JERUSALEM (JTA) — Palestinians are divided in their feelings on a two-state solution with Israel, while 42 percent believe that armed action is the best way to achieve a state, a new poll found.
The survey conducted by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research found that a slight majority, 51 percent, oppose the two-state solution while 48 percent are in favor. The margin of error, however, is 3 percent.
While armed action was the preferred method to a state, 29 percent of Palestinians surveyed think negotiations is the most effective way to achieve a state and 24 percent favor popular nonviolent resistance.
To carry out the poll, 1,270 Palestinian adults in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip were interviewed face to face in 127 randomly selected locations from Sept. 17 to 19.
Some 66 percent of Palestinians reject a return to unconditional negotiations with Israel if it means that settlement activities will continue. In addition, 88 percent of Palestinians demand that the Palestinian Authority take Israel to the International Criminal Court in the Hague over the settlement building.
The poll also found Palestinians mostly split on the Arab Peace Initiative, which offers a return to Israel’s pre-1967 borders in return for peace, with 45 percent in support and 49 percent in opposition. Forty percent back a mutual recognition of Israel’s national identity as the state for the Jewish people and Palestine as the state for the Palestinian people, but 58 percent oppose it.
Some 65 percent of Palestinians support indirect negotiations between Hamas and Israel to reach a long term hudna, or truce, in the Gaza Strip in return for lifting the siege and 32 percent oppose such negotiations. At the same time, 59 percent of Palestinians believe that Hamas won last summer’s Gaza war, which breaks down to 69 percent of those in the West Bank and 42 percent in Gaza. Some 67 percent believe that rocket launches at Israel from Gaza should resume if the blockade of Gaza is not ended.
The poll found that 65 percent of the Palestinian public wants Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to resign. Satisfaction with Abbas’ job performance dropped to 38 percent from 44 percent three months ago and from 50 percent in June 2014.
If new elections were held today, according to the poll, 35 percent each would vote for Hamas and Abbas’ Fatah party.
