Half of Israel’s Arab population believes that Israel does not have the right to exist and much larger percentages hold negative views of Zionism and support the establishment of a Palestinian state, according to the results of a survey made public today.
The survey was conducted among Israeli Arabs by the Institute of Research and Development of Arab Education under the direction of Dr. Sami Samouha, head of the Arab Department of the Arab Jewish Center at Haifa University. It was financed by a grant from the Ford Foundation. The poll showed that while 50 percent reject Israel’s right to exist, 64 percent consider the Zionist movement to be racist; 75 percent of Arabs holding an Israeli passport support a Palestinian state, and 48 percent define themselves as Palestinians.
The findings showed further that 87 percent of Israel’s Arabs support the return of Israel to its pre 1967 borders and 59 percent would have it return to the original borders envisaged in the 1947 partition plan. Of those responding, 64 percent favored abolition of the Law of Return which allows Jews from anywhere in the world to settle in Israel as citizens.
Samouha stressed the growing polarization among Israeli Arabs. He said there is constant defection from the formerly large group that tried to adopt itself to the Jewish State. He warned that sooner or later the Israeli government will be compelled to put the problem of Israeli Arabs on the agenda of the peace process, something, he said, it has failed to do so far.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
