due to under- or late reporting of vital events, but unquestionably some doubt
remains about who is counted: the legal resident population or those actually (de facto)
present. Other much lower estimates of WBG population were suggested (e.g.,
Zimmerman et al. 2005a, 2005b; Feitelson 2013), but rather than ascertained
demographic criteria, they reflected political narratives (see also Miller 2015).
The Arab population of East Jerusalem (plus a few thousand in the Westernneighborhood), which we have included in Israel's population count, was assessed at
366,900 at the beginning of 2021, and constituted 38.5% of Jerusalem's total populationof 952,300 (Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, Choshen et al. 2010 and 2012; Jerusalem
Institute of Israel Studies 2015; Jerusalem Institute for Policy Research 2016, 2020, 2021;
DellaPergola 2008b). This was amazingly close, with a total error of 0.6%, to a population
projection elaborated on behalf of the Jerusalem Municipality in their Strategic Plan 2020
based on 1995 data (DellaPergola 2001b; DellaPergola and Rebhun 2003).
38

By adding the 1,957,600 Arab population of Israel, including East Jerusalem, and the4,668,900 estimated Palestinians in WBG, a total of 6,626,500 Arabs/Palestinians obtains
for the whole territory between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, comparedwith the total enlarged Jewish population of 7,335,700.
Table 10 reports the percentage of Jews according to the core and Law of Return
definitions, out of the total population of the combined territory of Israel and WBG. Suchpercentages are conditional upon two factors: which definitional criteria are applied inaddressing the question of who is a Jew, and which territorial boundaries are chosen forassessment. Relative to this territorial grand total, we demonstrate the potential effect on
the existence and size of a Jewish population majority when gradually and cumulatively
subtracting from the initial maximum possible Arab/Palestinian population of designatedareas as well as the foreign workers and refugees. The result is gradual growth of thepotential Jewish share of the total population, along with hypothesized diminishing
territorial and total population extents.
Table 10 Percent of core and Law of Return Jewish population in Israel and Palestinian Territory, according todifferent territorial definitions, 1/1/2021
Area
Grand total of Israel and Palestinian Territory
Minus foreign workers and refugees
Minus Gaza
Minus Golan Heights
Minus West Bank
Minus East Jerusalem

Percentage of Jewsa by definition
Core
48.5
49.2
57.3
57.5
74.1
77.2

Law of Return
51.8
52.5
61.2
61.4
79.2
82.4

a Total Jewish population of Israel, including East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights. In each row, Arabs and others of mentioned
area are deducted and the percentages are recalculated accordingly
Source: Table 8.9

A total combined Jewish, Arab, and Other population of 14,159,500 lived in Israel and
the Palestinian Territories (WBG) at the beginning of 2021, including foreign workers,
undocumented tourists, and refugees. The core Jewish population of 6,870,900
represented 48.5% of this total between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, of
which the State of Israel is part and parcel. Thus, by the Orthodox rabbinic definition of
who is a Jew, the extant Jewish majority not only is constantly decreasing but actually
does not exist any longer among the broader aggregate of people currently found over
the whole territory between the Sea and the River (DellaPergola 2003a, 2003b, 2007a,
2011a; Soffer and Bistrow 2004; Soffer 2015). If the 464,800 Others (non-Jewish
members of Jewish households) are added to the core Jewish population, the Law ofReturn Jewish population of 7,335,700 represented 51.8% of the total population in Israel
and the Palestinian Territories—a narrow majority. If we subtract from the grand total the197,300 foreign workers, undocumented tourists and asylum seekers, the core andenlarged Jewish populations rise to 49.2% and 52.5% of the total population
respectively—including those legally resident in Israel plus the Palestinian Territory—
estimated at 13,962,200 in 2021. After subtracting the population of Gaza, thepercentages of Jews out of total rise to 57.3% (core) and 61.2% (Law of Return). If one
subtracts the Druze population of the Golan Heights, the Jewish percentages rise to57.5% and 61.4%, respectively. If one further subtracts the Palestinian population of the39

West Bank, the Jewish percentages become 74.1% and 79.2%, respectively; and theArab population of East Jerusalem are also subtracted, the percentages rise to 77.2%
and 82.4%. Interestingly, those who claim the much lower Palestinian population
estimates are authoritative argue that the percentage of Jews (Law of Return) out of thetotal population of Israel and West Bank combined is 65% (Ettinger 2019), compared with
our estimated 61.4%. A spirited and aggressive debate has been occurring for several
years about a modest 3.6% difference in figures. The reality is that under current
demographic trends, the rate of erosion of the Jewish majority is about 0.1% per year.
The same data are graphically presented in Fig. 8.

Fig 8 Percent Jewish out of total population of Israel and Palestine by different territorial and Jewish population
definitions, 2021

Section 4.2 The United States
Section 4.2.1 GeneralIn the US, in the absence of official census documentation, Jewish population estimates
must rely on alternative sources. These are now quite abundant, though of very unequalquality (Goldstein 1981, 1989, 1992; Perlmann 2007; DellaPergola 2005 and 2013b;
Sheskin 2015a). In 2020, the Pew Research Center in Washington, DC, undertook afollow-up study (Pew Research Center 2021) to their 2013 Portrait of Jewish Americans(Pew Research Center 2013). The following overview discusses how the new evidence
can be incorporated within the general context and main research issues of US Jewish
demography.
The quest for US national Jewish population estimates relies on three major
strategies:
The first strategy, including the two mentioned Pew Research Center studies, hasbeen to carry out independent national Jewish population surveys. Since the end of World
40

War II, several major national surveys were undertaken in the US. The Bureau of the
Census’ 1957 Current Population Survey CPS (US Census Bureau 1958, 1968; Glick
1960; Goldstein 1969) relied on a large sample of the total national population. National
Jewish Population Studies (NJPS), sponsored by (what is today) the Jewish Federationsof North America (JFNA), specifically targeted national samples of Jews. Three NJPSs
were conducted in 1970/1 (Massarik 1974; Lazerwitz 1978), 1990 (Kosmin et al. 1991),
and 2000/1 (Kotler-Berkowitz et al. 2003). The earliest of the three relied on
conglomerated Jewish organization lists and on canvassing randomly chosen areas; thetwo later ones were based on random digit dialing (RDD) extracted from a broader
screening of the total national population. The 1991 and 2008 American Religious Identity
Surveys (ARIS) (Kosmin and Lachman 1993; Kosmin and Keysar 2009) and the 2001
American Jewish Identity Survey (AJIS) (Mayer et al. 2001), followed similar procedures.
The 2013 and 2020 Pew surveys likewise screened a Jewish sample from an initialbroader national sample and reported a net Jewish population of 6.7M and 7.5M,
respectively. The Pew initiatives should be praised in that they filled the void following the
JFNA withdrawal from supporting systematic Jewish population research. Numerous
other national surveys included subsamples of Jews, but the latter were generally small
and did not offer a sufficient basis for detailed analyses of Jewish population
characteristics. For all purposes, the logic of working nationally to obtain a national Jewish
population estimate is the same by which, since 1790, a national population census (andnot a compilation of local or state statistics) was held in the US (US Bureau of the
Census). Of the three research strategies, only this one was designed a priori todetermine a nationwide Jewish population estimate. The 2020 Pew study results areevaluated below in some detail reporting about, but independently of the official survey
report (Pew Research Center 2021).
The second strategy (see the US Jewish Population report in this series), since thebeginnings of US Jewish population studies at turn of the 19th century (The American
Jewish Year Book 1899, Linfield 1942, Robison 1943), has been to construct a national
total from a compilation of existing local Jewish population estimates, and previously the
US Censuses of Religious Bodies (Schwartz et al. 2002). Based on their compilation of
local estimates, Sheskin and Dashefsky evaluated the US Jewish population at 7.3 million(see the US Jewish Population report in this series). While local Jewish community
studies are still the most important tool for local Jewish community planning, themethodology of summing local studies to obtain a national estimate is problematic, as theauthors themselves conceded (Sheskin and Dashefsky 2007, 2010, 2017; Sheskin 2008,2009). Among the main shortcomings are the diversity of databases and definitions, thelack of synchronization in time, and the very uneven quality of the technical procedures
followed, including sometimes embarrassing skill gaps across different polling firms.
When it comes to national Jewish population estimates which, as noted, local studies
were not designed to supply, local Jewish community summations may risk cumulating
significant errors and biases, including double counts of geographically mobile individuals(Rebhun and Goldstein 2006, Groeneman and Smith 2009). Combined use of these local
databases can, nonetheless, provide valuable grounds for comparisons and in-depth
multivariate analysis (Hartman and Sheskin 2012; Hartman et al. 2017).
The third more recent strategy has been to construct a national total through a
combined analysis of a pool of national and local surveys periodically undertaken by41

public and private bodies, each of which include a small subsample of Jews (see an
explanation of this concept in Saxe and Tighe 2013). Such combined analysis of a large
set of general social surveys underpins the American Jewish Population Project (AJPP)
and represents an innovative and ambitious project conducted at Brandeis University’s
Steinhardt Social Research Institute (SSRI) (Saxe et al. 2006b; Tighe et al. 2005, 2009a,
2009b). Jewish population estimates suggested by AJPP, based on a synthesis ofsurveys conducted between 2012 and 2020 and additional inference, stood at 7.6 million
in 2020, plus or minus a margin of error of over 300,000 (SSRI 2019a, 2019b; Saxe 2019;
Tighe et al. 2019; Saxe et al. 2021; Tighe et al. 2021). Among several caveats concerning
the AJPP, probably the most important is that it attempts to estimate Jewish populations
based on surveys which include a Jewish category as one option in a question about
religious identity (Magidin de Kramer et al. 2018; Hackett 2014). The category of Jews of
No Religion is then introduced, which must come from other sources or speculation. In
the AJPP analysis, this unknown additional Jewish category was assessed based on the
proportion of Jews of No Religion in the 2013 Portrait of Jewish Americans (Pew
Research Center 2013). The AJPP estimate, while claiming independence and notnecessarily accepting the reliability of national surveys like Pew's, built its own models of
the proportion of people of Jewish origin who declare they have no religion borrowing thepercentages from the same Pew survey (or from contemporaneous local Jewish
population studies where available). But at the same time the same research persuasively
demonstrated that the percentage of people declaring themselves as Jews of No Religion
clearly depended on who the sponsor was of a given research project (Tighe et al. 2009a,2011). If it was a Jewish organization, the proportion eschewing a straightforward Jewish
self-definition was higher than if the research project was sponsored by a government,
local authority, or general social survey. The Pew Research Center is indeed a general,
prestigious and highly reliable research organization, and usually does research about
religion among the total US population (and worldwide), including reference to Jewish
minorities (e.g. Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life 2008; Pew Research Center 2015a).
At the same time, its national Jewish population surveys can be identified by respondents
as Jewish-oriented, with all the associated biases. Moreover, AJPP Jewish population
estimates at the county level are obtained through a logistic regression model thatpredicts the likelihood that an adult would identify as Jewish if asked about religion basedon other personal characteristics. Factors involved in weighting the model include
geographic distribution, sex, age, race/ethnicity, and educational attainment. The model
is fit using Bayesian multilevel estimation with post-stratification (BMP) (SSRI 2019c). In
other words, in many cases Jewishness of an individual is not determined by a direct
investigation of the personal religious or otherwise cultural identity of the interviewees
and instead reflects a blind statistical iteration based on predetermined assumptions
whose margin of error can be substantial. This contradicts a basic tenet in the social
scientific study of Jewry that characteristics of Jews and possible differences between
Jews and others should be ascertained empirically and not attributed a priori based on
hypotheses. Even if the Jews by Religion estimates were accurate, the further attempt to
extrapolate the real number of Jews from sources that only deal with religion—instead of
directly ascertaining the complex nature of Jewish identification—is at best speculative.
In sum, the 2020 Pew net Jewish population of 7.5M, the cumulated estimate of 7.3M
from local Jewish community studies, and the 7.6M from the combined analysis of a pool42

of national surveys all provide fairly similar results. Other sources, however, provide
different, quite lower estimates (PRRI 2021). An important question is to what extent
these figures for the US can be compared with Jewish population estimates obtained forall other countries around the world. Since American Jewry pertains not only to America,
but also to a much broader transnational Jewish entity, efforts should be made to establish
comparable definitional criteria.
Section 4.2.2 The Pew’s Jewish Americans in 2020 study
With fair disclosure, the Pew Jewish Americans in 2020 report (Pew Research Center2021) affirmed that the 2020 data were not really comparable with the 2013 results,
because they reflected a different conceptualization and methodology in data collection
and weighting, as well as a different Jewish population definition. Over the seven years
between the two surveys, dramatic differences could not be expected, and in fact the2020 overall Pew picture portrayed stability compared to the 2013 Pew survey. The 2020
Pew study reported a net Jewish population estimate of 7.5M Jews—800,000 more than
the 6.7M found in 2013.
Before addressing the substantive results, we shall examine the survey methodology.
In 2013, the survey was conducted by telephone, but sharply declining phone response
rates (Keeter et al. 2017; Schneider 2021) necessitated a different approach in 2020. The
2020 data were collected through an Address Based Sample (ABS) involving internet
contacts supplemented by mail questionnaires (see detailed description of themethodology in Pew Research Center 2021, 224-238). A series of letters and postcards
were sent to a national sample of postal addresses from the CDS (Computerized Delivery
Sequence) provided by the United States Postal Service with an invitation to complete aquestionnaire online or in print form, returning it by mail. Each survey mode hasadvantages and disadvantages. Answering the phone involves selective biases
according to whether the telephone number is in service and who answers the call. Quite
the same degree of incertitude exists regarding materials sent to a postal address; theaddress may be incorrect, the house may not be inhabited, and if the addressee exists,
he/she may ignore the invitation. This may not be an issue in a general national survey,
but the effects can multiply when the target population is a specific minority and the areas
or individual addresses to which the letters and postcards would be sent were selectedaccording to a carefully predetermined geographical design. There is, however, adifference between telephone and Internet/mail surveys. In the former case, when acontact has been established, the pollster or researcher has some control over thesituation. In the latter case, no communication occurs between the survey team andpotential respondents. Answering the telephone does not involve significant additional
skills. Using the Internet or filling in a paper questionnaire and putting it into an envelope
involves much more selective bias in terms of the respondents’ technical skills andpersonal initiative. The extent and direction of this particular bias cannot be assessed,
unless the research team pursues the respondents more actively, for example by directly
contacting a subsample of non-respondents via telephone or through face-to-faceinterviewing, and by thus being in control of the process to weight the data accordingly.
But this procedure was not implemented in the 2020 Pew study. Table 11 describes thedifferent stages of the Pew 2020 survey and the distribution of answers via the Internet
and via regular mail.
43

Table 11 Number of completed surveys by mode of participation – Pew survey of Jewish Americans, 2020

Screening survey
Extended survey

Total
received

Response
rate

N

%

68,398
5,881

20.1
82.4

Received
via
internet

Received
via mailNN

47,918
4,506

20,232
1,129

Screenervia
internet,
extended
via mail
NInternet

Mail

%

%

248
246

70.4
77.6

29.6
23.4

Source: Courtesy of Pew Research Center. Survey conducted Nov. 19, 2019-June 3, 2020 among US adults.
Note: the Screening survey was quite short and basically determined whether a household was eligible as Jewish. The extended survey was meant
to be completed only by households with one or more Jewish adult.

The initial national screening survey involved the mailing of 340,000 requests toparticipate, yielding 68,398 answers, a response rate of 20.1%—much better than the
expected response rate to telephone surveys in recent years. Of these, a subsample of
5,881 completed the extended survey (intended for the Jewish population only), at a
response rate of 82.4%. Combining the success rates of these two data collection stages
provided an effective final response rate of 16.6%.
The general framework used by Pew to establish a plausible geographical distribution
scheme of the initial letters and postcards inviting participation logically focused more on
areas with expectedly higher Jewish residential concentrations. Thus, adisproportionately high number of invitations were sent to places like New York and adisproportionately lower number were sent to places like the Dakotas, Kansas, andNebraska. Weighting factors were then employed to adjust this bias, saving significant
financial resources. This initial geographical scheme relied on Jewish population
distribution estimates supplied by AJPP (SSRI 2019 a, b, c). It is not entirely surprising,then, that the Pew net Jewish population aligned approximately with the AJPP estimates.
Here the question of the representativeness of the Pew survey cannot be avoided. As
noted, it cannot be easily ascertained when conducting telephone surveys whether nonresponse depends on non-connected or non-functioning telephones, or on refusals toanswer the phone (which is a common occurrence these days when one does notrecognize the name on the caller ID). In 2020, much depended on a reliablecorrespondence between the selected postal addresses and the expected residential
distribution, as well as the density of the target population (US Jews). One can raise somedoubts about this reliability in a country like the US with a very high (though somewhat
declining) frequency of residential mobility (Rebhun and Goldstein 2006; Molloy et al.
2011; Frost 2020). Unfortunately, the 2020 Pew survey did not include a question on
residential mobility (such as: Where did you live seven years prior to filling in this survey?
[i.e., the date of the previous Pew survey]). Such a question might have helped evaluate
the sampling framework. No letters and postcards were sent to drop points (addresses
with multiple units such as high-rise apartment buildings) with more than five residential
units. The proportion participating in the survey by regular mail was not negligible, ranging
around one-fourth of all effective contacts, but the question of the extent of initiativerequired of the respondents to participate in the survey via the Internet cannot be easily
dismissed. The problem is that national Internet coverage is lower than telephone
coverage. In 2020, 86% of the total US population could access the Internet fromanywhere via any device (Google 2021). This left out 14% of the total population and an
unknown—but probably much lower—share of Jews among them from the possibility of44

responding via the Internet. This would probably then yield a higher percentage Jewish
among the total of those surveyed than is actually the case among the total US population.
As became apparent in the 2020 US presidential elections, Internet surveys and likely
also telephone surveys tend to over-sample medium-high social classes, which is where
Jews are highly concentrated. Joe Biden beat Donald Trump, but by a lower margin thanwas expected, given selection biases in the pre-election surveys. Jews (most—perhaps
75%—of whom voted for Biden) were part of that bias. Jews are probably overrepresented in general sample surveys because of their higher socioeconomic status andeducational attainment, and their relatively lower presence in difficult to reach populations
such as the homeless, very recent and/or undocumented immigrants, those without afunctioning telephone or Internet connection, prisoners or those living in institutions, aswell as those who are otherwise unreachable or unable to answer a written questionnaireor respond in a telephone interview. By projecting the percent of Jews out of the total
population which also includes those uncovered populations, inflated Jewish estimates
result. Ultimately, what we have in the Pew 2020 survey is not really a random sample ofAmerican Jews, though it is probably much better than an ordinary convenience sample(Staetsky 2019b).
The existence of such different selection biases by response mode were
demonstrated through a very useful and innovative experiment completed by the Pew
Research Center in 2020. Supplementary answers were collected for a subgroup using
the older (phone) and for the majority the newer (Internet-plus-mail) survey method. The
responses of the subgroup were not included in the main data processing, but werereported in an appendix to the main report (Pew Research Center 2021, 239-247). This
experiment was a landmark contribution of Pew to elucidating both survey methods andthe socio-demography of Jewish Americans. The Internet-plus-mail 2020 returns indeed
brought in younger, less affiliated, more distant fringes of a more broadly defined Jewish
population and community. The telephone method generated more elderly, more
Orthodox (not unexpectedly considering the reluctance of some Orthodox circles toaccess the Internet), more affiliated Jews, and a less extended population. Some of thedifferences between the 2013 and 2020 findings are an artifact of the different datacollection methods utilized on the two occasions. As already noted, the report warned
that comparisons between 2013 and 2020 are somewhat problematic.
Another major change between 2013 and 2020 was the target (Jewish) population
definition. In 2013, Pew estimated a 6.7M net Jewish population, including the maincategories of Jews by Religion, as well as Jews of No Religion, which in turn could be
divided into self-identifying Jews and persons who self-define as partially Jewish. The
latter were assessed at 1M, including adults and children, and could be classified
separately from the core Jewish population which assumes a mutually exclusive Jewish
identity. The 2020 Pew net Jewish population was reported at 7.5M, but Jews of No
Religion could not be partitioned between self-identifying Jews and partially Jewish as in2013. The survey definition in 2020 included all who still consider themselves Jewish in
any way (such as ethnically, culturally or because of their family background). Such awider and more flexible definition, but especially the family background concept covers abroadly enlarged Jewish population beyond the core concept of self-identifying Jews (foran earlier anticipation of the same approach, see Tobin and Groeneman 2003). The 2020
survey, because of the phrase Jewish background enabled people to answer the survey
45

who might have had one Jewish great-grandparent as well as from people who believe
their ancestors were Conversos.
In the case of the 2020 survey, in the absence of a clear traceability of the selfassessed partly Jewish, an alternative (provisional) operational criterion had to be
estimated to ensure comparability with the 2013 data. Our estimate of 6M core Jewish
population in 2020 (versus 5.7M in 2013—see Lipka 2013; DellaPergola 2015b) was
obtained by adding the total of Jews by Religion and all those Jews of No Religion who
had two Jewish parents (see Table 12) (see more below).
Table 12 US Jewish population estimates , adults and children by various definitional criteria, 2013 and 2020 – inmillions

Jews by Religion
No religion, Jewish
Total Core Jewish Population (CJP)
No religion, partly Jewish
Total Net Jewish Population (NJP)
Non-Jews, Jewish background
Extended Jewish Background
Non-Jews, Jewish affinity
Grand Total

2013
Adults Childre
4.2
0.9
0.5
0.1
4.7
1.0
0.6
0.4
5.3
1.4
2.4
1.5
7.7
2.9
1.2
0.2
8.9
3.1

2020
Total Adults Childre
5.1
4.2
1.1
0.6
0.6
0.1
5.7
4.8
1.2
1
1.0
0.5
6.7
5.8
1.7
3.9
2.8
1.4
10.6
8.6
3.1
1.4
1.4
0.3
12.0
10.0
3.4

Difference
Total Adults Childre Total
5.3
0.0
0.2
0.2
0.7
0.1
0.0
0.1
6.0
0.1
0.2
0.3
1.5
0.4
0.1
0.5
7.5
0.5
0.3
0.8
4.2
0.4
-0.1
0.3
11.7
0.9
0.2
1.1
1.7
0.2
0.1
0.3
13.4
1.1
0.3
1.4

Sources: Pew Research Center (2013), Pew Research Center (2021). Author’s processing by courtesy of Pew Research Center.

According to the Pew published report, the number of Jewish adults by religion was
the same in 2013 and in 2020: 4.2M—a sign of stability, and very similar to the AJPP
estimates (SSRI 2019a). Jewish children by religion increased by 200,000, to 1.1M. Adult
Jews of No Religion increased by half a million from 1.1M to 1.6M; and children being
raised without religion increased by 100,000, to 500,000. The latter figure reflects someapportionment we made to the next category of Persons of Jewish Background of children
raised in families holding more than one religion. Jews with no religion and only one
Jewish parent in 2020 were estimated at 1.5M (1M adults and 500,000 children),representing (in our view) the conceptual equivalent of the 1M partly Jewish in 2013
(600,000 adults and 400,000 children).
The apparent total net Jewish population increase of nearly 800,000 over a 7-year
period between 2013 and 2020, of which 500,000 are adults and 300,000 are children,
resulted in or view mostly from different population definitions, besides the already noted
survey method effects. Furthermore, the 2013 Pew survey found 3.9M non-Jews ofJewish background (2.4M adults and 1.5M children) and their number apparently
increased to 4.2M in 2020 (2.8M adults and 1.4M children).
There is, however, one more difference between the two Pew surveys. In 2013, of the
2.4M adults with Jewish background, about one-third had at least one Jewish parent. In
2020, all of the 2.8M adults with Jewish background were reported as having a Jewish
parent or as having been raised as Jews. Of these, 1.5M reported some connection with
Judaism and 1.3M reported no connection. At face value, these Jewish-born non-Jews(hence people of Jewish background) derived from a Jewish population that had toamount to about 8-9M at an earlier point of time. Besides the enormous rate of attrition
implicit in such numbers, it is highly unlikely that such a large Jewish population existed.
Finally, 1.4M people with Jewish affinity in 2013 (1.2M adults plus an estimated additional46

200,000 children) reportedly grew to 1.7M in 2020 (1.4M adults plus an estimatedadditional 300,000 children). The grand total of all those covered by the Pew surveys,
Jewish and non-Jewish, amounted to an estimated 12M in 2013 and 13.4M in 2020, which
can be considered a rough correlate (or proxy) of the Law of Return population.
Fig. 9 provides a graphical comparison of the 2013 and 2020 Pew surveys by thedefinitional criteria outlined here, showing the gradual and expanding transitions from thecore Jewish population to the net Jewish population, to an extended Jewish parents
population, and finally to an even more distant affinity linkage.

Fig 9 US Jewish population configuration of by alternative definitions – Pew surveys of Jewish Americans, 2013
and 2020, millions

To better understand the unfolding of the demographic and identification processes
that underly these gradual transformations, some supplemental analysis is needed, as is
illustrated in Fig. 10 and Tables 13 and 14. One important issue is the Jewish
identification background of the people who define themselves as Jews of No Religion.
Age-wise, of all Jews of No Religion, the proportion with two Jewish parents steadily
declined from 84% among those age 65 or older to 17% among those in age 18-29. It is
plausible that the same trend also continued among children under age 18 (Fig. 10). In
other words, a substantial transformation occurred in the nature of Jews of No Religion,
from a relatively small group of people probably motivated by secular norms and attitudes,
into the natural outcome of intermarried couples (see also Barack Fishman 2004; Barack
Fishman and Cohen 2017; Dashefsky and Heller 2008; Phillips 2018; Sheskin andHartman 2015).
The same trend is confirmed by observing the current marriage patterns among
younger Jewish adult cohorts who are most likely to be the parents of the next generation.
Table 13 shows the population distribution of Jews by Religion and Jews of No Religion,
by sex, age, and marital status respectively, for the main ages of family formation andchildbearing (18-59). First, within each sex and age cohort, the percentages of those notmarried are significantly higher among Jews of No Religion than among Jews by Religion.
47

Moreover, among those who have ever been married, the proportions of those currently
married to a non-Jewish person are fairly high among the younger adults who are Jews
by Religion. Those percentages, however, are much higher among Jews of No Religion.
Consequently, among the total cohorts of Jews of No Religion, the proportions of those
who are both married and currently with a Jewish spouse tend to be extremely low—2%
among men and 5% among women age 18-39, and 18% among men and 7% among
women age 40-59. This suggests an extremely low future share of children who will beraised within a recognizably Jewish cultural framework. Our operational choice to include
many of these among the partly Jewish and not within the core Jewish population,
therefore, seems highly justifiable.

Fig. 10 Percent with two Jewish parents among US Jews with no religion, by age, 2020.
The dotted line is the trendline

Table 14 further represents the distributions of children by different categories ofJewish or non-Jewish family socialization. Again, the impact of Jews of No Religion and,by implication, of the partly Jewish on the younger part of the Jewish population age
pyramid, appears to be very small. The dominant share of Jewish generational
reproduction appears to come from families identifying as Jewish by religion, with 75% ofchildren raised exclusively Jewish by religion, 5% raised as Jews of no religion, and 20%
raised differently. Among Jews of No Religion, 3% of all children are raised as Jews by
Religion and 37% as Jews of No Religion, with 60% raised differently.
Summing up, one should acknowledge the somewhat speculative nature of theseestimates, given the possibility that when growing up some children may adopt a different
and more (or less) engaged Jewish outlook. On the other hand, one should also expose
the fallacy of Judaism defined merely as a religion in the elaboration of population
estimates. The widespread assumption seems to be that all American Jews by Religion
see themselves as following a religion, and therefore those Jews who are secular or
agnostic must be found outside the initial definitional framework (i.e. the Jews of No
Religion). In reality, the majority of those identifying as Jews by Religion actually do notpractice the Jewish religion and rather hold quite a secular outlook. According to the 2020
48

Pew survey, 53% of Jews by Religion said religion is not important to them (versus 91%
of Jews of No Religion). Less than half of Jews by Religion (43%) said being Jewish isabout religion, and 74% of Jews by Religion do not think religious faith provides them agreat deal of meaning or fulfillment. This is not to say that Jews less concerned withreligion are less Jewish. Our point is that since so many people who respond to thedefinition of Jews by Religion in reality are not Jewishly religious by all means, most of
the Jewish seculars are already included in that definition. The additional quest for Jews
of No Religion is, in reality, an effort to incorporate many who lack the bravery (or interest)
to concede they are just Jewish.
Table 13 US Jewish population , by religious identity, sex, age, and marital status – 2020
Sex
and ageNotmarriedMarriedSpouseJewishSpousenot
Jewish% spouse
Jewish% spousenot
Jewish

(3)

(4)

(5)

(6)

% married
and with
Jewishspouse
(7)

48%
71%

32%
51%

16%
20%

67%
72%

33%
28%

32%
51%

48%
52%
17%
81%
Jews of No Religion

31%
51%

21%
29%

60%
64%

40%
36%

31%
52%

(1)
(2)
Jewish by religion
Men
18-39
40-59
Women
18-39
40-59
Men
18-39
40-59
Women
18-39
40-59

52%
28%

68%
36%

32%
64%

2%
18%

30%
46%

6%
28%

94%
72%

2%
18%

57%
43%

43%
57%

5%
7%

38%
50%

12%
12%

88%
88%

5%
7%

Source: Pew Research Center (2021). Author’s processing by courtesy of Pew Research Center.
Note: Column 2 = column 3 + column 4; Column 5 is column 4 divided by column 2; Column 7 is column 2 multiplied by column 5.

Table 14 Distribution of children by different types of Jewish family background – US, 2020
Identity of adultrespondent with whomchild lives

Net Jewish population
Jews by religion
Jews of no religion
Jewish backgroundJewish affinity

Proportion of children with given Jewish identity
Total
RaisedRaised as All
Raisedchildren exclusively a Jew ofotherJewishJewish byNo
children by
Religion
Religion
Religionandotherreligion
(1)
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%

(2)
50%
74%
3%
3%
3%

(3)
16%
5%
37%
1%
2%

Source: Courtesy of Pew Research Center.
Note: column 4 is the sum of columns 5-9

49

(4)
34%
20%
60%
97%
95%

(5)
7%
8%
5%
9%
18%

Raisedin otherreligion,
Jewishaside
fromreligion

Raisedin otherreligion,
NOT
raisedJewishat allNo
religion,
NOT
raisedJewishat allMissing
data

(6)
2%
1%
4%
1%
0%

(7)
3%
4%
2%
42%
23%

(8)
21%
6%
49%
40%
38%

(9)
1%
1%
0%
5%
16%

Section 4.2.3 Plausibility analysis
When trying to evaluate Jewish population estimates in relation to the total US population,
the first factor to be considered is the relative smallness of the minority vis-à-vis the
majority. When the absolute numbers of Jews are derived from their percentage share of
the total population sample, one should remember that a difference of 0.1% of Americans
corresponds to 331,000 people. So, if Pew in 2020 overestimated by 0.2%, subtracting
660,000 from the 7.5M net Jewish population would give 6.84M, which would be more inline with the 6.7M in 2013.
More generally, Jewish population estimates should not only take the available
sources at face value (JPPI 2021). To reach more robust conclusions, one needs to rely
on reasoning and empirical evidence grounded in demographic concepts and researchtechniques (discussed above and elsewhere in greater detail, see DellaPergola 2005,2010a, 2011a, 2013a, 2014a, 2014c, 2014d, 2014e, 2015b). A meticulous effort should
be invested to coherently link the various independent estimates by considering theintervening factors of population change between two points in time. Jews are not likecarrots or maize where in a given year the yield was scant, and in a different year thecrop bountiful. A population, and more cogently a community, is the culmination ofcontinuous changes reflecting individual and collective history and societal change.
Serious attempts to monitor Jewish population size over time at the national level requirea reliable baseline figure and updates based on solid empirical research. One needs tobridge several different national estimates available over the years by assessing
intervening demographic changes: births and deaths, incoming and outgoing internationalmigration, and identification changes such as accessions to and secessions from Jewish
identification. This is the context within which we should read and evaluate the 2020 Pew
data.
In the US, the 1990 NJPS is usually accepted as a solid and reliable source which
provided a national core Jewish population estimate of 5.515M. Monitoring subsequent
Jewish population changes, including immigration (namely from the FSU), led to ourestimate of 5.7 million for 2000. The 2000/1 NJPS indicated a much lower estimate
around 5.2 million. This prompted our downward revision of over 400,000. But critics (ledby Kadushin et al. 2005) argued that the study had missed a significant proportion of thetarget population. Some upward adjustment of the lowered estimate was indeed
suggested (DellaPergola 2013b). In the light of the 2020 Pew study it appears that suchadjustment was insufficient, leading to the conclusion that the original 5.7M estimate for2000 was plausible, and the 2000/1 NJPS had missed more people than originally
thought. Regarding the subsequent period, to support our new 6M core Jewish population
estimate for 2020 one needs to bridge the 300,000 increase versus the restored figurefor 2000, establishing along the way a reasonable intermediate estimate for 2013. Some
Jewish population growth most plausibly occurred, but it would be inappropriate torepresent that growth by a straight line. Furthermore, the question is how plausibly thePew 6.7M net Jewish population in 2013 could become 7.5M in 2020.
The suggested more realistic estimate of the US core Jewish population US at 6M—
an increase over the 2013 survey—calls for a retroactive upward revision of previous
estimates. Fig. 11 demonstrates a reconstruction of US Jewish population estimates as
originally published in the annual AJYB’s World Jewish population chapter, as well as oursuggested path to connect the new estimate of 6M core Jews to the existing body of50

previous estimates. According to this wavelike model, the 300,000 core Jewish population
growth between 2000 and 2020 was spread non-linearly with an assumed yearly increaseof 5,000 at the beginning of the 20-year period, gradually increasing to 25,000 around2010, and again gradually declining to 5,000 in 2020. Fig. 11 also shows the pace ofgrowth of the total US population. By this reconstruction, the core Jewish population in2013 would have been 5.9M, higher than previously estimated but within the limits of thestatistical variability that accompanies all sample surveys, old and new, and creates amargin above or below the expressed central value.
Jewish

US Total

6,500,000

350,000,000

6,300,000

340,000,000

6,100,000

330,000,000
320,000,000

5,900,000

310,000,000

5,700,000

300,000,000

5,500,000

290,000,000

5,300,000

280,000,000

5,100,000

Jews
previous
estimates
Jews
corrected
after Pew
US total
pop

270,000,000

2020

2018

2016

2014

2012

2010

2008

2006

2004

2002

2000

240,000,000

1998

4,500,000

1996

250,000,000

1994

4,700,000
1992

260,000,000

1990

4,900,000

Fig. 11 US Core Jewish population and total population, 1990-2021 – Annual estimates as originally published in
the American Jewish Year Book World Jewish Population chapter, and revised estimates based on the 2020 Pew
Survey of Jewish Americans. Author’s processing

Several hypotheses about recent US Jewish population growth (according to the Pew
published estimates but also by our own reconstruction) have been suggested and should
be reconsidered:a) Increase of the share and visibility of the Orthodox: Comparing the absolute numbersof net Jewish population adults between 2013 and 2020 shows the following distribution
by denominations: Orthodox, -8,000; Conservative, +32,000; Reform, +296,000; Other
denomination, -86,000; No particular denomination, +266,000. As such the “moreOrthodox” explanation does not hold, although there may be little doubt about someincreasing impact of the Orthodox denomination in the distribution of Jewish children(DellaPergola and Rebhun 1998-9; Keysar and DellaPergola 2019; Pinker 2021).
b) Continuing immigration: Comparing the Pew net Jewish population absolute numbersof the foreign-born, we find 938,000 in 2013 versus 750,000 in 2020. The enlarged total
including the foreign-born and the US born with foreign-born parents shrank from 2.9
51

million in 2013 to 2.4 million in 2020. At face value, the immigration hypothesis fails,
pointing if anything to some survey under-coverage. But if the latter is true, the actualJewish population estimates should be increased.
c) Jews of color: The 2013 Pew survey found 94% Non-Hispanic whites among the net
Jewish population. Of the other 6%, 3% were Hispanic, 2% Black (non-Hispanic), and 2%
other/mixed races. This adds to 7% due to rounding (Sheskin and Dashefsky 2020b). As
against this, the suggestion was put forward that the number of Jews of color significantly
increased in the US in recent years and was greatly undervalued in previous research(Kelman et al. 2019). A spirited debate followed on the frequency of Jews of color andtheir definition, from a minimum circle of Afro-American Jews, extending to Hispanics,
Asians, Pacific Islanders and other origins, and further stretching to Middle East and North
African (MENA) Jews and to all non-American-born/non-Ashkenazi Jews (see Bokser
Liwerant in this volume). The 2020 Pew survey found among the net Jewish population
92% of Non-Hispanic whites. Of the other 8%, 2% were Hispanic and White, 2% Hispanicand other/multiple races, 1% Black (non-Hispanic), 1% White and Black, 1% White andAsian, and 1% other combinations of White, Asian, American Indian, and Pacific Islander.
All in all, 3% did not identify as White, and another 6% also identified as White. This adds
to 9% due to rounding. These data do not support the thesis of significant increase ofJews of color according to the more limited definitions. On the other hand, 17% of the net
Jewish population defined themselves as Hispanic, Black, Asian, other and multiple raceplus Sephardi or Mizrahi plus born/had parent born in Americas (except U.S. or Canada,
Asia (except FSU), MENA (including Israel) or Africa. The percent of US Jews who are
not Ashkenazi or were not born in the US amounted to 40%. Such truly haphazard
conglomerates seem more a tribute to the quest for diversity, which unquestionably exists
in the US, than a meaningful Jewish population category. What was appalling, though,was the unrestricted use of the globally disqualified category of race in a Jewish
population survey, which was done to align with the US Census classifications.
d) Echo effects of the baby boom: The remarkable increase in fertility and birth rates that
occurred after World War II was followed by a period of fertility decline (DellaPergola1980). This created an alternation between large and small cohorts of young adults who
in turn had children and created a first, and probably also a second, echo effect. Thesefluctuations in the pace of Jewish population growth have become weaker over time, andthey have been scaled somewhat differently than among the total US population becauseof a longer generation span among Jews that is related to higher age at first marriage andpostponement of childbearing. But it is not implausible that this is what may have occurred
between 2000 and 2020, in the wavelike mode suggested above. Such suggested
reconstruction also signals the end of growth for the US core Jewish population.
E) Higher incorporation of children of intermarriage: It is remarkable how all past attempts
to project the future of the American Jewish population predicted an end of growthfollowed by slow gradual decline. Various authors set the expected inflection points at
different dates: in 1990 (Schmelz 1981), 2000 (DellaPergola and Rebhun 1998-9;
52

DellaPergola et al. 2000), 2002 (Goujon et al. 2012), 2005 (Rebhun et al. 1999), 2010
(DellaPergola 2013b; Pew Research Center 2015a), 2020 (Klaff 1998), and 2023 (Pinker
2021). Such broad consensus reflects the marked aging of the American Jewish
population following decades of low fertility and the failure to incorporate within a Jewish
community framework of a majority of the children of intermarriage. Aging produceshigher death rates, but the US Jewish death rate is one of the least investigated topics inJewish demographic research and is practically ignored in all pertinent discussions. It
would be a reasonable priority to try to assess it empirically. The noted postponement of
the expected end of growth possibly reflects the lengthening of generations, but also a
gradually increasing incorporation of children of intermarriage within the Jewish context,
as was evident in the 2013 and 2020 Pew surveys.
f) Shifts in lifetime religious preferences: It should also be stressed that in American
society religious change is comparatively more frequent than in other countries. Repeatedsurveys have found that Jews, Catholics, and older established Protestant denominations
tended to lose membership, while Evangelical denominations, Eastern cults, andespecially the religiously undefined (i.e., none and not reported) tended to gain (Kosmin
and Lachman 1993; Kosmin et al. 2001; Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life 2008;
Kosmin and Keysar 2009; Smith 2009; Pew Research Center 2015a; Rebhun 2016). By
the Pew 2013 survey, total secessions from Judaism were double the number ofaccessions; by the 2015 Pew survey of the US religious landscape, moreover, the netbalance of changes of religion resulted in a total lifetime loss of 600,000 Jews (Pew
Research Center 2015b). In 2020, 90% of Americans raised Jewish by religion and 76%
raised as Jews of No Religion had remained Jewish (Pew Research Center 2021). Thisconfirmed the previous impression of a losing balance.
All in all, it should be remembered that each of the existing sources about American
Jewish demography is imperfect, but they do amount to an impressively coherent bodyof evidence. Beginning with historical assessment (Rosenwaike 1980), the various
datasets fit well together when performing forward-backward Jewish population
projections. High consistency is also evident when checking through various sources ofthe profile of the same birth-cohort regarding international migration, age composition,
marriage, fertility, survivorship at different ages, and conversions to and from Judaism(Schmelz and DellaPergola 1983 and 1988; DellaPergola et al. 1999, 2000; DellaPergola
2005, 2013a; Perlmann 2007).
Accordingly, the evidence about the recent and current demographic growth ofAmerican Jewry should be regarded with some skepticism. An increase of 800,000
between 2013 and 2020, as per Pew’s net Jewish population, would signify a 12% growthover 7 years, compared with a 5% growth for the total US population which absorbed
large numbers of international migrants (legal and illegal), and whose fertility rate washigher than that of Jews, in spite of a recent significant decrease. The rate of total
population growth in the US between 2010 and 2020 was in fact the second lowest since
the country’s first census in 1790 (Cohen and Chamie 2021). As to the 30 years since
1990, Pew’s 2020 net Jewish population of 7.5M would be 2M higher than the 1990 NJPS,
again a faster growth than the total US population (36% vs. 32%). That is extremely53implausible demographically, and should be understood as a product of Pew’s changing
and expanding definitions of who is a Jew.
Unlike the normative framework of Jewish law, the empirical concept of a binary
Jewish/non-Jewish delineation no longer reflects a verifiable social reality, especially in
the US. Numerous intermediate nuances are observable with significant points ofdemarcation which should not be ignored. Where one places those demarcation points
not only affects the subsequent narratives, but actually directly derives from thosenarratives (Kaufman 2014). The Pew net definition, especially in the case of children,
included people lacking any attachment to or interest in being Jewish. If Jewishness
becomes a property that, once acquired, can never be lost, this contradicts the tenets ofsociology and demography, neither of which follows a deterministic approach, seeking
instead to ascertain facts empirically. Substantively, from a social scientific perspective,
one had better consider the Jews as a socially meaningful and deliberate collective rather
than a random aggregate of people with an indelibly ascribed trait they neither connect
nor live by.
The 2020 Pew study, like its 2013 predecessor and the NJPSs of the previous
generation, constituted a serious contribution to Jewish population research. The former
enriched the possibility for tracing trends, outlining differences, discovering patterns, or
disproving existing conceptions. It should be noted that biases in determining the size ofgroups do not affect—to the same extent—the distribution of characteristics and opinions
among those included. The Pew surveys are, therefore, more useful in assessing a
Jewish population profile than its size. The database should be intensively probed for indepth analysis and as a background for policy recommendations, keeping in mind thatwhatever reservations there might be regarding the outer framework of population size
estimates, the relationships and interactions between variables tend to be much morerobust and reliable.
The major message in 2020 was that US Jews are a stable and solid lot. Their position
as a strong and proud component of American society and the fundamentals of theirbeliefs and behaviors, individual and collective, are coherent and enduring. For example,
Holocaust memory along with love for ethics and social justice are far more salient thanbelief in God (Pew Research Center 2021). This is of great importance in assessing therole of religion as a defining criterion of American Jewish identity. But no less importantis the fact that exactly the same value hierarchy appeared in all major Jewish communities
worldwide, in Canada, Western and Eastern Europe, Latin America, Australia, South
Africa, and remarkably, Israel (DellaPergola and Staetsky 2021; DellaPergola 2022)
underscoring the transnational character of Jewish peoplehood. See the US Jewish
Population report in this series for more information about American Jewry.

Section 5 Major Cities and Metropolitan Areas
Changes in the geographic distribution of Jews have affected their distribution not only
among countries, but also significantly within countries, and have resulted in a preference
for Jews to live in major metropolitan areas. Within metropolitan areas, too, Jews often
manifested unique propensities to settle or resettle in specific neighborhoods that weremore compatible with their socioeconomic status, and/or more attractive to them because54

of their propinquity to employment or Jewish community facilities (DellaPergola andSheskin 2015). Most metropolitan areas include extended inhabited territory, and several
municipal authorities around the central city. Definitions of urban areas vary by country.
The urban areas reported in Table 15 for the US are Metropolitan Statistical Areas(MSAs), whereas in previous years we reported data for larger Consolidated StatisticalAreas (CSAs). Similar changes in the definition of Metropolitan areas affected some ofthe data for Israel.
It is not easy to create a truly standardized picture of Jewish populations in major
cities, as some of the available figures refer to different years and only roughly comparewith each other regarding Jewish population definitions and evaluation methods.
Regarding the US Metropolitan areas (MSAs) we use here the data reported in the US
Jewish Population report in this series. Sheskin and Dashefsky rely mostly on theestimates resulting from definitions used by the local Jewish federations. This often
results in what we define as an extended aggregate of people currently Jewish, born orraised Jewish—or in other words a population with Jewish parents (PJP)—although inmost instances not one that includes non-Jewish members of Jewish households. Theirestimates, along with those for other locales not reported here, suggest a total US Jewish
population of 7,266,140, as against our core Jewish population estimate of 6M and a net
Jewish population of 7.5M according to the Pew 2020 definition. To create a morecomparable database, we adopted an extended definition here—substantially similar to
the Pew net Jewish population—of Jews residing in metropolitan areas out of the US as
well. For metropolitan areas in Israel, the data refer to an enlarged Jewish population(EJP) including non-Jewish household members. Referring to a broader Jewish
population definition raises the number and percent of Jews out of the total local
population, but at the same time lowers the proportion in the selected metropolitan areas
out of the total world Jewish population. This has to be kept in mind when comparing the2021 estimates with those for earlier years.
Moreover, unlike our estimates of Jewish populations in individual countries, the datareported here on major urban Jewish populations do not fully adjust for possible double
counting due to multiple residences. Especially in the US, the differences may be quite
significant, in the range of tens of thousands, involving both major and minor metropolitan
areas. The respective estimates of part-year residents were mostly included in theestimates in Table 15. Part-year residency is related to both climate differences andeconomic and employment factors. Such multiple residences now also increasingly occur
internationally. A person from New York or Paris may also own or rent an apartment inJerusalem or Tel Aviv, and some may even commute monthly or weekly (Pupko 2013).
The case of Israelis regularly commuting abroad for work has also become more frequent.
Beyond doubt, Jewish populations globally are overwhelmingly concentrated in large
urban areas. In 2021, more than half (51.2%) of world Jewry (as defined above) lived inonly ten metropolitan areas (Israel Central Bureau of Statistics; the US Jewish Population
chapter in this volume). These ten areas—including the main cities and vast urbanized
territories around them—were Tel Aviv, New York-Newark-Jersey City, Jerusalem, Haifa,
Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, Miami-Ft. Lauderdale-Pompano Beach,
Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington,
Paris,
Washington-Arlington-Alexandria,
andChicago-Naperville-Elgin (Table 15). Over 60% of an admittedly rough estimate ofenlarged world Jewry lived in the ten previously mentioned largest areas plus another55

nine with at least 100,000 Jews (including non-Jewish members of Jewish households):
Boston-Cambridge-Newton, Be'er Sheva, San Francisco-Oakland-Berkeley, London,
Buenos Aires, Toronto, Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Alpharetta, Baltimore-Columbia-Towson,
and San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad.
The Jewish population in the Tel Aviv urban conurbation, extending from Netanya to
Ashdod and approaching 3.9 million Jews by the enlarged definition, largely exceededthat in the New York MSA, extending from southern New York State to parts ofConnecticut, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, with 2.1 million Jews. Of the 19 largest
metropolitan areas of Jewish residence, eleven were located in the US, four in Israel, andone each in France, the UK, Canada, and Argentina. Nearly all the major areas ofsettlement of contemporary Jewish populations share distinct features, such as being
national or regional capitals, enjoying higher standards of living, with highly developed
infrastructure for higher education and hi-tech, and widespread transnational
connections. The Tel Aviv area also featured the highest percent of (enlarged) Jews
among the total population (94.8%), followed at a distance by Jerusalem (72.3%), Haifa(73.1%), and Beersheba (60.4%), the balance mostly being Israeli Arabs. In the rest of
the world, the highest percent of Jews in a metropolitan area was in New York (10.8%),
followed by Miami-Fort Lauderdale (8.7%), Philadelphia (6.8%), San Francisco (5.1%),
Washington and Los Angeles (4.7% each), Toronto (4.5%), and Baltimore (4.1%).

56

Table 15 Metropolitan areas with populations with Jewish parents (PJP) above 100,000, 1/1/2021a
Rank

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19

Metropolitan area

Tel Avivc
New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ-PA
Jerusalemd
HaifaeLos Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA
Miami-Ft. Lauderdale-Pompano Beach, FLf
Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, PA-NJ-DE-MD
ParisgWashington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV
Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN-WI
Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH
Be'er Shevah
San Francisco-Oakland-Berkeley, CA
Londoni
Buenos Airesj
Torontok
Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Alpharetta, GA
Baltimore-Columbia-Towson, MD
San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad, CA

Country

IsraelUS
IsraelIsraelUS
US
USFranceUS
US
US
IsraelUS
UK
Argentina
CanadaUS
US
US

Jewishpopulation(PJP)b% Jewsout of
total
population

3,891,800
2,109,300
992,800
710,600
622,480
535,500
419,850
337,600
297,290294,280
257,460
247,600
244,000
230,400
230,300
219,900
119,800
117,800
100,000

94.8
10.8
72.3
73.1
4.7
8.7
6.8
2.8
4.7
3.1
5.2
60.4
5.1
2.4
1.4
4.5
2.0
4.1
3.0

% of world
Jewish population (PJP)b
%
19.5
10.6
5.0
3.6
3.1
2.7
2.1
1.7
1.5
1.5
1.3
1.2
1.2
1.2
1.2
1.1
0.6
0.6
0.5

Cumulative
%
19.5
30.1
35.1
38.6
41.8
44.5
46.6
48.3
49.7
51.2
52.5
53.8
55.0
56.1
57.3
58.4
59.0
59.6
60.1

a Most metropolitan areas include extended inhabited territory and several municipal authorities around the central city
Definitions vary by country. The US metropolitan areas are Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) as defined by the US Office of Management and Budget.
See www.census.gov/geographies/reference-files/time-series/demo/metro-micro/delineationfiles.html
A table of the population of the top 20 MSAs appears in the Jewish Population Chapter of this volume. Israel metropolitan areas are defined by the Central Bureau of Statistics
b Several of the US estimates refer to Population with Jewish parents (PJP). All Israel Jewish Populations are Enlarged Jewish Populations (EJP). Data for other countries refer to Population with Jewish
Parents (PJP)
c Includes Tel Aviv District, Central District, Ashdod Subdistrict, and sections of Judea and Samaria area. Principal cities: Tel Aviv, Ramat Gan, Bene Beraq, Petach Tikwa, Bat Yam, Holon, Rishon
LeZiyon, Rehovot, Netanya, and Ashdod, all with Jewish populations 100,000 and overd Includes Jerusalem District and parts of the Judea and Samaria District. Includes Bet Shemesh with over 100,000 Jewish populatione Includes Haifa District and parts of Northern District
f Includes about 55,000 part-year residents
g Departments 75, 77, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95
h Includes Beersheba Subdistrict and other parts of Southern District
i Greater London and contiguous postcode areas
j Buenos Aires Metropolitan Area A.M.B.A
k Census Metropolitan Area

57

Section 6 Major Determinants of Demographic Change
The changes in the size and composition of Jewish populations outlined above reflect a
chain of interrelated factors, each of which in turn depends on a complex array of
explanatory determinants. We briefly review here only two of these factors—Jewish
international migration, and some possible effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on Jewish
births and deaths. Both these factors operated differently in each country. Their different
developments affected in singular ways the Jewish population in Israel, and ultimately
produced a significantly slower growth as compared to previous years.

Section 6.1 International Migration
Over the past decades, shifts in Jewish population size in the major regions of the world
were primarily determined by large-scale international migration. Unfortunately,international migration of Jews is imperfectly documented. Currently, only Israel annually
records Jewish immigrants as such by their detailed country of origin (Israel Central
Bureau of Statistics). Israeli data, compared over several successive years, may provide
a sense of the intensity of concomitant migration movements of Jews to other countries,
although there also are differences in the timing, volume, direction, and characteristics ofthe respective migrants (DellaPergola 2009a; Amit et al. 2010). Some countries do haverecords of the annual numbers of migrants from Israel, although it is unlikely that theywould distinguish between Jews and non-Jews (US Department of Homeland Security
2017; Eurostat 2015). Jewish organizations, like HIAS—formerly the Hebrew Immigrant
Aid Society (HIAS 2013) in the US or the Zentralwohlfhartsstelle in Germany, record
Jewish immigrants on a yearly basis, but the global picture of Jewish migration remains
incomplete.
Beginning with 1948, Israel was the main recipient of Jewish international migration.
It was the home to 69% of all Jewish migration between 1948 and 1968, and about 60%
between 1969 and 2015 (Amit and DellaPergola 2016). Clearly migration, or rather amigration balance producing a net surplus to Israel, reduced the population of theDiaspora and increased the Jewish population of Israel. Jewish international migration
reached one of its highest peaks ever when the FSU opened its doors to emigration at
the end of 1989. Of the estimated over 1.7M FSU migrants between 1989 and 2019
including non-Jewish household members, over one million migrated to Israel, over
300,000 to the US, and over 225,000 to Germany. The US lost its allure as a destination
for FSU migrants since the beginning of the 21st century, and a decrease in theattractiveness of Germany occurred since 2005. These remarkable increases anddecreases reflected the changing incidence of push factors not only in the FSU but inother regional realities as well during times of rapid geopolitical change and shifts ineconomic opportunities. Migration levels also reflected the different and significantly
variable legal provisions related to migration and socioeconomic options in the main
countries of destination (DellaPergola 2020b). Indeed, Israeli immigration law (the Law ofReturn) allows for comparatively easier access and immediate citizenship to Jewish
migrants and their families, especially after a new citizenship law of 2017, but the
integration difficulties experienced in Israel by some immigrants may have created
deterrents to successful absorption.
58

In recent years, the volume of Jewish migration was far from the peaks of the past,
due to the increasing concentration of Jews in more developed countries and the rapidly
decreasing Jewish population in the less developed countries from which most of Jewish
emigration derived. We already noted the clearly strong relationship that prevails between
the quality of life in a country and the propensity of Jews to stay (or to emigrate). Morerecently, perceptions and experiences of mounting antisemitism or a violent anddangerous environment in some countries, particularly in France, Ukraine, Turkey, andVenezuela, stimulated Jewish emigration.
Table 16 shows the number of immigrants to Israel by country of origin in 2019 and2020. The data reflect the Law of Return, not the core Jewish population, definition (Israel
Central Bureau of Statistics annual, and unpublished data).
In 2020, 19,696 new immigrants arrived in Israel—a 40% decrease compared theprevious year and the lowest since 2013. This reflected the travel difficulties andrestrictions related to the Covid-19 pandemic. Immigrants came from 81 countries andterritories, and their number compared with 33,096 in 2019, 28,118 in 2018, 26,333 in2017, and 25,010 in 2016. In 2020, immigration to Israel increased from Northern Africa,
mostly reflecting small numbers of new immigrants from Ethiopia, as well as from Central
and South America. There was also a minimal increase from the European Union. Allother major world areas registered negative change, ranging between -6% for North
America, and -55% for the European republics of the FSU. Migration toward othercountries did not necessarily follow the same patterns of change but was not expected tobe significant.
The Russian Federation was still the main country of origin in 2020 with 6,632, but thisrepresented a 58% decline versus the 15,753 immigrants of 2019 (and 10,474 in 2018).
Similarly, immigration from Ukraine declined from 6,177 in 2019 to 2,921 in 2020, a
reduction of 53%. Such sharp reduction may be attributed to the reduced possibilities of
the Jewish Agency and other aliyah promoting Jewish organizations to operate regularly
under the Covid-19 restrictions. Another factor may have been the more stringent rules
adopted by Israel’s Population and Migration Authority regarding renewal of Israeli
citizenship to new immigrants—who received it upon arrival—after their first year since
immigrating to the country. There is some evidence that, in the past, several thousand
new immigrants to Israel received an Israeli passport, took up the new passport, and left
shortly afterwards. Immigration from the US declined from 2,471 in 2019 to 2,285 in 2020(-8%). Immigration from France, after an all-time peak in 2015 (6,627), declined to 4,147
in 2016, 3,160 in 2017, 2,431 in 2018, 2,209 in 2019, and slightly increased to 2,394 in2020 (+8%). No other country had more than 1,000 migrants to Israel. Among countries
with more than 100 immigrants, small absolute increases occurred from Canada (+7%),
Mexico (+31%), and Argentina (+33%), probably pointing to economic difficulties in thelatter two countries as well as in some smaller ones in Latin America. In 2020, there were
187 immigrants from Ethiopia, compared with only 41 in 2019, an increase of 356%. Other
countries with at least 100 immigrants in 2020, including Brazil, the United Kingdom,
Belarus, Moldova, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and South Africa, all recorded
significant declines.

59

Table 16 New immigrants to Israela (Law of return population – LRP), by last country of residence, 2019-2020
Country
20192020% change
Country
20192020% change
GRAND TOTALb
33,096
19,696-40.5
Ukraine
6,177
2,921
-52.7
America - Totalb
4,202
4,087
-2.7
FSU n.e.s.
6
6
0.0North America
2,688
2,517
-6.4 Other Europe
739
613
-17.1
Canada217
232
6.9
Albania30United States
2,471
2,285
-7.5
Bosnia Herzegovina
10Central America
188
206
9.6
Gibraltar
03
Cayman Islands
50Monaco50
Costa Rica
13
3
-76.9
North Macedonia
1
0
Cuba
10
5
-50.0
Norway2
1-50.0
Dominican Rep.
1
1
0.0
Serbia3
7
133.3
El Salvador
1
1
0.0
Switzerland
67
69
3.0
Guadeloupe
06Turkey157
90-42.7
Guatemala3
6
100.0
United Kingdom
497
443
-10.9
Honduras7
1-85.7
Yugoslavia n.e.s.
30Mexico133
17430.8 Asia - Totalb
1,144
742
-35.1
Panama15
9-40.0 FSU in Asia
1,005
627
-37.6
South America
1,326
1,364
2.9
Armenia15
0
Argentina
410
544
32.7
Azerbaijan
191
95
-50.3
Bolivia63-50.0
Georgia
316
228
-27.8
Brazil
588
508
-13.6
Kazakhstan
199
139
-30.2
Chile
43
76
76.7
Kyrgyzstan
36
13
-63.9
Colombia
44
77
75.0
Tajikistan
3
6
100.0
Ecuador7
6-14.3
Turkmenistan
36
2
-94.4
Paraguay
112-81.8
Uzbekistan
209
144
-31.1
Peru
33
26
-21.2 Other Asia
139
115
-17.3
Uruguay84
65-22.6
Bangladesh
02Venezuela
100
57
-43.0
China
10
5
-50.0
Europe - Totalb
26,76013,838-48.3
Hong Kong
10
14
40.0
European Unionc
2,870
2,876
0.2
India
28
49
75.0
Austria23
15-34.8
Indonesia
10Belgium
95
86
-9.5
Iran
67
31
-53.7
Bulgaria
7
6
-14.3
Japan
1
1
0.0
Croatia
1
0
Nepal
2
0
Cyprus27
9-66.7
Pakistan
1
0Czechia
14
13-7.1
Philippines
2
5
150.0
Denmark
6
8
33.3
Singapore
3
6
100.0
Finland11
6-45.5
South Korea
02
France
2,209
2,394
8.4
Thailand
100Germany
161
77
-52.2
Yemen
4
0
Greece74-42.9 Africa - Totalb
463
512
10.6
Hungary
4226-38.1 Northern Africa
117
240
105.1
Ireland3
4
33.3
Algeria
0
1
Italy
70
80
14.3
Egypt
1
0
Luxembourg
35
66.7
Ethiopia
41
187
356.1
Malta
4
0
Morocco4723-51.1
Netherlands
46
44
-4.3
Sudan
6
0
Poland24
6-75.0
Tunisia2230
36.4
Portugal
514180.0 Sub-Saharan Africa
346
272
-21.4
Romania39200.0
Guinea-Bissau
10
Slovakia
0
7
Ivory Coast
1
0
Spain
84
44
-47.6
Kenya
1
0
Sweden25
19-24.0
Ruanda1
0
FSU in Europe
23,141
10,349-55.3
South Africa
342
268
-21.6
Belarus
919
622
-32.3
Uganda0
1
Estonia
70
Zambia01Latvia80
32-60.0
Zimbabwe
02
Lithuania
436-86.0 Oceania - Total
129
80
-38.0
Moldova
156
130
-16.7
Australia
129
79
-38.8
Russian Federation
15,753
6,632-57.9
New Zealand01
New immigrants and tourists changing their status to immigrant, not including temporary residents, returning Israelis, and immigrant citizensb Including country unknown
c Not including the Baltic countries
Source: Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, unpublished data60

To these figures, one should add several thousand immigrant citizens (Israeli citizens
born abroad and entering the country for the first time) and of returning Israelis, at a time
when the Israeli economy was performing comparatively better than many Westerncountries. This made Israel a reasonably attractive option for international migration until
the end of 2019, but much less so in 2020 when unemployment rates skyrocketed due tothe Covid-19 pandemic. Some of the difference between migration to Israel in 2019 and2020 are summarized in Fig. 12.

Fig. 12 Percent change in number of immigrants to Israel from major areas of origin, 2019-2020
Source of data: Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, author’s processing

On the other hand, Jewish immigration to the US nearly stopped from the FSU but
continued at moderate levels from other countries in Western Europe, Latin America, and,to some extent, other countries in the Middle East and South Africa. Israel—in part
because of its small market and the limits this imposes upon employment opportunities—
is today probably the main single source of Jewish emigration, mostly to the US and toother Western countries (Rebhun and Lev Ari 2010; Rebhun et al. 2016, Israel Central
Bureau of Statistics 2020). Evidence for Israelis in the US shows a significant reductionin the influx, largely compensated by returns to Israel (Gold and Phillips 1996, Gold 2002,
Cohen 2009, Rebhun and Lev Ari 2010, Rebhun 2014, Israel Central Bureau of
Statistics). The number of Israel residents who were allowed lawful permanent resident
status in the US was 4,324 in 2015, 4,652 in 2016, 4,227 in 2017, 4,009 in 2018, and4,702 in 2019—a five-year average of 4,383 (US Department of Homeland Security 2017,2019). Accounting for other Jewish migration to the US, and discounting for the about
2,000-2,500 yearly emigrants to Israel, an annual net migration into the US can be
estimated at 5,000 Jews (or slightly more).
Levels of emigration from Israel are overall quite low, consistent with expectations fora country at Israel’s level of human development (DellaPergola 2011c). These findings
confirm the primacy of socioeconomic determinants related to both the basic level of61

development of a country and its current economic situation, along with variations in thestringency of regulations about immigrant admissions. The effects of ideological, security,and fear-related factors such as antisemitism end up as weaker determinants of thevolume and timing of Jewish immigration and emigration—namely to and from Israel(DellaPergola 2020b). In 2020, in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, the level of
emigration from Israel, reached a historical minimum.

Section 6.2 Some effects of the Covid-19 pandemic
In addition to reducing effects on international migration, the Covid-19 pandemic had
visible effects on death rates and, indirectly, also on birth rates. Research on Jewish
populations in several countries shows significant differences in the incidence of mortality
among Jews in different environments. Regarding the first wave (March-May 2020), threemain patterns were detected based on information supplied by local Jewish burial
societies (Staetsky and Paltiel 2020; Staetsky 2021). The first pattern involved a muchhigher incidence of Covid-19 among Jews than the surrounding general population.
Regarding European Jewish communities, this was detected in the UK (London,
Manchester, Scotland), Sweden (Stockholm), Italy (Milano), and Belgium (Brussels). A
second pattern involved Covid-19 levels similar among Jews and the general population,such as in France (Paris, Strasbourg), the Netherlands (Amsterdam), Belgium (Antwerp),
and Hungary (Budapest). The third pattern involved a relatively lower incidence of Covid19 among Jews, such as in Germany (various regions), Italy (Rome), and Austria(Vienna). Similar variation occurred across the American continent with parts of the New
York area more severely hit than other US regions, and different incidences bygeographic area in Argentina and Mexico. Remarkably, then, Jewish populations
worldwide did not respond uniformly to Covid-19 but were highly affected by factors that
operated locally. This could involve the efficiency and diffusion of vaccinations, and theavailability and efficiency of health structures. It could also be related to vaccine
compliance or hesitancy of both Jews and the non-Jews among who they live. The
observation that more closely knit Jewish religious communities were more affected thanother sectors of the Jewish population is quite clear. This impacted ultra-Orthodox areas,
particularly in places like Israel, the UK, and New York. It also appeared that the negative
economic impact of the pandemic was much more keenly suffered by the lower
socioeconomic strata among the Jewish population (Boyd et al. 2020).
More detailed data for Israel’s total population (Jews and Arabs together – Israel
Central Bureau of Statistics monthly) show the peaks and troughs of the pandemic as afactor of increased mortality, but also as a possible cause of the postponement of births(see Fig. 13). The percentages shown represent the difference between the given monthand the corresponding month in 2019.
The first wave of the pandemic (March-May 2020) in Israel did not cause a visible
increase in the monthly number of deaths. The second wave peaked in October 2020,
followed by a third wave in January 2021. Data for July-August 2021 indicated the
beginning of a fourth wave mostly caused by the Delta variant. As to the birth rate,
contrary to some speculation that it would increase as a consequence of the forced home
isolation of millions of adults, it actually diminished. Decline was visible by July throughOctober 2020, reflecting pregnancies that commenced between the end of 2019 and the62beginning of 2020 when the health, economic, and psychological effects of the pandemic
were actually still to come. The diminished numbers of births continued from the second
half of 2020 until February 2021, reflecting the direct impact of the pandemics.
Interestingly, in March 2021 and during the following months there was a visible birthincrease which must have followed the initial euphoria after the first wave of coronavirus
had supposedly ended in June 2020. The birth rate again increased in the summer of2021, partly offsetting the decline during 2020. But soon after, the fourth Covid-19 wave
was again causing a significant increase in the death rate. The possible consequencesof the later waves of the pandemic on the birth rate can only be evaluated with later data,
not yet available at the time of this writing.
All in all, the Covid-19 pandemic caused a visible increase in the number of deaths, adecrease in the number of births, and a significant reduction in the natural increase of
Israel’s population. Along with diminished immigration, this slowed down the pace ofIsrael’s population growth in 2020, as well as presumably among most Jewish
communities globally.

Section 7 Concluding Remarks
Jews are a rare population, representing less than 2 per 1000 of the total world population.
They are highly dispersed across over 100 countries. The size of the Jewish populationof a country is subject to change as a consequence of births, deaths, geographicalmobility, and because people may wish to leave or join the collective. They are also tied
together by symbolic values, rituals, memories, experiences, and for most, proximate or
distant common ancestries or, in one word, identity. The former variables may clearly
determine the presence or absence of a person in a given place. The latter is more difficult
to grasp because it is related to mutations over an individual life course, collective
variation over time, and shrinking or expansion. This research effort to document Jewish
population size is complicated by the imperfect availability of sources and often by theirlack of comparability. The estimation method we followed is empirical-inductive
reasoning, as is typical of the social sciences, and not normative-legal-deductive
reasoning, as typical of rabbinical deliberation.
The picture presented here, as in previous years, shows a clear demographic
dissonance between Jews as a majority of Israel’s total population, and as minorities ofvariable size and density in diaspora countries. Robust demographic growth in Israel
usually contrasts with moderate growth, or more often stability or decline in most otherlocales. Consequently, the numerical weight of Israel within the demography of world
Jewry has grown considerably over the past decades and is bound to increase in the
future. Given the large and quite stable Jewish presence in the United States, this makes
the demographic configuration of world Jewry increasingly concentrated in the two major
centers of Jewish life.

63

Deaths
6,000
5,500

+13%

5,000
+28%

+11%

4,500

2019

+25%

2020

+22%

2021

4,000
3,500
3,000

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

Births
17,000+4%

16,50016,000+6%

15,500-5%

2019

15,00014,500

2020
-7%

-6%

2021

14,00013,50013,000

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

Fig. 13 Influences of the Covid-19 epidemics on births and deaths – Israel, monthly absolute numbers, 2019-2021
Source of data: Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, author’s processing

64

Acknowledgments
Since inception, the AJYB has documented the Jewish world and has given significant attention to Jewish
population issues. Since 1981, responsibility for preparing annual population estimates for world Jewry was
taken by the Division of Jewish Demography and Statistics of the A. Harman Institute of Contemporary
Jewry at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The Division was founded by Roberto Bachi in 1959, washeaded by Uziel O. Schmelz until 1986, by the present author until 2010, and by Uzi Rebhun since 2010.
Jewish population estimates appeared in the AJYB, then under the aegis of the American Jewish
Committee (AJC), until 2008. Since 2010, our world Jewish population estimates appeared in the frameworkof the North American Jewish Data Bank (now the Berman Jewish DataBank), and since 2012 within the
renewed AJYB. World Jewish population estimates as of January 1, 2009 and January 1, 2011 wereprepared for publication but not released in print. The interested reader may consult past AJYB volumes
for further details on how the respective annual estimates were obtained (especially Schmelz 1981 andDellaPergola 2015a).
The author expresses warm appreciation to the editors of AJYB during more than thirty years of a close
collaboration: Morris Fine, Milton Himmelfarb, David Singer, Ruth Seldin, Lawrence Grossman, andcurrently Arnold Dashefsky and Ira M. Sheskin. The author also gratefully acknowledges the collaborationof many institutions and persons in various countries who supplied information or otherwise helped in the
preparation of this study. Special thanks are due to my colleagues at The Avraham Harman Institute ofContemporary Jewry at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Uzi Rebhun and Mark Tolts. I am alsoindebted to those who over the years provided relevant information and advice at different stages of thepresent study (in alphabetical order of the respective cities): Chris Kooyman (Amsterdam), the late Ralph
Weill (Basel), Jim Schwartz (Bergen County, NJ), Olaf Glöckner (Berlin), Shmuel Frankel (Bne Berak),
Marcos Peckel (Bogota), Simon Cohn, and Claude Kandiyoti (Brussels), András Kovács (Budapest), Victor
Bukofser, Ezequiel Erdei, and Yaacov Rubel (Buenos Aires), Tally Frankental (Cape Town), Salomon
Benzaquen and Tony Beker de Weinraub (Caracas), Cathleen Falsani, and Tom W. Smith (Chicago), Frank
Mott (Columbus, OH), Heike von Bassewitz, and Ellen Rubinstein (Frankfurt a. M.), Frans van Poppel, andHanna van Solinge (The Hague), Ariela Keysar and Barry Kosmin (Hartford, CT), Maritza Corrales
Capestrany (Havana), Lina Filiba (Istanbul), Steven Adler, Benjamin Anderman, Adina Bankier-Karp,
Margalit Bejarano, Maya Choshen, Eilat Cohen-Kastro, Susanne Cohen-Weisz, Oren Cytto, Nurit Dovrin,
Judith Even, Netanel Fisher, Ahmad Hleihel, Shlomit Levy, Israel Pupko, Uzi Rebhun, Liat Rehavi, Dalia
Sagi, Marina Sheps, Maya Shorer Kaplan, Mark Tolts, Eduardo Torres, Emma Trahtenberg, Chaim I.
Waxman, and the late Norma Gurovich (Jerusalem), David Saks (Johannesburg), Roy van Keulen (Leiden),Jonathan Boyd, Richard Goldstein, Marlena Schmool, and Daniel Staetsky (London), Pini Herman, andBruce Phillips (Los Angeles), Pinhas Punturello (Madrid), John Goldlust, Andrew Markus and Ran Porat(Melbourne), Judit Bokser Liwerant, Susana Lerner, Mauricio Lulka, and Yael Siman (Mexico City), Ira M.
Sheskin (Miami), Alfonso Sassun (Milano), Rafael Porzecanski (Montevideo), Evgueni Andreev and Eugeni
Soroko (Moscow), David Bass (Neveh Daniel), the late Vivian Z. Klaff (Newark, DE), Steven M. Cohen,
Laurence Kotler-Berkowitz, Lucette Lagnado and Sarah Markowitz (New York), David M. Mizrachi (Panama
City), Marcelo Dimentstein, Alberto Senderey, and the late Doris Bensimon-Donat (Paris), Allen Glicksman(Philadelphia), Zbyněk Tarant (Pilsen), Yochanan Moran (Porto), Alice Goldstein, and the late SidneyGoldstein (Providence, RI), Narciso Attía (Quito), Mustafa Khawaja (Ramallah), Orly C. Meron, Carlos
Tapiero, and the late Erik H. Cohen (Ramat Gan), Gloria Arbib, Emanuele Di Porto, and Alberto Levy
(Rome), Lars Dencik (Roskilde), David Saltiel (Saloniki), Alberto Milkewitz, Simon Schwartzman, and thelate René Decol (São Paulo), Mordechai Abergel (Singapore), Arnold Dashefsky (Storrs, CT), Gary
Eckstein, and David Graham (Sydney), Allie A. Dubb (Tel Aviv), Robert Brym, Gustave Goldman, andRandal Schnoor (Toronto), Jeffrey Scheckner (Union, NJ), Thomas Buettner, and Hania Zlotnik (United
Nations, NY), Raimund Fastenbauer (Vienna), Sylvia Barack Fishman, Leonard Saxe, Charles Kadushin,
Benjamin Phillips, and Elizabeth Tighe (Waltham, MA), Becka Alper, Jacob Ausubel, Barry R. Chiswick,
Carmel U. Chiswick, Alan Cooperman, Conrad Hackett, Neha Sagal, and Greg Smith (Washington, DC),and Melita Svob (Zagreb).
An anonymous reviewer provided useful suggestions to the text and tables. Responsibility for thecontents of this article is the author's only.

65Appendix
Mechanisms of population change
Jewish population change is determined by a known set of demographic factors which can increase or
decrease the number of Jews in the world or in any given country over time. Formally, the fundamental
demographic equation reads:
P(t) = P(t-1) + (B-D) + (I-E) + (A-S)
where: P(t) is the population size at any point in time, called t, and P(t-1) is the population size at apreceding point in time; B and D stand for the number of births and deaths, respectively, during the same
period of time; I and E stand for immigration into and emigration from a given area by the given population;
A and S stand for the numbers of accessions and secessions, i.e. conversions or other modes ofidentificational change, into and out of the Jewish community, respectively.
Unfortunately, the demographic data currently available on Jews in most countries of the world are notsufficient to translate this equation into accurate figures. However there exist abundant and significant
indications about the size and characteristics of the major demographic factors involved, and the respective
directions of change.
Definitions
In most Diaspora countries, the core Jewish population (CJP—a concept initially suggested by
Kosmin et al. 1991) includes all people who, when asked in a socio-demographic survey, identify
themselves as Jews, or who are identified as Jews by a respondent in the same household, and do notprofess another monotheistic religion. Such a definition of a person as a Jew, reflecting subjective
perceptions, broadly overlaps, but does not necessarily coincide, with Halakhah (Jewish law) or othernormatively binding definitions. Inclusion does not depend on any measure of that person’s Jewish
commitment or behavior in terms of religiosity, beliefs, knowledge, communal affiliation, or otherwise. The
core Jewish population includes people who identify as Jews by religion, as well as others who do not
identify by religion but see themselves as Jews by ethnicity or other cultural criteria (Jewish only, no
religion). Some do not even identify themselves as Jews when first asked, but if they descend from Jewish
parents and do not hold another religious identity they are included. All these people are considered to bepart of the core Jewish population which also includes all converts to Judaism by any procedure, as well asother people who declare they are Jewish even without formal conversion and do not hold another identity.
People of Jewish parentage who adopted another monotheistic religion are excluded, as are people whostate being partly Jewish along with another identity, and those of Jewish origin who in censuses or sociodemographic surveys explicitly identify with a non-Jewish religious group without having formally converted.
The core population concept offers an intentionally comprehensive and pragmatic, mutually exclusive
approach compatible with the analytic options offered by many available demographic data sources.
In the Diaspora, such data often derive from population censuses or socio-demographic surveys whereinterviewees have the option to decide how to answer relevant questions on religious or ethnic identities.
In Israel, personal status is subject to Ministry of the Interior rulings, which rely on criteria established by
rabbinic authorities and by the Israeli Supreme Court (Corinaldi 2001). In Israel, therefore, the core Jewish
population does not simply express subjective identification but reflects definite legal rules. This entails
matrilineal Jewish origin, or conversion to Judaism, and not holding another religion. Documentation toprove a person’s Jewish status may include non-Jewish sources.
A major research issue of growing impact is whether core Jewish identification can or should bemutually exclusive with other religious and/or ethnic identities. In a much-debated study—the 2000-01 US
National Jewish Population Survey-NJPS (Kotler-Berkowitz et al. 2003)—the solution chosen was to allow
for Jews with multiple religious identities to be included in the core Jewish population definition undercondition that the other identity was not a monotheistic religion. This resulted in a rather multi-layered andnot mutually exclusive definition of the US Jewish population. A further category of Persons of Jewish
Background (PJBs) was introduced by NJPS 2000-01. Some PJBs were included in the final Jewish
population count and others were not, based on a more thorough evaluation of each individual ancestry

66and childhood. (See further comprehensive discussions of the demography of US Jews in Heilman 2005,2013).
The 2013 Pew Research Center’s A Portrait of Jewish Americans (Pew Research Center 2013),
introduced a new concept, the net Jewish population (NJP). The Pew survey included in the NJP not only
those who responded to the CJP definition, but also the previously not empirically tested category of partly
Jewish—people who stated they had no religion, and who by their own preference qualified their Jewish
identity as part of a broader composite cluster of two or more sub-identities. The new and previously
untested concept of the partly Jewish helped clarifying the socio-demographic picture, but also made thedebate about definitions more complicated, and the comparison of results between different surveys moredifficult. One intriguing issue concerned the status of the partly Jewish as a standard component of theJewish collective, as different analysts would have it differently. The 2013 Pew report included the partly
Jewish in the net Jewish population. Following a similar logic, people with multiple ethnic identities, one
being Jewish, were included in some total Jewish population counts for Canada. As against this, in thepresent report we did not include them in the core Jewish population. This writer suggested that the partly
Jewish stand conceptually closer to the other Pew survey categories of Non-Jews with Jewish background,or Non-Jews feeling some Jewish affinity. This latter assumption was fully supported by detailed data on
the behaviors and attitudes of the partly Jewish compared with the other categories of the broadly enlarged
Jewish population aggregate (DellaPergola 2014). In the 2020 Pew survey the category of partly Jewish
was abandoned, and instead the broader criterion for inclusion in the net Jewish population was
identifying as Jewish because of family background.
Emerging from these more recent research developments, the concept of total population with atleast one Jewish parent (PJP) includes the core Jewish population plus anyone currently not identifying
as exclusively Jewish but with one or two Jewish parents. In the Pew 2013 survey, the total population with
Jewish parents besides the core comprised two sub-groups: (a) people who reported no religion, anddeclared they are partly Jewish, and (b) people who reported not being Jewish and declared a Jewish
background because they had a Jewish parent (Pew Research Center 2013). In the Pew 2020 survey (Pew
Research Center 2021), no distinction was allowed among people with no religion and reporting themselves
Jewish or partly Jewish. All persons not reporting themselves as currently Jewish and who had at least one
Jewish parent or were raised Jewish were included in the category of persons of Jewish background.
The enlarged Jewish population (EJP—a concept initially suggested by DellaPergola 1975) further
expands by including the sum of: (a) the core Jewish population; (b) people reporting they are partly Jewish;(c) all others of Jewish parentage who—by core Jewish population criteria—are not currently Jewish; (d) allother non-Jews with Jewish background more distant than a Jewish parent; and (e) all respective nonJewish household members (spouses, children, etc.). Non-Jews with Jewish background, as far as they
can be ascertained, include: (a) people who have adopted another religion, or otherwise opted out, although
they may also claim to be Jewish by ethnicity or in some other way—with the previously mentioned caveat
for recent US and Canadian data; and (b) other people with Jewish parentage who disclaim being Jewish.
It logically follows that most Jews who are identified in the 2013 Pew survey as partly Jewish or as PJBs
who are not part of the US core Jewish population, as well as many Canadians identifying Jewish as oneof multiple ethnicities, naturally should be included under the enlarged definition. For both conceptual andpractical reasons, the enlarged definition usually does not include other non-Jewish relatives who lack a
Jewish background and live in exclusively non-Jewish households.
The Law of Return population (LRP) reflects Israel’s distinctive legal framework for the acceptanceand absorption of new immigrants. Articles 1 and 4A(a) of this law extend its provisions to all current Jews,
their children, and grandchildren, as well as to their respective Jewish or non-Jewish spouses. As a resultof its three-generation and lateral extension, the Law of Return applies to a large population—the so-calledaliyah eligible—whose scope is significantly wider than the core and enlarged Jewish populations defined
above (Corinaldi 1998 and 2018). The Law of Return awards Jewish new immigrants immediate citizenshipand other civil rights. The Law of Entrance and the Law of Citizenship apply to all other foreign arrivals,
some of whom may apply for Israeli citizenship. According to the current, amended version of the Law ofReturn (Gavison 2009), a Jew is any person born to a Jewish mother or converted to Judaism (regardlessof denomination—Orthodox, Conservative, Reconstructionist, or Reform) who does not have anotherreligious identity. According to the ruling of Israel’s Supreme Court, conversion from Judaism, as in thecase of some ethnic Jews who currently identify with another religion, entails loss of eligibility for Law ofReturn purposes. Thus, all the Falash Mura—a group of Ethiopian non-Jews with Jewish ancestry—must
undergo conversion to be eligible for the Law of Return. The law itself does not affect a person’s Jewish

67status—which, as noted, is adjudicated by Israel’s Ministry of Interior which relies, in turn, on Israel's
rabbinic authorities—but only for the specific immigration and citizenship benefits granted under the Law ofReturn. It is actually quite difficult to estimate the total size of the Law of Return population. Rough estimatesof these higher figures are tentatively suggested below.
Some major Jewish organizations in Israel and the US—such as the Jewish Agency for Israel (JAFI),
the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC), and the major Jewish Federations in the US—
sponsor data collection and tend to influence research targets, rendering them increasingly complex andflexible. Organizations enact their mission toward their respective constituencies based on perceived
interests rather than scientific criteria. The understandable interest of organizations to function and securebudgetary resources may prompt them to expand their reach strategies to Jewish populations increasingly
closer to the enlarged and Law of Return definitions than to the core definition.
Presentation and quality of data
Jewish population estimates in this report refer to January 1, 2020. Efforts to provide the most recent
possible picture entail a short span of time for evaluation of available information, hence some margin of
inaccuracy. Corrections also were applied retroactively to the 2019 totals for major geographical regions so
as to ensure a better base for comparisons with the 2020 estimates. Corrections of the 2020 estimates, if
needed, will be presented in the future.
We provide separate estimates for each country with approximately 100 or more resident coreJews. Estimates of Jews in smaller communities have been added to some of the continental totals. For
each country, we provide in the Appendix Table an estimate of:1) mid-year 2019 Total Population (including both Jews and non-Jews) (Population Reference Bureau
2020)2) the estimated January 1, 2020 core Jewish population (CJP)
3) the number of Jews per 1000 of the total population
4) an indicator of the type of source used to derive the Jewish population
5) a rating of the accuracy of the Jewish population estimate
6) a rough estimate of the population with Jewish parents (PJP)
7) a rough estimate of the enlarged Jewish population inclusive of non-Jewish household members(EJP)8)a rough estimate of the Law of Return population (LRP)9) the Core Jewish Population World Rank
The rough estimates were derived from available information and assessments on the recent extent andgenerational depth of cultural assimilation and intermarriage in the different countries. The quality of suchbroader estimates of the aggregate of Jews and non-Jews who often share daily life is much lower thanthat of the respective core Jewish populations, and the data should be taken as indicative only.
Wide variation exists in the quality of the Jewish population estimates for different countries. For many
Diaspora countries, it might be better to indicate a range for the number of Jews (minimum, maximum)
rather than a definite estimate. It would be confusing, however, for the reader to be confronted with a long
list of ranges; this would also complicate the regional and world totals. The estimates reported for most of
the Diaspora communities should be understood as being the central value of the plausible range for therespective core Jewish populations. The relative magnitude of this range varies inversely with the accuracyof the estimate. One issue of growing significance is related to people who hold multiple residences indifferent countries. Based on available evidence, we make efforts to avoid double counting. Wherever
possible, we strive to assign people to their country of permanent residence, ignoring the effect of part-year
residents. (This is similar to the part-year resident, or “snowbird” issue in estimating the US Jewish
population in the US Jewish Population report in this series.)
Jewish population data come from a large array of different sources, each with inherent advantages
and disadvantages. We report both the main type and the evaluated accuracy of the sources used in thisstudy. In the Appendix Table the main types of sources are indicated as follows:(C) National population census. This in theory would be the best source, but undercounts and overcounts do occur in several countries which need to be evaluated.

68(P) National population register. Some countries, besides the periodic census, also keep a permanent
population register which is constantly updated through detailed accountancy of individual
demographic events.
(S) Survey of the Jewish population, national or inclusive of the main localities, undertaken most often
by a Jewish community organization, and sometimes by a public organization.
(J) Jewish community register maintained by a central Jewish community organization.
(E) Estimate otherwise obtained by a Jewish organization.
Our estimates reflect these sources, but the figures reported below do not necessarily correspondexactly with those indicated in the given sources. When necessary, additional information is brought to bearin deriving our estimates. The three main elements that affect the accuracy of each country's Jewish
population estimate are: (a) the nature and quality of the base data, (b) how recently the base data weregathered, and (c) the updating method. A simple code combines these elements to provide a generalevaluation of the reliability of data reported in the Appendix Table, as follows:(A) Base estimate derived from a national census or reliable Jewish population survey; updated on thebasis of full or partial information on Jewish population change in the respective country during theintervening period.
(B) Base estimate derived from less accurate but recent national Jewish population data; updated on
the basis of partial information on Jewish population change during the intervening period.
(C) Base estimate derived from less recent sources and/or unsatisfactory or partial coverage of acountry’s Jewish population; updated on the basis of demographic information illustrative ofregional demographic trends.
(D) Base estimate essentially speculative; no reliable updating procedure.
The year in which a country’s base estimate or important partial updates were initially obtained is also
stated as part of the accuracy rating. This is not the current estimate's date but the initial basis for its
attainment. An X is appended to the accuracy rating for several countries whose Jewish population estimate
for 2020 was not only updated but also revised in light of improved information.
One additional tool for updating Jewish population estimates is provided by several sets of demographic
projections developed by the Division of Jewish Demography and Statistics at the Institute of Contemporary
Jewry of The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (DellaPergola et al. 2000b; and author's current updating).
Such projections, based on available data on Jewish population composition by age and sex, extrapolate
the most recently observed or expected Jewish population trends over the first two decades of the twentyfirst century. Even where reliable information on the dynamics of Jewish population change is not available,
the powerful connection that generally exists between age composition, birth rates, death rates, andmigration helps provide plausible scenarios for the developments that occur in the short term. Where betterdata were lacking, we used findings from these projections to refine the 2020 estimates against previous
years. It should be acknowledged that projections are shaped by a comparatively limited set of assumptions
and need to be constantly updated in light of actual demographic developments.

69Appendix Table. Jewish population by country, core definition and expanded definitions, 1/1/2021
Country or territory

Total
Core Jewish Jews per Source
populationa populationb 1000 totalc
CJP
population Type Accuracy
ratingdWORLD

7,773,521,000

15,166,200

1.95

Population Enlarged
Law of Jewish corewithJewishReturn population
Jewish populationf populationg world rank
parentse
EJP
LRP
PJP
19,937,600 22,626,000 25,336,100

AMERICA TOTAL

1,019,946,000

6,761,300

6.63

10,754,500 12,655,500 14,816,700

Bermuda65,000

100

1.54

C

C 2016

200

300

400

Canada38,200,000

393,500

10.30

C

B 2019450,000

550,000

700,000

4

United States

329,900,000

6,000,000

18.19

S

B 2020 X

9,800,000 11,500,000 13,400,000

2

368,225,000

6,393,600

17.36

400,000

200

0.50

C

B 2010Total North AmericahBahamas83-102

10,250,200 12,050,300 14,100,400
500

700

900

77-82

Barbados

300,000

100

0.33

C

B 2010

200

300

400

83-102

Costa Rica

5,100,000

2,600

0.51

J

C 2020

2,800

3,100

3,400

43-44

Cuba

11,300,000

500

0.04

S

C 2013

1,000

1,500

2,000

67-70

Dominican Republic

10,500,000

100

0.01

E

D 2000

200

300

400

83-102

El Salvador

6,500,000

100

0.02

E

D 2000

200

300

400

83-102

Guatemala

18,100,000

900

0.05

S

B 1999

1,200

1,500

1,800

61-62

Jamaica

2,800,000

500

0.18

C,J

C 2010

300

400

500

67-70

Mexico127,800,000

40,0000.31

C,SB 201045,00050,00065,000

14
71-73

i

Netherlands Antilles

321,000

400

1.25

C

C 2016

500

700

900

Panama4,300,000

10,0002.33

SC 2012

11,00012,00013,00025

Puerto Rico

3,200,000

1,500

0.47

J

C 2000

2,000

2,500

3,000

53-54

E

D 2016

600

700

800

71-73

D 2020

400

600

800

65,900260,000

74,600310,000

93,300360,000

6

Virgin Islands
Other
Total Central Amer.,
Caribbean
Argentina

105,000

400

3.81

31,874,000

200

0.01

222,600,000
45,400,000

57,500175,000

0.26
3.85

S

B 2021 X

Bolivia

11,600,000

500

0.04

J

C 2000

700

900

1,100

67-70

Brazil

211,800,000

91,5000.43

CB 2010120,000

150,000

180,000

10

Chile

19,500,000

15,9000.82

C,SB 202020,00024,00028,00020

Colombia

49,400,000

2,100

0.04

S

C 2016

2,800

3,500

4,500

46-47

Ecuador

17,500,000

600

0.03

J

B 2011

800

1,000

1,200

66

Paraguay

7,300,000

1,100

0.15

C

B 2002

1,300

1,600

1,900

58

Peru

32,800,000

1,900

0.06

S

C 2000

2,400

3,000

3,500

49-50

Suriname

602,000

200

0.33

J

D 2000

400

600

800

77-82

Uruguay

3,519,000

16,4004.66

S

B 201320,00024,00028,00019

Venezuela

28,600,000

5,000

0.17

S

C 202010,00012,00014,00032

429,121,000

310,200

0.72

438,400

530,600

623,000

1.58

Total South America
EUROPE TOTAL

h831,375,000

1,317,500

1,819,800

2,330,600

2,832,800

Austria

8,900,000

10,3001.16 C,S,J

B 201914,00017,00020,00024

Belgium

11,500,000

28,9002.51

S,JC 201835,00040,00045,00016

Bulgaria

6,900,000

2,000

0.29

C,J

C 2011

4,000

6,000

8,000

48

Croatia

4,000,000

1,700

0.43

C,J

C 2011

2,400

3,100

3,800

52

Cyprus1,200,000

300

0.25

C,E

C 2012

400

500

600

74-76

Czechia

10,700,000

3,900

0.36

C,J

C 2011

5,000

6,500

8,000

37

Denmark

5,800,000

6,400

1.10

S,J

C 2018

7,500

8,500

9,500

31

Estonia

1,300,000

1,800

1.38

C,P

A 2019

2,700

3,500

4,500

51

70

Country or territory

Total
Core Jewish Jews per Source
populationa populationb 1000 totalc
CJP
population Type Accuracy
ratingd

Finland5,500,000

1,300

0.24

France64,900,000

446,000

Germany

83,300,000

118,000

Greece10,700,000

Hungary
IrelandPopulation Enlarged
Law of Jewish corewithJewishReturn populationf
Jewish population populationg world rank
parentse
EJP
LRP
PJP
1,600
1,900
2,200 56-57

P

B 2015

6.87

S

B 2018550,000

650,000

750,000

1.42

S,J

B 2018150,000

225,000

275,000

8

4,100

0.38

J

B 2010

5,200

6,000

7,000

36

9,800,000

46,8004.78

C,SC 201875,000100,000

130,000

12

5,000,000

2,700

0.54

C

B 2016

3,600

5,000

6,500

41

Italy

60,300,000

27,2000.45

S,JB 201934,00041,00048,00017

Latvia1,900,000

4,300

2.26

C,P

A 2020 X

8,000

12,00016,00034-35

Lithuania

2,800,000

2,300

0.82

C,P

B 2019

4,700

7,500

10,50045

Luxembourg

600,000

700

1.17

J

B 2010

900

1,100

1,300

64-65

Malta

500,000

100

0.20

E

D 2012

200

300

400

83-102

Netherlands

17,500,000

29,7001.70

SB 201843,00053,00063,00015

Poland38,400,000

4,500

0.12 C,S,J

B 20187,500

15,30025,00034-35

Portugal

10,300,000

3,300

0.32

C

B 2011

3,500

4,000

5,000

38

Romania

19,200,000

8,800

0.46

C,J

B 2011

13,00017,00020,00027

Slovakia

5,500,000

2,600

0.47

C

C 2011

3,600

4,600

6,000

42

Slovenia

2,100,000

100

0.05

C

C 2019

200

300

400

83-102

Spain

47,600,000

12,9000.27

S,JC 202016,00019,00022,00023

SwedenTotal European Union
27

10,400,000

14,9001.43

SC 201820,00025,00030,00021446,600,000

785,600

1.76

1,011,000

1,273,100

1,517,700

Bosnia-Herzegovina

33,300,000

500

0.15

C

C 2001

800

1,100

1,400

67-70

Channel Islands

200,000

200

1.00

S

C 2015

250

300

400

77-82

Gibraltar

35,000

800

22.86

C

B 2019

900

1,000

1,100

63

Monaco40,000

700

17.50

S

B 2012

900

1,100

1,300

64-65

North Macedonia

2,100,000

100

0.05

C

C 1996

200

300

400

83-102

Norway5,400,000

1,300

0.24

P

B 2010

1,600

2,000

2,500

56-57

Serbia7,000,000

1,400

0.20

C

C 2011

2,100

2,800

3,500

55

Switzerland

8,600,000

18,4002.14

CB 202022,00025,00028,00018

Turkeyk

83,700,000

14,5000.17

S,JB 201619,00021,00023,00022

United Kingdomj

67,200,000

292,000

4.35

C,S

B 2019330,000

370,000

410,000

5

Other
Total other Europeh
Belarus5,800,000

100

0.02

183,375,000

330,000

1.80

D 20209,400,000

7,200

0.77

C

B 2019 X

250

400

500

378,000

425,000

472,100

17,00025,00033,00028
49-50

Moldova

3,500,000

1,700

0.49

C

B 2014

3,800

7,500

10,000Russiak

146,700,000

150,000

1.02

C

C 2010320,000

460,000

600,000

7

Ukraine41,800,000

43,0001.03

C

C 200190,000140,000

200,000

13

201,400,000

201,900

1.00

430,800

632,500

843,000

207,400,000

210,300

1.01

446,200

655,500

874,000

7,152,900

7,401,200

7,418,600

Total FSU Republicsl[Total FSU in Europe]
ASIA TOTAL

4,541,100,000

6,905,300

1.52m

8,837,500

6,425,100

727.03C,P

A 20206,652,500

6,879,900

6,879,900

West Bankn

3,144,600

445,800

141.77C,P

A 2020450,800

455,800

455,800n

1,980,100

0

0.00

C,P

A 202000

013,962,200

6,870,900

492.11

7,103,300

7,335,700

7,335,700

IsraelGaza
Total Israel andPalestineo

71

Country or territory

Total
Core Jewish Jews per Source
populationa populationb 1000 totalc
CJP
population Type Accuracy
ratingd

Population Enlarged
Law of Jewish corewithJewishReturn populationf
Jewish population populationg world rank
parentse
EJP
LRP
PJP
7,103,300 7,335,700 7,335,700
1[Total State of Israel]p9,293,300

6,870,900

739.34

Armenia

3,000,000

100

0.03

C

B 2011

300

500

700

Azerbaijan

10,100,000

7,000

0.69

C

B 200910,50015,50020,50030

Georgia

3,700,000

1,400

0.38

C

B 2014

3,000

5,000

7,500

53-54

Kazakhstan

18,700,000

2,400

0.13

C

B 2009

4,800

6,500

9,500

43-44

Kyrgyzstan

6,600,000

300

0.05

C

B 2009

700

1,000

1,500

71-73

Turkmenistan

6,000,000

200

0.03

C

D 1995

400

600

800

77-82

Uzbekistan
Total former USSR in
Asiah
Chinaq34,200,000

2,800

0.08

C

D 1989

6,000

8,000

10,00040

91,700,000
1,410,600,000

14,200
3,000

0.15
0.00

E

D 201525,7003,200

37,1003,400

50,500
3,600

39

India

1,400,100,000

4,800

0.00

C

C 2011

6,000

7,500

9,000

33
83-102

83-102Indonesia

271,700,000

100

0.00

E

D 2016

200

300

400

Iran

84,200,000

9,400

0.11

C

B 2016

10,50012,00013,00026

Japan126,000,000

1,000

0.01

E

D 2015

1,200

1,400

1,600

59-60

Philippines

109,600,000

100

0.00

E

D 2000

200

300

400

83-102Singapore

5,800,000

900

0.16

J

C 2015

1,000

1,200

1,400

61-62

South Korea

51,800,000

100

0.00

J

C 2015

200

300

400

83-102Syria and Lebanon

26,200,000

100

0.00

E

D 2015

200

300

400

83-102

Taiwan23,600,000

100

0.00

E

D 2000

200

300

400

83-102Thailand

66,500,000

200

0.00

E

D 2015

300

400

500

77-82

United Arab Emirates

9,800,000

300

0.03

E

D 2020

500

700

900

74-76

849,537,800

100

0.00

D 2020

200

300

400

Total other Asia

4,435,437,800

20,2000.00

23,90028,40032,400AFRICA TOTAL

71,70083,90097,100

200

300

400

83-102

Other

1,338,000,000

56,500

0.04

Egypt

100,800,000

100

0.00

J

C 2015

Ethiopia

114,900,000

100

0.00

S

C 2015

500

1,000

2,500

83-102

Morocco36,000,000

2,100

0.06

J

C 2015

2,500

2,800

3,100

46-47

Tunisia

11,900,000

1,000

0.08

J

C 2015

1,200

1,400

1,600

59-60

Total Northern Africah

359,300,000

3,300

0.01

4,400

5,500

7,600

Botswana

2,300,000

100

0.04

E

C 2000

200

300

400

83-102

Congo D.R.

89,600,000

100

0.00

E

C 2000

200

300

400

83-102

Kenya

53,500,000

300

0.01

J

C 2000

500

700

900

74-76

Madagascar

27,700,000

100

0.00

J

D 2016

200

300

400

83-102

Namibia

2,500,000

100

0.04

C

C 2000

200

300

400

83-102

Nigeria

206,100,000

100

0.00

E

D 2000

200

300

400

83-102South Africa

59,600,000

52,0000.87

C,SB 201965,00075,00085,00011

Zimbabwe

14,900,000

200

0.01

C

B 2001

400

600

800

77-82

Other
Total Sub-SaharanAfricar522,500,000

200

0.00

D 2020

400

600

800

978,700,000

53,2000.05

67,30078,40089,500OCEANIA TOTAL

43,100,000

125,600

2.91

138,700

154,800

170,900

Australia

25,800,000

118,000

4.57

C

A 2016130,000

145,000

160,000

9

New Zealand

5,000,000

7,500

1.50

C

B 2013

8,500

9,500

10,50029

Others12,300,000

100

0.01

D 2020

200

300

400

72

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Sergio DellaPergola is Professor Emeritus and former Chairman of the Hebrew University’sHarman Institute of Contemporary Jewry. Born in Italy 1942, in Israel since 1966. M.A., Political
Sciences, University of Pavía; Ph.D., Social Sciences and Contemporary Jewry, The Hebrew
University of Jerusalem. Specialist on the demography of world Jewry, published or edited
numerous books and monographs and over 300 papers, including Israel and Palestine: The Powerof Numbers (2008), Jewish Demographic Policies: Population Trends and Options (2011), Jewish
Population and Identity: Concept and Reality (2018, with Uzi Rebhun), Diaspora vs. Homeland:
Migration to Israel, 1991-2019 (2020). Since 1983 author of the AJYB yearly World Jewish
Population report. Member of the advisory committee of the FRA surveys on perceptions of
discrimination and antisemitism in European Union Member States in 2012 and 2018, and of the
Pew surveys of Jewish Americans in 2013 and 2020. Advisor to Israel’s Central Bureau of
Statistics and Senior policy consultant to major Israeli and international organizations. Winner ofthe Marshall Sklare Award for distinguished achievement by the Association for the Social
Scientific Study of Jewry (1999), and the Michael Landau Prize for Demography and Migration(2013). Member of Yad Vashem's committee for the Righteous among the Nations.

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