Fact check: What was the total population of the British Mandate for Palestine in 1945?

1. What sources claim the 1945 total — and why one number stands out

Only one analysis in the provided set gives a clear aggregated total for 1945: the demographic summary reporting 1,764,520 residents with a religious breakdown ^[1]. Several other items reference the Survey of Palestine (compiled December 1945–January 1946) as the primary documentary basis for mid‑1940s demographic figures, but those pieces do not state the final total outright ^[2]. Given the internal consistency and specificity of the ^[1] entry, that figure functions as the principal quantitative claim within this dataset, while the survey references establish a credible documentary framework.

2. How the Survey of Palestine frames the context but leaves gaps

The Survey of Palestine is repeatedly noted across the materials as the authoritative compilation prepared for postwar inquiry, and it likely contains granular district and population tables prepared in late 1945 and early 1946 ^[2]. The survey’s timing makes it the natural primary source for a mid‑1945 population estimate, yet the excerpts provided here do not reproduce its full tables. That omission explains why several source analyses remark on population distribution and trends without presenting a single consolidated Mandate total — they rely on the survey’s data without transcribing the aggregate figure into these summaries ^{[3] [4]}.

3. Demographic breakdowns and what they imply about population structure

The ^[1] breakdown assigns roughly 60% Muslim, 31% Jewish, and 8% Christian of the total population in 1945, implying a Muslim majority and substantial Jewish minority by numbers ^[1]. Other analytic notes emphasize that Jews constituted about one‑third of the population by 1947 and that Jewish population growth during the Mandate was pronounced, though those points do not contradict the 1945 snapshot and instead highlight rapid demographic change during the late Mandate years ^{[3] [4]}.

4. Conflicting emphases rather than direct contradictions

The supplied documents do not present rival totals; instead, they emphasize differing aspects of the same demographic story: some cite growth trends and proportions, others reference the survey as an investigative tool ^{[3] [4] [2]}. Absent contradictory totals, the analytic balance favors the explicit ^[1] aggregate while treating survey references as corroborative context. The materials together therefore converge on a consistent narrative: a Mandate population in the mid‑1.7 million range with a Muslim plurality and a rapidly expanding Jewish community.

5. Methodological caveats implicit in the dataset

The summaries hint at methodological complexities that could affect absolute totals: timing of enumeration, inclusion or exclusion of nomadic Bedouin, and displacement or migration flows during 1945–1946. Because the Survey was prepared across December 1945–January 1946, its counts may blend late‑1945 population movements and administrative cutoffs differently than a strict 31 December 1945 census would. The provided materials do not supply those methodological notes verbatim, so the 1,764,520 figure should be read as the best available reported total within this corpus, subject to standard demographic caveats ^[2].

6. What is omitted and why it matters for interpretation

The dataset lacks the raw Survey tables, metadata on enumeration methods, and alternative contemporaneous counts from other agencies; those omissions limit our ability to assess margins of error or reconcile possible undercounts of transient populations. Without those primary tables, we cannot quantify uncertainty around the 1.76 million estimate, nor can we decompose regional variations beyond the summary religious breakdown offered in ^[1]. The recurring references to the Survey indicate that richer detail exists, but it is not reproduced in the provided summaries ^{[2] [5]}.

7. Bottom line: the best‑supported answer from the provided materials

Synthesizing the supplied analyses and explicit figures, the authoritative answer within this collection is that the British Mandate for Palestine had approximately 1,764,520 inhabitants in 1945, with about 1,061,270 Muslims, 135,550 Christians, and 553,600 Jews ^[1]. The Survey of Palestine is the documentary source repeatedly invoked for this period, and while other entries frame trends and proportions, none in this set provide a different total figure, leaving ^[1] as the principal numeric claim supported by the corpus ^{[2] [3] [4]}.