(JTA) — Seventy-one percent of Israelis say they believe the Iran nuclear accord brings Iran closer to a bomb, and 51 percent support bypassing President Barack Obama in effort to nix it.
Forty-seven percent of respondents in a survey conducted by Maariv, an Israeli daily, supported a military strike to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear arms.
The poll was published Friday, three days after Tehran and major world powers agreed on the deal. The unsigned pact offers Iran sanctions relief in exchange for a scaling back of its nuclear program.
The paper did not give a sample size or margin of error for the poll carried out by Panels Politics Polling Institute, nor did it provide information on respondents’ age, gender or religion.
Nearly three-quarters of respondents said they thought the agreement would accelerate Iran’s development of a nuclear weapon, not prevent it as claimed by the powers.
Asked “Do you support independent military action by Israel against Iran if such action is needed to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon?” 47 percent said yes, 35 percent said no and 18 percent expressed no opinion.
A majority of respondents believed Jerusalem should use whatever means necessary to convince the U.S. Congress to reject the deal, while only 38 percent said it was now time to engage with Obama on the execution of the deal in order to achieve conditions preferable to Israel. Eleven percent said they did not know what the best course of action was.
