Global study finds number of Holocaust survivors shrank by half since 2000
Major demographic survey by Claims Conference determines world has at most 272,000 survivors left, nearly all of whom were children during Nazi genocide
Cnaan Lidor is The Times of Israel's Jewish World reporter
The world has at most about 272,000 Holocaust survivors still alive, nearly all of whom were children when the genocide ended, according to the first major demographic study of its kind in over 20 years.
The data was published Tuesday by the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, known as the Claims Conference, ahead of International Holocaust Remembrance Day on January 27.
The tally shows a halving of the population of living Holocaust survivors, who numbered 564,000 in 2000, according to a study from that year that the Claims Conference says was previously the most comprehensive global survey.
Women make up about 60 percent of survivors alive as of 2023, a figure that corresponds with women’s greater life expectancy globally.
Nearly half of all survivors reside in Israel, according to the report, which is based on the Claims Conference records of 245,000 living Holocaust survivors around the world who have received compensation through its mechanism.
The Claims Conference assesses that there could be up to another 10% who are not in contact with or known to it, according to the report, “Holocaust Survivors Worldwide — A Demographic Overview,” which would bring the global population of Holocaust survivors to 272,000 at most.
North America and Europe have roughly the same number of survivors, with each area accounting for about 18% of the global population. Half of all Western European survivors live in France. About 90% of North American survivors live in the United States. Another 12% of all survivors reside in countries that used to be part of the Soviet Union.
The report found the survivors are spread across 90 countries and that their median age is 86.
Of all survivors, 90% have received some compensation from Germany, with 35% receiving monthly pensions, according to the report by the Claims Conference, which acts as the representative in compensation talks and negotiations with Germany.
The Claims Conference allocated more than $812 million in social welfare payments for survivors in 2023, an increase of nearly $100 million from 2022, it said.
The Claims Conference report “clearly indicates that most survivors are at a time in their lives when their need for care is growing,” wrote Gideon Taylor, the Claims Conference’s president, and Greg Schneider, its executive vice president, in a letter accompanying the report.
Israeli Holocaust survivors have for years lobbied for greater financial assistance from the state, including in a series of street protests in 2007. Multiple governments have in recent years allocated new funds to this end, but approximately 25% of Holocaust survivors living in Israel remain living below the poverty line, according (Hebrew) to data provided last year by the National Insurance Institute.
Activists seeking greater state assistance for Holocaust survivors say this is largely because tens of thousands of survivors who immigrated to Israel after October 1953 are ineligible for monthly compensation pensions from the state, which are paid to other survivors as part of Israel’s Reparations Agreement with Germany. In 2012 an Israeli court rejected a petition by such survivors, who argued the rules were unfair because the Iron Curtain had prevented many of them from immigrating to Israel, before October 1953.
The Conference’s figure of 119,300 survivors in Israel is some 30% lower than a tally by Israel’s Census Bureau, which reported 167,862 survivors as of the end of 2022, while Israel’s Holocaust Survivors’ Rights Authority put the figure at 150,000.
Israeli governments have modified the definition for who is a Holocaust survivor several times, leading to the diverging tallies. One significant change occurred in 2014, when the Finance Ministry extended the definition to more than 100,000 citizens who had not been interned in ghettos or concentration camps.
