Aliyah from Britain has dropped over the last two years, according to the latest figures from the Jewish Agency.

Compared with 772 Anglo-Jewish emigrants to Israel in 2015 — a rise of around 25 per cent on the previous year — the number fell to 694 in 2016 and 544 last year.

No great surge seems likely this year, with a total of 371 recorded for the first eight months of 2018.

The UK figures parallel those for Western Europe as a whole. In 2015, 9,937 made aliyah — including more than 7,300 from France in the year of the terrorist attacks in Paris. But there was a notable drop from Western Europe to 6,508 the following year and further in 2017 to 4,939. So far from January to August this year, 2,693 Jews have made aliyah from Western Europe.

While UK aliyah fell to a low of 323 in 2002, it has averaged around 500 annually since, according to an Institute for the Jewish Policy Research report in 2013.

Yigal Palmor, the Jewish Agency’s director for communications and public affairs, said it did not have the data to draw conclusions from the latest figures as it did not ask prospective immigrants their motivation for going to Israel.

UK aliyah has fluctuated over time, with 1,294 in 1983, compared to close to 1,000 fewer in 2002, he pointed out.

The current low could be “attributed to statistical undulations,” he suggested.

“It is obviously clear that no massive rush will have taken place by the end of 2018 — we’ll probably be at around 500.

“That said, people may be preparing their aliyah for the medium range, in two or three years, and we might see a rise by then. But as Abba Eban used to say: ‘It’s difficult to make predictions, especially regarding the future’.”