From the Middle Ages until the Holocaust, Polish Jews comprised an appreciable part of Poland's population. The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, known for its religious tolerance and described as Paradisus Judaeorum (Latin for "Paradise of the Jews"), had attracted tens of thousands of Jews who fled persecution from other European countries. Poland was a major spiritual and cultural center for Ashkenazi Jews. At the start of the Second World War, Poland had the largest Jewish population in the world (over 3.3 million, some 10% of the general Polish population). The vast majority were murdered under the Nazi "Final Solution" mass-extermination program in the Holocaust in Poland during the German occupation; only 369,000 (11%) of Poland's Jews survived the War. The list below includes persons of Jewish faith or ancestry.

Historical figures

Politicians

Others

Sovereign Polish Armed Forces

Religious figures

Rabbis

Academics

Economists

Mathematicians

Philosophers

Sciences

Historians

Cultural figures

Artists

Musicians

Screen and stage

Writers and poets

Polish-language

Yiddish-language

Business figures

Sports

Baseball

Chess

Fencing

Football

Professional wrestling

Swimming

Track and field

Weightlifting

Holocaust survivors

• Nelly Ben-Or • Tauba Biterman • Zahava Burack • Yehiel De-Nur • David Faber • Leon Feldhendler • Joseph Friedenson • Tuviah Friedman • Roman Frister • Rena Kornreich Gelissen • Ben-Zion Gold • Yekusiel Yehudah Halberstam • Anna Heilman • Alicia Appleman-Jurman • Natalia Karp • Gerda Weissmann Klein • Jerzy Kosinski • Yisrael Lau • Zvia Lubetkin • Henryk Mandelbaum • Jack Mandelbaum • Kitty Hart-Moxon • David Olère • Leopold Pfefferberg • Philip Riteman • Josef Rosensaft • Israel Shahak • Mike Staner • Alina Szapocznikow • Władysław Szpilman • Emanuel Tanay • Menachem Mendel Taub • Jack Tramiel • Ernst Wiechert • Meir Wilchek