Sixty-eight years after gaining independence, and 71 years since the end of World War II and the Holocaust, Israel's population stands at 8,522,000, the Central Bureau of Statistics said on Monday. This means that Israel's population grew tenfold since its founding in 1948, when its population was only 806,000. Some 6,377,000 (74.8%) of Israel's residents are Jews, 1,771,000 (20.8%) are Arab and about 374,000 people (4.4%) fall into the other ethno-religious categories (non-Arab Christians, members of other religions, and those who do not belong to any specific faith in the official population registry). Foreign workers and asylum seekers are not included in those figures. As of 2014, they numbered about 192,000. Today, some 75% of Israel's Jewish population can be classified as "sabra" (native Israeli), of whom about half are second-generation Israelis. Only 35% of Israel's Jews were sabras in 1948. According to CBS projections, Israel's population will reach 11,300,000 by 2035. Israel's population grew by 182,000 people since last year's Independence Day, representing a 2.2% increase. Some 195,000 babies were born over the past 12 months, an all-time high. Meanwhile, 47,000 people died in Israel during that period. Some 36,000 people immigrated to Israel over the past year (this figure includes immigrants who were born to Israeli citizens abroad). In 1948, Israel had only one city that exceeded 100,000 residents: Tel Aviv-Jaffa. Today this figure applies to 14 Israeli cities, including eight whose population is greater than 200,000: Jerusalem, Tel Aviv-Jaffa, Haifa, Rishon Lezion, Petah Tikva, Ashdod, Netanya and Beersheba. According to the CBS, in 1948 there were about 11.5 million Jews worldwide, with only 6% of them living in Israel. In 2014, Jews numbered 14,300,000 million, with 43% living in Israel.
