MAZAL (Ma’agar Zehuyot Leumi/ the National Authorities Database)
MAZAL is the National Library of Israel's central database that brings together information from 32 libraries (and counting) across Israel and contains over 4.5 million records of people, places, titles of works, subjects, and more—with thousands of updates and new records added each month. By handcrafting metadata and ensuring consistency in names and topics throughout the catalog, MAZAL makes it easier to find all relevant information—even when different terms or spellings are used for the same entity. MAZAL has a higher threshold of accuracy than almost any other library system in the world, supports multiple alphabets (Hebrew, Latin, Arabic, Cyrillic), connects with international databases like Wikidata and VIAF, and presents clear, enriched results. The information in MAZAL also assists the Library in identifying which materials have passed out of copyright and may be opened to the public worldwide. With a new public interface as of 2024, searching the library catalogs is now more reliable, user-friendly, and precise than ever before.
Digital Access
11,600,000 website visits (2024), including nearly 800,000 visits from Arab countries (a decrease in 2024 due to security controls)
375 curated subject pages (160 Hebrew, 70 English, 145 Arabic)
250 feature stories/year in The Librarians online magazine (Hebrew/English/Arabic)
15,000 music and liturgy pages
200,000 podcast downloads
152,000 Facebook followers (Hebrew)
55,000 Facebook followers (English)
300,000 visits to NLI education website (2024)
220,000 items on Wikimedia Commons, generating 25-30m views per month
200,000 automated subject pages
[ 46 ]
Made with FlippingBook flipbook maker