Israel's population nears 9 million on eve of 2019

Jews make up 74.3% of society and Arabs 20.9%; over the past 12 months 185,000 babies were born and 40,000 people moved in

By Stuart Winer 31 December 2018, 4:59 pm Edit

Stuart Winer is a breaking news editor at The Times of Israel.

Israel’s population stands at 8,972,000 as it readies to enter 2019, 174,000 more people than a year before, the Central Bureau of Statistics said Monday.

Of that number, 6,668,000 (74.3%) are Jews, 1,878,000 are Arabs (20.9%) and 426,000 (4.8%) are other.

In 2018 the population grew by 174,000, or 2%, the average rate of growth of Israeli society over the past decade.

Natural population growth accounted for 81% of the increase with over 100,000 added to the Jewish population, 37,000 to the Arab community and another 3,500 to other communities.

The number of babies born was 185,000 and there were 28,000 new immigrants, the CBS said. A further 12,000 other people came to the country, including returning citizens and non-citizens.

Outgoing Jewish Agency head Nathan Sharansky (3rd left) and new chief Isaac Herzog (4th right) welcome new immigrants on a special ‘aliyah’ flight organized by the Jewish Agency, at Ben Gurion Airport on July 23, 2018. (Jewish Agency Facebook page/Dudi Salem, Zoog Productions)

About a third of new immigrants came from Russia, 19.6% from Ukraine, 8% from France, a similar number from the US, 4.9% from Asia, and 1.6% from Africa.

Some 45,000 people died in 2018, and 7,000 were taken off the population rolls after spending more than a year abroad.