The two countries with the greatest shares of the world's Jewish population are the United States and Israel. The United States had been a hub of Jewish immigration since the nineteenth century, as Jewish people sought to escape persecution in Europe by emigrating across the Atlantic. The Jewish population in the U.S. is largely congregated in major urban areas, such as New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago, with the New York metropolitan area being the city with the second largest Jewish population worldwide, after Tel Aviv, Israel. Israel is the world's only officially Jewish state, having been founded in 1948 following the first Arab-Israeli War. While Jews had been emigrating to the holy lands since the nineteenth century, when they were controlled by the Ottoman Empire, immigration increased rapidly following the establishment of the state of Israel. Jewish communities in Eastern Europe who had survived the Holocaust saw Israel as a haven from persecution, while the state encouraged immigration from Jewish communities in other regions, notably the Middle East & North Africa. Smaller Jewish communities remain in Europe in countries such as France, the UK, and Germany, and in other countries which were hotspots for Jewish migration in the twentieth century, such as Canada and Argentina.

The Holocaust was the systematic extermination of Europe's Jewish population in the Second World War, during which time, up to six million Jews were murdered as part of Nazi Germany's "Final Solution to the Jewish Question". In the context of the Second World War, the term "Holocaust" is traditionally used to reference the genocide of Europe's Jews, although this coincided with the Nazi regime's genocide and ethnic cleansing of an additional eleven million people deemed "undesirable" due to their ethnicity, beliefs, disability or sexuality (among others). During the Holocaust, Poland's Jewish population suffered the largest number of fatalities, with approximately three million deaths. Additionally, at least one million Jews were murdered in the Soviet Union, while Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands and Yugoslavia also lost the majority of their respective pre-war Jewish populations. The Holocaust in Poland In the interwar period, Europe's Jewish population was concentrated in the east, with roughly one third living in Poland; this can be traced back to the Middle Ages, when thousands of Jews flocked to Eastern Europe to escape persecution. At the outbreak of the Second World War, it is estimated that there were 3.4 million Jews living in Poland, which was approximately ten percent of the total population. Following the German invasion of Poland, Nazi authorities then segregated Jews in ghettos across most large towns and cities, and expanded their network of concentration camps throughout the country. In the ghettos, civilians were deprived of food, and hundreds of thousands died due to disease and starvation; while prison labor was implemented under extreme conditions in concentration camps to fuel the German war effort. In Poland, six extermination camps were also operational between December 1941 and January 1945, which saw the mass extermination of approximately 2.7 million people over the next three years (including many non-Poles, imported from other regions of Europe). While concentration camps housed prisoners of all backgrounds, extermination camps were purpose-built for the elimination of the Jewish race, and over 90% of their victims were Jewish. The majority of the victims in these extermination camps were executed by poison gas, although disease, starvation and overworking were also common causes of death. In addition to the camps and ghettos, SS death squads (Einsatzgruppen) and local collaborators also committed widespread atrocities across Eastern Europe. While the majority of these atrocities took place in the Balkan, Baltic and Soviet regions, they were still prevalent in Poland (particularly during the liquidation of the ghettos), and the Einsatzgruppen alone are estimated to have killed up to 1.3 million Jews throughout the Holocaust. By early 1945, Soviet forces had largely expelled the German armies from Poland and liberated the concentration and extermination camps; by this time, Poland had lost roughly ninety percent of its pre-war Jewish population, and suffered approximately three million further civilian and military deaths. By 1991, Poland's Jewish population was estimated to be just 15 thousand people, while there were fewer than two thousand Jews recorded as living in Poland in 2018.

According to a survey, ** percent of the Jewish population in Israel followed kosher practices consistently in accordance with the Jewish tradition. On the other hand, ** percent of Jews did not keep kosher at all, and ** percent mostly kept kosher.

With the heightened threat to Germany's Jewish population following the Nazi Party's ascent to power in 1933, many German Jews chose to flee or emigrate. In 1933, Germany's Jewish population was approximately 500,000 people; by the end of the war, it is estimated that 300,000 fled the country, and 165,000 were murdered in the Holocaust. In order to flee, most Jewish emigrants from Germany had to give up the majority of their wealth to the German state, whose emigration tax and seizure of property stripped Jews of their financial assets. Destination and transit For Germany's Jewish refugees, the most common destination country was the United States, and almost half of all these refugees would arrive in the U.S. over this 12 year period. As the United States had a strict quota of 27,000 German migrants per year, many refugees were forced to enter via other countries. France was the second most common destination country, receiving 100,000 refugees. However, France was also used as a transit country for German Jews wishing to travel further afield, especially after it was annexed by Germany in 1940. This was also true for several other European countries, such as the Netherlands, which had provided protection for German Jews in the mid-1930s, before rapidly becoming very unsafe following the outbreak of war in 1939. The Frank family Possibly the most famous example of this was the story of Anne Frank and her family. Anne had been born in Frankfurt, Germany in 1929, but her family moved to the Netherlands in 1934 after Hitler came to power. The family then led a relatively comfortable and successful life in Amsterdam, with her father, Otto, founding his own businesses. When the Netherlands was invaded by the Germans in 1940, the family tried to emigrate once more; Otto had been granted a single Cuban visa in 1942, but the family was forced to go into hiding as the restrictions tightened. For the next two years, with the help of non-Jewish friends, they lived in secret in the upper floor of Otto's business premises with several other Jewish refugees, in a small space concealed behind a bookcase. In August 1944, through unknown means, the group was betrayed and then arrested by Dutch authorities, and the Frank family was sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau thereafter. Anne's mother, Edith, died of starvation in Auschwitz within five months of her capture, while Anne and her sister, Margot, died one month later after being transferred to the Bergen-Belsen camp in Germany. Otto was the sole survivor of the group. Otto's secretary, Miep Gies, had saved Anne's diary the day after the group was arrested, which she then gave to Otto; he then devoted much of the remainder of his life to the publication and promotion of his daughter's diary, which has now become one of the most famous and widely-read books in recent history. Additionally, the hiding space is now open to the public, and has become one of the Netherlands' most popular tourist museums.

Europe's Jewish population in 1939 was around 9.5 million people, and it is estimated that six million of these were ultimately killed by 1945. The persecution of German Jews escalated during the interwar period, particularly after Hitler's ascent to power in 1933, and again after Kristallnacht in 1938. However, the scale of this increased drastically following the German invasions of Poland in 1939 and the USSR in 1941, when Germany annexed regions with some of the largest Jewish populations in Europe. Extermination Camps As part of the "Final Solution to the Jewish Question", the Nazi occupiers established six extermination camps in present-day Poland; these were Auschwitz-Birkenau, Belzec, Chelmno, Majdanek***, Sobibor, and Treblinka. Prisoners, mostly Jews, were transported from all over Europe to these camps. Upon arrival, the majority of victims were sent directly to purpose-built chambers or vans, where they were murdered with carbon monoxide or Zyklon B gas. A relatively small number of prisoners were also forced to dispose of the victims' bodies, which often included their own family members, friends, or persons known to them. Most of the deceased were incinerated, and many of the camp records were destroyed; this means that precise figures for the number of deaths in extermination camps will never be known. It has been estimated that at least 2.7 million Jews were murdered in these six camps; over two thirds of these were killed at Auschwitz or Treblinka. Einsatzgruppen After extermination camps, the most common method of murder was through mass shootings. The majority of these shootings were not carried out by regular soldiers, but specialized task forces known as "Einsatzgruppen". Each group was just a few hundred men each, but they were responsible for some of the largest individual acts of genocide in the war. The largest of these took place at Babi Yar, near Kyiv in 1941, where almost 35,000 victims were beaten, humiliated, and then shot over a two day period. The Einsatzgruppen were most active in the annexed Soviet territories (although additional regiments were active in Poland and the Balkans), and their ranks were often bolstered by local volunteers. It has been estimated that Einsatzgruppen were responsible for the genocide of more than two million people in fewer than six years.

In 1808, as it was preparing for a major new war against Napoleonic France, the armed forces of the Habsburg Monarchy were augmented by two additional recruitment systems. In parallel to the creation of a trained reserve, which significantly increased the manpower available to the regular army, a popular levy was raised in the Austro-Bohemian crown lands. With a strength of nearly 150 battalions, the Landwehr was intended primarily for national defence. Its individual battalions were formed on a strictly territorial basis, ensuring men from the same area would serve together. In March 1809, when general mobilisation was declared, members of the Landwehr were asked to offer themselves as war volunteers. In the Kingdom of Bohemia, six battalions of such volunteers were drawn out of a total of 50 Landwehr battalions. To emphasise that they were wartime formations and not part of the standing army, these volunteer battalions were formally designated either as Freikorps or as Freiwillige. The Bohemian Freikorps was named Legion Erzherzog Carl in honour of the Austrian commander-in-chief, Generalissimo Archduke Charles. Unlike the regular army and the Landwehr, the bulk of the Legion was made of genuine volunteers. The unit sustained heavy combat casualties, but relatively few of its soldiers were taken prisoner, deserted, or went missing. Despite the defeat of the Austrian army, the Legion's battalions maintained their combat effectiveness to the very end of the war.

Based on all available manpower reports preserved in the Austrian State Archives, this database covers all 16 documented Jewish soldiers of the Legion EH Carl. Apart from one veteran non-commissioned officer who was transferred from the regular army, the remaining Jewish soldiers volunteered from their respective Landwehr battalions or were exempt civilians who signed up directly into the unit. The detailed monthly tables enable the reconstruction of their entire service itineraries, almost on a daily basis. When considered together, the Jewish soldiers of the Legion appear to have been enthusiastic fighters. By the end of the war, half of them had either become casualties or had been promoted to non-commissioned officers. Contrary to many regular army and Landwehr units, the EH Carl Legion did not experience disciplinary disintegration. It was, therefore, able to retain most of its men during the retreats from Bavaria and from the Battle of Wagram. Hence, most of its Jewish soldiers survived the war and were honourably discharged when the Legion was dissolved in January 1810.

The remaining 25 entries cover all the documented Jewish soldiers who served in other volunteer formations of the Austrian army during the 1809 War. Similar to Bohemia, volunteers were raised from the 24 Landwehr Battalions of Moravia and Silesia. The service record of the Mährische-Schlesische Freiwillige was similar to that the Legion EH Carl. Its three battalions fought well, as did its eight Jewish soldiers. Very different was the experience of the three Free Battalions from Galicia where not enough local volunteers came forward. After failing to reach the desired strength at the start of the war, these units first took foreign mercenaries and deserters and then, when many of these ran away, had to resort to conscripts. The fifteen Jewish soldiers of the Galician battalions were just that - a combination of transferees from the regular army, foreigners (including a deserter from the French army), and later in the war, conscripts. Almost half of them had deserted before the battalions were disbanded. The Bukovina Freikorps actually had two stages: a popular levy, which was badly defeated by the advancing Poles and which was subsequently re-organised as an army-run Freikorps manned primarily by second echelon troops: border guards, garrison troops, and members of the deserter cordon. Each of these formations had a Jewish soldier. Both were volunteers, and one of them even came with his own horse.

It should be made clear that the 41 individual entries in this dataset cannot give a full picture of the Jewish presence in volunteer formations in 1809. Unusually, the enlistment papers of the six battalions of the Wiener Freiwillige, by far the best-known volunteer formation of the Austrian army, did not record the religion of the recruits. Any Jew who served in that unit would not be known to us. Furthermore, the experience of the Jewish members of the volunteer formations should be seen in wider context. It was colourful but unrepresentative. There were probably hundreds of Jews in the Landwehr and several thousands in the regular army. Collective enthusiasm to volunteer pro-actively for military service to prove a point, which occurred in Jewish communities of the Habsburg Monarchy later on and particular during the First World War, was still very far away.

For more information on the Austrian Volunteer Formations during the 1809 War, see:

Alfons von Wrede, Geschichte der k. und k. Wehrmacht, 5 Vols., (Vienna: Seidel, 1898–1905), Vol. 2, pp. 459-66.

For more information on the Legion EH Carl, see:

Anton Ernstberger, Böhmens Freiwilliger Kriegseinsatz gegen Napoleon 1809, Veröffentlichen des Collegium Carolinum 14, (Munich: Robert Lerche, 1963), pp. 9-55.

Hermansky–Pudlak syndrome (HPS) is a group of rare autosomal recessive disorders characterized by oculocutaneous albinism (OCA) and bleeding diathesis. To date, 11 HPS types have been reported (HPS-1 to HPS-11), each defined by disease-causing variants in specific genes. Variants in the HPS1 gene were found in approximately 15% of HPS patients, most of whom harbor the Puerto Rican founder mutation. In this study, we report six affected individuals from three nonconsanguineous families of Ashkenazi Jewish descent, who presented with OCA and multiple ecchymoses and had normal platelet number and size. Linkage analysis indicated complete segregation to HPS3. Sequencing of the whole coding region and the intron boundaries of HPS3 revealed a heterozygous c.1163+1G>A variant in all six patients. Long-range PCR amplification revealed that all affected individuals also carry a 14,761bp deletion that includes the 5′UTR and exon 1 of HPS3, encompassing regions with long interspersed nuclear elements. The frequency of the c.1163+1G>A splice site variant was found to be 1:200 in the Ashkenazi Jewish population, whereas the large deletion was not detected in 300 Ashkenazi Jewish controls. These results present a novel HPS3 deletion mutation and suggest that the prevalence of HPS-3 in Ashkenazi Jews is more common than previously thought.

This statistic represents the distribution of people of Jewish religion or Jewish origin living in France in 2015, by age group. Thus, more than half of the practicing Jews in France were under 35 years of age.

Islam is the major religion in many African countries, especially in the north of the continent. In Comoros, Libya, Western Sahara, at least 99 percent of the population was Muslim as of 202. These were the highest percentages on the continent. However, also in many other African nations, the majority of the population was Muslim. In Egypt, for instance, Islam was the religion of 79 percent of the people. Islam and other religions in Africa Africa accounts for an important share of the world’s Muslim population. As of 2019, 16 percent of the Muslims worldwide lived in Sub-Saharan Africa, while 20 percent of them lived in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. Together with Christianity, Islam is the most common religious affiliation in Africa, followed by several traditional African religions. Although to a smaller extent, numerous other religions are practiced on the continent: these include Judaism, the Baha’i Faith, Hinduism, and Buddhism. Number of Muslims worldwide Islam is one of the most widespread religions in the world. There are approximately 1.9 billion Muslims globally, with the largest Muslim communities living in the Asia-Pacific region. Specifically, Indonesia hosts the highest number of Muslims worldwide, amounting to over 200 million, followed by India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. Islam is also present in Europe and America. The largest Islamic communities in Europe are in France (5.72 million), Germany (4.95 million), and the United Kingdom (4.13 million). In the United States, there is an estimated number of around 3.45 million Muslims.

General studies constituted the main field of study chosen by university students in humanities faculties in Israel, in the academic year 2019/2020. Over 3,200 students enrolled in this subject area. The second most common field was general philosophy, which attracted over 1,170 students in the same year. In contrast, Judaism was the least popular field of study, with 221 students enrolled.

As early as 1319, allegations of well-poisoning had been levelled at leper communities in Europe, in an attempt to demonize and ostracize this group in society. In France and Spain in 1321, the "leper's plot" developed into a widespread conspiracy, claiming that leper communities were acting on the orders of the Jews or Spanish Moors, poisoning water supplies in an attempt to spread disease among Christians. Under royal decrees, many lepers were then tortured into confessing to these acts, and were subsequently burnt at the stake (although this was often carried out by vigilante mobs before it could be done by the courts). After the initial hysteria in 1321, the involvement of lepers was quickly dismissed, and a papal bull was introduced to grant protection to leper communities in France; this however did not dispel the myths surrounding the Jews' involvement in the conspiracy, and the issue emerged again a few decades later. Why the Jews were blamed When the bubonic plague made its way to Europe, many were eager to find a scapegoat on whom they could blame their misfortune. The "well-poisoning" accusations were quickly raised again against Jewish communities in France and Spain, and also across the German states. Historians point to several reasons why Jews were blamed for the Black Death; many Jews lived in separate communities and did not use the same common wells, and Jewish religious practices promote bathing and hand-washing; both of these factors meant that the plague spread differently and at a different rate among Jews than it did among the general population. Modern historians also point to the fact that Jews were often moneylenders, and their debtors often used the plague as an opportunity to expunge their debts; Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV also forfeited the property of Jews who were killed in the pogroms, giving further impetus to these mobs. Anti-Jewish pogroms The first reported pogroms took place in Toulon in 1348, before the violence then spread across the rest of Western Europe. Over the next three years, hundreds of Jewish communities were attacked and exterminated, with the majority taking place in the German states. A number of larger communities, such as those in Cologne and Mainz, were destroyed completely, resulting in the deaths and forced conversions of thousands of Jews. Pope Clement VI introduced two papal bulls in 1348, which granted the church's protection to Europe's Jews. He also urged the clergy and nobility to take measures that protected Jews in their local areas, although most sources show that authorities were apathetic or complicit in the actions of the mobs. There is even evidence that authorities orchestrated several of the pogroms, such as in Strasbourg, where authorities led the city's Jewish community to a newly-built house outside the city, but when they arrived, any Jews who refused to convert to Christianity were then burned alive inside the house. Legacy Many of the sources present different versions of events, with death tolls ranging from one hundred to several thousand in some cases, while some sources also claim that Jews set fire to their own homes rather than convert. It is now impossible to confirm the exact sequence of events, or the actual number of deaths resulting from these pogroms, however, the limited sources available do provide a brief foundation for the modern understanding of medieval anti-Semitism and the destruction inflicted upon the Jews during the plague. It is also important to note that these pogroms were not unique to the Black Death's outbreak, and there is evidence of numerous massacres of Jewish communities in the centuries that followed. The demographic impact of the massacres was that there was a mass exodus of Jews from west to Eastern Europe, to countries such as Poland (where they were actually welcomed by authorities). The consequences of this demographic shift would be most felt six centuries later, when millions of Jews across Eastern Europe were exterminated at the hands of the Nazi regime during the Holocaust.

Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.

The aims of the project were to examine alcohol- and suicide-related beliefs among UK Protestants and Jews, both men and women, to investigate the so-called alcohol-suicide-depression hypothesis. This hypothesis suggests that attitudes to alcohol use and suicide will be more favourable among Protestants than Jews, and among men more than women. Questionnaire measures of alcohol- and suicide-related beliefs and behaviour assessed the dependent variables in an analysis of covariance design. The independent variables were cultural-religious group (Protestant vs. Jewish background or affiliation). Covariates, assessed by questionnaire measures, were religiosity, depression, anxiety, and (a new measure of) tolerance for depression.
Main Topics:

The data cover:
demographics - participant's age, other demographic factors, religious practice;
alcohol - consumption, beliefs about alcoholism, expectations about alcohol's effects, attitudes to alcohol use;
suicide - attempts, ideation, reasons for living;
tolerance for depression;
depression, anxiety.

Standard Measures
Reasons for Living inventory (RFL): Linehan, M. M. et al (1983) 'Reasons for staying alive when you are thinking of killing yourself: the Reasons for Living inventory' Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 52, pp.276-286.
Religious Activity Measure, from: Loewenthal, K. M., Macleod, A. K. and Cinnirella, M. (2001) 'Are women more religious than men? Gender differences in religious activity among different religious groups in the UK' Personality and Individual Differences.
Biphasic Alcohol Effects Scale (BAES): Martin, C. S. et al (1993) 'Development and validation of the Biphasic Alcohol Effects Scale' Alcoholism - Clinical and Experimental Research, 17, pp.140-146.
Alcohol consumption, from: Weiss, S. and Moore, M. (1992) 'Perception of alcoholism among Jewish, Moslem and Christian teachers in Israel' Journal of Drug Education, 22, pp.253-260.
Suicide ideation and attempts, from the Present State Examination: Wing, J. K., Cooper, J. E. and Sartorius, N. (1973) The measurement and classification of psychiatric symptoms, London: Cambridge University Press.
Anxiety, depression: Zigmond, A. S. and Snaith, R. P. (1993) 'The Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale' Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavia, 67, pp.361-370.

Approximately one fifth of the world's Jews lived outside of their country of birth. Israel was both the most common country of origin and the most common destination of Jewish migrants.

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In 2021, almost half (percent) of people of Jewish faith or culture had already considered leaving France. The most frequently mentioned reason was concern about the future of Jews in France (percent). The second most common reason was a fear about the future of the country (***percent). ******percent of Jews had also considered leaving France for economic reasons, and ***percent because they were attracted to other countries for religious or cultural reasons.

Anti-Jewish attacks were the most common form of anti-religious group hate crimes in the United States in 2023, with ***** cases. Anti-Islamic hate crimes were the second most common anti-religious hate crimes in that year, with *** incidents.

Between 1941 and early 1945, over 1.3 million people were deported to the Auschwitz concentration camp complex; approximately 1.1 million of these deportees were Jewish, and one million Jews were murdered. Auschwitz was the largest of six extermination camps constructed by the Nazi regime in Poland, as part of their "Final Solution to the Jewish Question", which sought to exterminate Europe's Jewish population.

The Holocaust in Hungary Of the 1.1 million Jews sent to Auschwitz, the most common country of origin was Hungary. Hungary had a sizeable Jewish population of around 445,000 people in 1930, but Hungary's territory grew significantly after it annexed parts of Slovakia, Romania, Ukraine, and Yugoslavia in the late-1930s, and the total Jewish population (including Christians with Jewish heritage) in the 1941 census was approximately 825,000. Compared to the Germans, Hungary's treatment of the Jews throughout the war had been much less restrictive, and its prime minister opposed deportations to concentration camps. German invasion and increasing number of deportations This changed, however, in March 1944; as the Axis forces were being pushed west out of Soviet territory; Germany then invaded Hungary to prevent them from negotiating a peace with the Allies. Thereafter, a puppet government was installed and authorities, under the leadership of Adolf Eichmann, began to round up and deport Jews to Poland. While the Nazi extermination of Jews began on a large scale in 1941, the majority of Hungary's victims were deported and murdered over an eight week period, between May and July 1944. 430,000 Jews were deported from Hungary to Auschwitz in this time; it is estimated that around 20 percent of these were selected for labor, and the remaining 80 percent were sent directly to the gas chambers. Arrivals from Hungary were so rapid that the crematoriums could not keep up with the rate of murder, and additional mass graves had to be dug while the number of trains was reduced. Eventually, as the Axis position deteriorated, Hungarian authorities ceased deportations under mounting pressure from the Allies in early July. Exact figures for Hungary's death toll in the Holocaust remain elusive, although it is estimated that over 560,000 Jews were killed from within Hungary's wartime borders (270,000 from pre-war territories), with 434,000 of these deaths taking place between May and July 1944, the majority of which at Auschwitz.

In 2020, around 28.8 percent of the global population were identified as Christian. Around 25.6 percent of the global population identify as Muslims, followed by 14.9 percent of global populations as Hindu. The number of Muslims increased by 347 million, when compared to 2010 data, more than all other religions combined.

Jesus is the most commonly mentioned name in the Christian Bible, despite only appearing in the New Testament. Moses, considered the most important patriarch in Judaism, is the third most mentioned name in the Bible with 803 mentions, after David, the third King of Israel.

In January 2024, ** percent of Jewish respondents in Israel believed that there was a common set of values and understandings shared by most Israelis. This amounts to a ** percentage point increase from a previous survey conducted in June 2023. In comparison, only ** percent of Arab respondents agreed that there was such a consensus in January 2024, a decline of ** percentage points from June 2023. Following the Israel-Hamas war, which started on October 7th, 2023, public sentiment on a 'national consensus' among Jews and Arabs in Israel diverged significantly.