Peace Index: November 2004

Prof. Ephraim Yaar and Prof. Tamar Hermann
http://spirit.tau.ac.il/socant/peace/peaceindex/2004/files/nov2004e.doc

In the wake of Arafat's death, a definite majority of the Israeli Jewish
public tends to be more optimistic about the chances of peace with the
Palestinians and also favors conducting negotiations with them. The
prevalent view is that even from the Palestinian standpoint Arafat's
leadership was generally negative, as was his role in key regards such as
advancing the Palestinian people's struggle for political independence,
creating a democratic system of government, and promoting the peace process.

The general optimism in the public about the chances for peace is
accompanied by a positive impression, among most of those who have an
opinion on the matter, of the way in which the current Palestinian
leadership is managing the affairs of the Palestinian Authority. At the same
time, only a minority believe the upcoming elections will produce a
Palestinian leadership that can take charge in the field and wield clear
authority over all the Palestinian organizations. On this background, there
seems to be a majority who believe Israel should help the Palestinian
leadership stabilize its rule by means of certain gestures to ease the lives
of the Palestinian population in the territories, such as ending closures
and removing checkpoints.

It seems, however, that the sense of Israeli-Palestinian relations being on
the verge of a positive change has not carried over to the Syrian issue. An
overwhelming majority rejects the initiative by the Syrian president, Bashar
Assad, to renew negotiations with Israel without preconditions, while
accepting the government's position that first Syria must end its support
for the terror organizations. Likewise, the majority currently rejects, as
in the past, the formula of signing a peace agreement with Syria in return
for full withdrawal from the Golan Heights.

As for which Israeli leaders the public regards as capable of advancing the
peace process with the Arabs while safeguarding the vital interests of the
state, most of the public opts for Ariel Sharon and after him, by
considerable margins, Bibi Netanyahu. Other personalities, both from the
Right (Effie Eitam and Silvan Shalom) and the Left (Shimon Peres, Ami
Ayalon, Ehud Barak, and Yossi Beilin), received only a few percentage points
each.

About 70% of the Israeli public is now more optimistic, after Arafat's
death, about the chances of reaching a peace agreement with the Palestinians
(9% are more pessimistic, 20% say Arafat's death does not affect the
chances, and 12% do not know). This appears to explain the increase in the
number of supporters of holding negotiations-from around two-thirds in
recent months to 75% at present. A segmentation of the respondents by
Knesset voting reveals that, as one would expect, among Meretz, Labor, and
Shinui voters the support for negotiations is overwhelming, while among Shas
and Mafdal (National Religious Party) voters only a minority favors such
talks. However, the interesting finding is that in Likud, too, a pronounced
majority of three-fourths now supports such talks, compared to about 60% who
favored them in recent months. That is, Arafat's death has clearly increased
the Likud voters' readiness to support peace negotiations with the
Palestinians.

The growing optimism can be explained in terms of the widespread assessment
that Arafat personally harmed the peace process even from the standpoint of
the Palestinians' interests-86% take that view compared to only 8% who say
he did more good than harm. The negative evaluations of Arafat's leadership
concern not only relations with Israel but other issues as well, aside from
the question of putting the Palestinian issue on the international agenda,
on which the public is divided-50% believing he did more good while 43%
think he did more harm. Thus, regarding the struggle to achieve political
independence, 67% thought he did more harm than good (27% thought the
benefit was greater than the harm he caused). Some 83% said he did more harm
in terms of building a democratic system of government, and 87% thought so
regarding the development of the Palestinian economy. Overall, two-thirds of
the Jewish public view Arafat as a quite bad or very bad leader from the
Palestinian standpoint, compared to 26% who think he was a quite good or
very good leader for them.

The Israeli Arab public views Arafat's leadership completely differently.
Seventy-five percent say he did more good than harm in getting the
Palestinian issue on the international stage, 65% in the struggle for
political independence, 61% in building a democratic system of government,
and 59% in advancing the peace process. In the economic domain, a small
majority-45%-believe he did more harm (compared to 39% who credit him with
more good than harm). As for the general assessment of Arafat as a leader of
the Palestinian people, the contrast with the Jewish public is even more
stark: 92% think he was a quite good or very good leader and only 6% see him
as a bad or very bad leader. Yet, notwithstanding the Israeli Arab public's
positive view of Arafat's contribution to advancing the peace process with
Israel, as in the Jewish public a majority-58%-is today more optimistic
about the chances of reaching an Israeli-Palestinian settlement (21% are
more pessimistic, 14% think Arafat's death has brought no change in the
chances, and 7% do not know).

It appears that the Israeli Jewish public still has trouble assessing the
Palestinian leadership's handling of the Authority's affairs since Arafat's
death-38% responded that they cannot evaluate its actions one way or the
other. Among those who do take a position, however, the tendency is to view
the leadership's functioning positively so far-34%-compared to 28% who have
the impression that it is functioning poorly or very poorly.

Nevertheless, when we asked, regarding the decision to hold elections for
the leadership of the Palestinian Authority next month, this question:
"What, in your opinion, are the chances that the elections will produce a
Palestinian leadership that has clear authority over all the Palestinian
organizations, and is able to run the Authority and take charge in the
field?"-it turned out that the Israeli Jewish public does not see much
chance of a leadership emerging that wields authority. The
majority-62%-thought the chances of this are quite low or very low, compared
to 26% who believe the chances are quite high or very high (12% did not
know). Perhaps because of this fear that no Palestinian leadership is
emerging that has the authority to take charge, or for some other reason, a
majority (53%) supported the view that Israel should help the new
Palestinian leadership stabilize its rule with certain gestures to ease the
lives of the Palestinian population, such as ending closures and removing
checkpoints in the West Bank (42% oppose Israel making such gestures and 5%
do not know).

In the Israeli Arab public, 58% evaluate the functioning of the current
leadership as quite good or very good, compared to 25% who see it as quite
poor or very poor (17% do not know). Regarding the results of the upcoming
elections, the views are divided with a slight tendency in the negative
direction-51% believe the chances of a Palestinian leadership emerging that
wields authority and control are low, while 45% say the chances of this are
high.

The overwhelming support for holding peace negotiations with the
Palestinians does not carry over to the question of relations with Syria.
When asked whether, in light of President Bashar Assad's expression of
readiness for negotiations with Israel without preconditions, Israel should
respond positively to the Syrian initiative or if, instead, in the words of
Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom, Syria must first prove its peaceful
intentions by ending its support for Hizbullah and the terror organizations
active in Damascus, 71% of the Jewish interviewees agreed that renewing the
negotiations must be conditional on Syria ending its support for the terror
organizations, with only 22% saying Israel should respond positively to the
Syrian initiative and return to the negotiating table immediately (7% did
not know). The clear tendency to reject the Syrian initiative is apparently
related to the public's views on the familiar formula of signing a full
peace agreement with Syria in return for a full Israeli withdrawal from the
Golan Heights: whereas only 24% support that formulation, 57% oppose it and
17% are in between (3% do not know). This segmentation is basically similar
to findings obtained on this question in Peace Index surveys over the past
decade.

In view of the current situation and the decisions facing Israel in the near
future, we asked: "Who among the following leaders could, in your opinion,
as prime minister, advance the peace process between Israel and the Arabs
while safeguarding the vital interests of the state?" Among the leaders we
presented (the list of candidates being read to the interviewees in random
order), the serving prime minister, Ariel Sharon, had a clear lead with 35%
of the interviewees seeing him as the right person. In second place, 17% of
the interviewees did not choose an actual candidate but opted for none of
the candidates or someone else, indicating the current lack of a clear
candidate to replace Sharon. In third place came Benjamin Netanyahu with
14%, while all the other candidates received less than 10% each-Shimon
Peres, 8%; Ami Ayalon, 6%; Ehud Barak, 4%; Effie Eitam, 3%; Silvan Shalom,
2.5%; and Yossi Beilin, 2%. A segmentation of these preferences for prime
minister by voting in the most recent Knesset elections shows that support
for Sharon among Likud voters is high-53%, followed by Netanyahu, 18%; no
one or someone else, 13%; and Silvan Shalom, 5%. Among Labor voters the
leader-although with a much smaller percentage-is also Prime Minister Sharon
at 25%, and after him, Peres, 18.5%; Ami Ayalon, 17.5%; and Ehud Barak, 15%.
Among Shas voters the majority-56%-chose the option of none of the
candidates or someone else; Netanyahu came in second with 25%; and Sharon
and Silvan Shalom each got 6%. In Shinui the leading candidate is
Sharon-47%, and after him Peres with 16%, and someone else/none of the
candidates with 10.5%. In Meretz, quite surprisingly, the leading candidate
is Ami Ayalon at 57%.

The Peace indexes for this month were:
Oslo Index - overall sample: 36.7; the Jewish sample: 33.9.
Negotiation Index - overall sample: 56.7; for the Jewish sample: 54.9.
Syria Index - overall sample: 40.8; the Jewish sample: 37.4.

The Peace Index project is conducted at the Tami Steinmetz Center for Peace
Research of Tel Aviv University, headed by Prof. Ephraim Yaar and Prof.
Tamar Hermann. The telephone interviews were conducted by the B. I. Cohen
Institute of Tel Aviv University, November 29-30, 2004, and included 581
interviewees who represent the adult Jewish and Arab population of Israel
(including the territories and the kibbutzim).
The sampling error for a sample of this size is about 4.5% in each
direction.