Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

Mohammed Was the Most Popular Israeli Baby Name in 2014

Mohammed was the most popular name in Israel in 2014.

Some 2,650 Mohammeds were born in Israel in 2014, the country’s Central Bureau of Statistics said in a report released Sunday.

The second most popular name for a boy was Noam, with 1,600 baby boys, though according to the report some 400 girls also were named Noam.

The other nine most popular boys names were Ori/Uri, David, Yousef, Eitan, Itay, Ariel, Daniel, Yonatan and Moshe.

The most popular name for a girl was Noa, with 1,478 newborns, followed by Tamar, Shira, Maya, Yael, Adele, Talia, Avigail, Ayala and Sara.

For Muslim children, the most popular names after Mohammed or Ahmed were Yusuf, Omar, Abed, Adam, Ali, Ibrahim, Mahmoud, Amir and Khaled. The most popular Muslim girls name was Maryam, as well as Jana, Lian, Malak, Alin, Lyn and Nur.

Eitan rose in popularity from 10th place in 2013 to fifth last year, likely in part to Operation Protective Edge in Gaza during the summer of 2014 known as Mivtza Tzuk Eitan in Hebrew.

Meanwhile, 209 baby boys were named Ovadia in 2014, up from 117 in 2013, the year Rabbi Ovadia Yosef died. Some 36 boys were named Ovadia in 2012.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.