Barely Half Of The World Has Ever Heard Of The Holocaust

The Anti-Defamation League surveyed 53,000 people in 102 countries and found only 54% of them had ever heard of the Holocaust, the mass murder of roughly 6 million Jews in Europe.

Awareness is predictably high in Western Europe, where 94% of those surveyed were aware of the Holocaust. But in the Middle East and Africa, awareness is low.

Young people under the age of 35 are also less likely to know about the Holocaust than people over the age of 50. Here's a look at awareness by region:

Among those who have heard of the Holocaust, 32% believe it is either a myth or has been greatly exaggerated.

Additionally, 26% of adults surveyed had anti-Semitic attitudes. These attitudes were measured using a "Global 100 Index score" that indicates the percentage of adults who answered "probably true" to six or more of 11 negative stereotypes about Jews, according to the ADL.

Here's a look at anti-Semitic attitudes around the world (a lower percentage represents less anti-Semitism):

Many African countries, however, were not included in the survey. Much of northern Africa was covered, but Democratic Republic of Congo, Angola, Zambia, and countries from Mauritania to Ethiopia were not included.

Still, the numbers are striking.

Barry Curtiss-Lusher, ADL's national chair, said in the news release: "The level of anti-Semitism in some countries and regions, even those where there are no Jews, is in many instances shocking. We hope this unprecedented effort to measure and gauge anti-Semitic attitudes globally will serve as a wake-up call to governments, to international institutions and to people of conscience that anti-Semitism is not just a relic of history, but a current event."

The stereotype that most respondents believed was "Jews are more loyal to Israel than to [this country/the countries they live in]," with 41% of people saying that was probably true. The second most popular stereotype was "Jews have too much power in the business world."