Israel’s Christian population is fast dwindling while those of Jews and Muslims continue to grow, giving credence to the fears that a plan to expel Christians is underway in the Jewish state.
The growth rate of Christians in Israel is much slower than those of Jews and Muslims. In 1949, when Israel was recognized as a UN member nation, there were 34,000 Christians. They increased only fivefold in the past 70 years to 180,000 in 2019. But during the same period, Muslims in Israel grew 14 times to number 1.6 million and Jews grew some six times to number 6.69 million in 2019, says a report of the Israeli Statistics Office released last month.
The Druze, another religious minority in the Jewish state, increased almost tenfold from 15,000 to 143,000 in 2019. The report noted that the falling number of Christians is due to the lower growth rate. The Christian growth rate was 1.9 percent, the lowest. The average growth rate was 2.43 for Jewish families and 2.60 for Muslim families, it said.
The lower growth rate of the Christian community in Israel is attributed to the violence due to the Palestine crisis. Often, their plight is overlooked as two main communities — Jews and Muslims — fight each other. As the fringe elements in both communities have become active in the last decade, Christians are caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. The largest Arab Christian population centres are Nazareth (21,400), Haifa (16,500) and Jerusalem (12,900). According to the report, 84 percent of Christians are satisfied with their life in Israel. According to Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics, 76.7 percent of Christians in Israel are Palestinian Arabs, who mainly live in the northern part of the country with more than 21,000 Christians in Nazareth.