Israel set to be home to majority of world’s Jews by 2035
What will the Jewish world look like in 2126? New report predicts major changes
Israel is expected to become home to most of the world’s Jews within the next decade, according to a major new report examining what Jewish life could look like 100 years from now.
The study, published by the Institute for Jewish Policy Research (JPR), explores how the Jewish people may change by 2126 as communities face rising antisemitism, assimilation, migration pressures and major demographic shifts.
Written by renowned demographer Professor Sergio DellaPergola, the report does not try to make exact predictions. Instead, it looks at the long-term trends that have shaped Jewish history for generations – and are likely to continue shaping it in the future.
Among its most striking findings is the prediction that Israel could pass the symbolic milestone of becoming home to more than 50 percent of the global Jewish population as early as 2035.
The report says this would fundamentally change the balance of Jewish life worldwide, shifting cultural and political influence increasingly towards Israel.
At the same time, many Diaspora communities are expected to continue shrinking because of ageing populations, lower birth rates and high levels of intermarriage.
In the United States, mixed marriages have risen from very small numbers in 1900 to more than 60 percent in 2020, according to the paper.
The study also points to the rapid growth of Haredi communities, particularly in Israel, where birth rates remain significantly higher than among secular Jews.
DellaPergola writes that Haredim currently make up around 15 percent of Israel’s Jewish population, but could grow to around 30 percent by 2050 if current trends continue.
The paper warns this could dramatically affect Israel’s economy, welfare system, politics and military service structure unless employment levels and national service participation rise within the Haredi sector.
The report also argues that antisemitism is likely to remain a defining challenge for Jewish communities worldwide. It says anti-Jewish hostility is increasingly expressed not only through violence, but through social exclusion, intimidation and attempts to undermine Jewish identity and ties to Israel.
Today, Jews make up less than two people per 1,000 globally, the report notes, despite the disproportionate attention and hostility often directed towards Jewish communities.
JPR executive director Dr Jonathan Boyd said the research was intended to encourage Jewish communities to think beyond immediate crises and focus on deeper long-term changes.
“There’s a tendency in Jewish communal life to focus on the crisis of the day,” Boyd said. “But if you base your understanding of the future on short-term shocks, you risk missing the bigger picture entirely.”
He added: “This paper doesn’t offer predictions in a simple sense. It offers something more valuable: a framework for understanding the forces that will shape the Jewish world over time.”
The paper repeatedly stresses how impossible it is to predict history with certainty, pointing to events such as the Holocaust, the creation of Israel and the 7 October attacks as examples of moments few people saw coming.
Despite the warnings, DellaPergola ends on a note of optimism about Jewish survival.
“If there is still a world in 2126, there will be a Jewish people,” he writes. “It will be a Jewish People very different from the current one, in a world even more unrecognisable than the one we live in today.”
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