Yad Vashem Reaches Five Million Holocaust Victims’ Names in Historic Milestone

Yad Vashem announced Monday that it has now identified the names of five million Jews murdered in the Holocaust, a historic milestone in its mission to restore the identities of the six million victims of Nazi persecution.

The Jerusalem-based World Holocaust Remembrance Center said the achievement marks more than seventy years of global research and collection work dedicated to ensuring that every victim is remembered by name. The announcement comes as the number of living Holocaust survivors continues to dwindle with about 200,000 alive today, according to estimates.

“Reaching five million names is both a milestone and a reminder of our unfinished obligation,” said Yad Vashem Chairman Dani Dayan. “Behind each name is a life that mattered — a child who never grew up, a parent who never came home, a voice that was silenced forever. It is our moral duty to ensure that every victim is remembered so that no one will be left behind in the darkness of anonymity.”

Yad Vashem’s Central Database of Shoah Victims’ Names now includes over 80 percent of the six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust. The database, accessible to the public online in six languages, is the result of decades of research using archival records, survivor testimonies, Nazi documentation, census data, and memorial projects from Jewish communities around the world. Researchers have even examined tombstones in Jewish cemeteries and memorial plaques in synagogues in their quest for missing names.

At the heart of the effort is Yad Vashem’s “Pages of Testimony” project are one-page memorial forms filled out by survivors, relatives, and friends to commemorate those killed. More than 2.8 million names have been collected through these pages, written in over 20 languages. Each submission is carefully vetted and cross-referenced with historical records.

“The Pages of Testimony are symbolic headstones,” said Dr. Alexander Avram, director of the Hall of Names and the Central Database of Shoah Victims’ Names. “Most of the victims were left without graves, without traces — remembered now only through the pages that bear their names. By identifying five million names, we are restoring their human identities and ensuring that their memory endures.”

Avram, who has led the project for nearly four decades, explained that the Nazis sought not only to exterminate the Jewish people but to erase their very existence. “The Nazis and their collaborators did not issue death certificates,” he said. “In most cases the Jews were just killed or gassed with no registration whatsoever.” 

New technologies have accelerated the process. In May 2024, Yad Vashem announced it had developed AI-powered software to analyze and cross-match historical documents, uncovering previously unidentified victims. Officials estimate that up to 250,000 more names may still be found through such efforts, though unfortunately hundreds of thousands will likely remain unknown forever.

“The Nazis aimed not only to murder them, but to erase their existence,” Avram said. “By identifying five million names, we are restoring their human identities and ensuring that their memory endures.” Over the years, the database has enabled countless families to commemorate lost relatives and, in some cases, reconnect with surviving kin.

Yad Vashem will mark the milestone with a seminar in Jerusalem on November 6 and a separate event hosted by the Yad Vashem USA Foundation in New York on November 9.

As the number of Holocaust survivors dwindles, as experts estimate that 90 percent will have passed away by 2040, the center says its mission is becoming ever more urgent. “Reconstructing these names is an act of remembrance and defiance,” Dayan said. “Each one restores a life stolen, and ensures that the Jewish people will never forget.”