LONDON (AFP) — Britain's Jewish population is expanding for the first time since World War II, notably due to the growth of large families of ultra-orthodox members of the faith, according to research out Tuesday.
Britain has the fifth largest Jewish population in the world, but since 1950, the numbers have fallen by 40 percent, from 450,000 to some 280,000 now, said Yaakov Wise, of Manchester University's Centre for Jewish Studies.
The latest figure is up from 275,000 in 2005 and is the first such increase in decades.
"The high birth rate of ultra-orthodox Jews is now reversing this trend and that will have a major impact on the Jewish community in the years to come," he said, adding there are more births than deaths for the first time since 1945.
He highlighted the large birth rate among ultra-orthodox Jews, who have an average of nearly seven children. Secular Jewish women have on average 1.65 children whereas the ultra-orthodox have on average 6.9, he said.
"The growing numbers of ultra-orthodox Jews in communities across the United Kingdom underline these trends," he said.
"That is a major contributory factor to my view that ultra-orthodox Jews are set to outnumber their more secular counterparts by the second half of this century."
The research was based on national census records, the last of which was held in 2001, and studies of Jews in the Manchester and Leeds areas of northern England.
Muslims are Britain's largest non-Christian religious group.
There are nearly 1.6 million Muslims in Britain, representing 2.7 percent of the total population, according to the 2001 national census.
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