Demographics
During the Roman period, Bayt Jibrin had a mixed population of Jews, Christians and pagans. Under Muslim rule, Islam gradually became the dominant religion and by the 1900s, the entire population was Muslim.
In Ottoman tax records from 1596, the town had a population of 275 inhabitants. In the 19th century its population reached 900. This rose to about 1,000 in 1912, and to 1,420 in the next decade. According to the 1931 census of Palestine, Bayt Jibrin's population was 1,804. A 1945 land and population survey by Sami Hadawi reported a dramatic increase to 2,430. The general growth pattern over every 9–11 years from 1912 to 1945 was around 400-500. In 1948, the projected population was 2,819.
The number of refugees from Bayt Jibrin, including their descendants, was estimated to be 17,310 in 1998. Many live in the al-'Azza and Fawwar camps in the southern West Bank.
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