ABSTRACT
During the past fifty years the Jewish world has experienced some unprecedented, momentous changes which have transformed its structure, internal composition and future prospects. On the one hand, there has been the creation of an independent sovereign Jewish State in its ancient homeland, reconstituted for the first time in nearly 2,000 years. At the same time, the farflung, extremely diverse Jewish Diaspora has enjoyed a sustained period of affluence, influence, empowerment and social acceptance in its Western branches, rare in the scarred, often tragic, annals of Jewish history. Tremendous shifts of population have also taken place with far-reaching consequences. In 1939, although the largest single Jewish community in the world already resided in the United States, the core of world Jewry (9.5 million or 57 per cent of the global Jewish population) still lived in Europe.
