Sixty percent of the Israeli adult public favor amnesty for the imprisoned members of the Jewish terrorist underground, while only 34 percent are against their pardon, according to a public opinion poll published in Maariv last Friday. The poll was taken by the Modi’in Ezrachi Research Institute.
A profile of the responders indicated the usual breakdown on such political questions — most of those in favor of amnesty were said to be from Asian and African countries or the children of Oriental communities, with lower education and in the lower income brackets.
A further breakdown showed that while people voting for the Labor Alignment were evenly split, 86 percent of those who said they voted for the Likud favor pardon, and 96 percent of Kach supporters want the Jewish underground prisoners pardoned.
A Hanoch and Rafi Smith poll in the Jerusalem Post Friday gave results similar to that of a Modi’in Ezrachi poll on the popularity of political parties that was published in Maariv earlier in the week. (See August 28 Bulletin.)
The Smith poll gives Labor 38 percent, with another II percent favoring small parties “close to Labor,” giving the “Labor Bloc” 49 percent; the Likud polled 22 percent; Tehiya and Kach together, 22 percent; the religious parties eight percent, giving what the pollsters termed the “Likud-religious bloc” 30 percent of the total.
Examining the popularity of Rabbi Meir Kahane, the Smiths found that 20 percent had a positive opinion of him, 17 percent had a “not so positive opinion” and 58 percent had a “very negative opinion.”
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