Imagine if in 1945 hundreds of Brits christened their newborn sons Adolf. That might have rattled us as a nation, right?
I feel similarly about the news that, last year, 583 baby boys in the UK were given the name Yahya.
|  | Name ‘Keir’ dies out after Starmer takes officeMost popular baby names from 2024 revealed – use our tool to see how yours ranked |
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Yes, hundreds of families saw fit to bestow on their little ones the name shared by the one-time leader of Hamas and the architect of the worst mass murder of Jews since Adolf’s days – Yahya Sinwar.
The Top 100 Boys’ Names of 2024 were released this week, and Yahya has really blown up.
| | Baby names: How popular is your name? Use our tool to find outThe Telegraph’s searchable tool shows where your name ranks, as Noah and Olivia top the charts again |
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It reportedly enjoyed a larger spike in popularity than any other male name. It leapt a staggering 33 places up the rankings, to become the 93rd most popular boy’s name.
The name that made the second largest jump was Vinnie, which went up 20 places to become the 91st most popular boy’s name. There were 585 boys called Vinnie and 583 called Yahya: it’s like a grainy snapshot of the tense times we live in.
As the Jewish Chronicle says, there’s no “definite correlation” between the spike in boys being called Yahya and an outburst of support for Yahya Sinwar. And yet it seems pretty clear something weird is going on. It’s the sudden leap in the popularity of Yahya that freaks me out.
The calendar year in which the most popular names were compiled started less than three months after Hamas’s pogrom of October 7, 2023. It’s a year in which Sinwar would have been in the news a lot, including when he was bumped off by the IDF in October 2024.
| | Israel kills Hamas leader Yahya SinwarWest piles pressure on Netanyahu to end conflict after death of Oct 7 mastermind but he vows to ‘go into Rafah a... |
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It was also a year in which the dimmest of the “pro-Palestine” set will have clogged up social media with gushing praise for Sinwar, calling him a “resistance fighter” and whatnot.
Can it really be a coincidence that as Hamas and its then top dog hit the headlines, the name Yahya rose higher up the rankings than any other boy’s name? Perhaps.
What’s in a name, people ask. A lot. Years ago I wrote a piece for the BBC about how the popularity of a name waxes and wanes in tandem with world events. I talked to women in their 80s called Lolita, who as kids had been blissfully unaware of what would become of their name following the publication of Nabokov’s infamous novel in 1955.
The name Adolf all but disappeared in Europe after World War II. Myra collapsed in the UK following the Moors Murders. I spoke to the only British male to have been named Lucifier – he calls himself Luke now.
Names have meaning. So surely it means something that more families than ever called their boys Yahya in the months after a man with that very name gave the go-ahead to the worst anti-Jewish pogrom in decades.
Not one baby boy was called Keir last year. That’s not surprising. It’s an old-fashioned name, and what’s more it is now associated with one of the lamest-duck PMs we’ve ever been saddled with.
And yet you don’t have to be a demographic doomerist to feel unnerved that while no boy was called Keir, 583 were called Yahya.
The name Adolf all but disappeared in Europe after World War II. Myra collapsed in the UK following the Moors Murders. I spoke to the only British male to have been named Lucifier – he calls himself Luke now.
Names have meaning. So surely it means something that more families than ever called their boys Yahya in the months after a man with that very name gave the go-ahead to the worst anti-Jewish pogrom in decades.
Not one baby boy was called Keir last year. That’s not surprising. It’s an old-fashioned name, and what’s more it is now associated with one of the lamest-duck PMs we’ve ever been saddled with.
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Imagine if in 1945 hundreds of Brits christened their newborn sons Adolf. That might have rattled us as a nation, right?
I feel similarly about the news that, last year, 583 baby boys in the UK were given the name Yahya.
Name ‘Keir’ dies out after Starmer takes office
Most popular baby names from 2024 revealed – use our tool to see how yours ranked
The Top 100 Boys’ Names of 2024 were released this week, and Yahya has really blown up.
Baby names: How popular is your name? Use our tool to find out
The Telegraph’s searchable tool shows where your name ranks, as Noah and Olivia top the charts again
The name that made the second largest jump was Vinnie, which went up 20 places to become the 91st most popular boy’s name. There were 585 boys called Vinnie and 583 called Yahya: it’s like a grainy snapshot of the tense times we live in.
As the Jewish Chronicle says, there’s no “definite correlation” between the spike in boys being called Yahya and an outburst of support for Yahya Sinwar. And yet it seems pretty clear something weird is going on. It’s the sudden leap in the popularity of Yahya that freaks me out.
The calendar year in which the most popular names were compiled started less than three months after Hamas’s pogrom of October 7, 2023. It’s a year in which Sinwar would have been in the news a lot, including when he was bumped off by the IDF in October 2024.
Israel kills Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar
West piles pressure on Netanyahu to end conflict after death of Oct 7 mastermind but he vows to ‘go into Rafah a...
Can it really be a coincidence that as Hamas and its then top dog hit the headlines, the name Yahya rose higher up the rankings than any other boy’s name? Perhaps.
What’s in a name, people ask. A lot. Years ago I wrote a piece for the BBC about how the popularity of a name waxes and wanes in tandem with world events. I talked to women in their 80s called Lolita, who as kids had been blissfully unaware of what would become of their name following the publication of Nabokov’s infamous novel in 1955.
The name Adolf all but disappeared in Europe after World War II. Myra collapsed in the UK following the Moors Murders. I spoke to the only British male to have been named Lucifier – he calls himself Luke now.
Names have meaning. So surely it means something that more families than ever called their boys Yahya in the months after a man with that very name gave the go-ahead to the worst anti-Jewish pogrom in decades.
Not one baby boy was called Keir last year. That’s not surprising. It’s an old-fashioned name, and what’s more it is now associated with one of the lamest-duck PMs we’ve ever been saddled with.
And yet you don’t have to be a demographic doomerist to feel unnerved that while no boy was called Keir, 583 were called Yahya.
The name Adolf all but disappeared in Europe after World War II. Myra collapsed in the UK following the Moors Murders. I spoke to the only British male to have been named Lucifier – he calls himself Luke now.
Names have meaning. So surely it means something that more families than ever called their boys Yahya in the months after a man with that very name gave the go-ahead to the worst anti-Jewish pogrom in decades.
Not one baby boy was called Keir last year. That’s not surprising. It’s an old-fashioned name, and what’s more it is now associated with one of the lamest-duck PMs we’ve ever been saddled with.