Nearly two thirds of Israelis fear being harmed in a terror attack as the terror wave which began last September continues.
According to the Tel Aviv University/IDI Peace Index survey published on Monday, 64.3% of Israeli Jews feared they or someone close to them would be wounded or killed in the current wave of terror attacks.
Surprisingly, Israeli Arabs were even more concerned by terrorism, with a full 72.9% fearing that they or someone important to them would be harmed by a terror attack.
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu received mediocre approval ratings from both Jewish and Arab Israelis, with only 39.8% of Israeli Jews viewing his performance as good, compared to 56.8% who disapproved.
Among Israeli Arabs 29.1% approved of Netanyahu’s performance, compared to 58.2% who disapproved.
Opposition leader Yitzhak Herzog also received poor marks, with just 15% of Israeli Jews approving of his performance, compared to 73% who disapproved.
The current governing coalition received mixed marks from both Arabs and Jews.
When asked to rate the government from 0 to 10 (higher numbers reflecting greater favorability), Jews ranked the government as very good or very poor in roughly equal numbers, with 16.2% giving the coalition a very positive rating, compared to 16.4% who gave a very poor one. More than 48% gave a middling grade.
Interestingly, Israeli Arabs were more likely than Jews to give the Netanyahu government a higher grade, with 21.6% giving it an 8, 9, or 10. More than five times as many Arabs as Jews gave the government a 10 – 14.1% compared to just 2.6% of Jews.
When grading Netanyahu’s government in specific areas, Israeli Arabs again gave more favorable rankings, except in security.
Only 36% of Israeli Jews approved of the government’s handling of the economy, compared to 52% of Arabs. A whopping 56.2% of Israeli Arabs also approved of the government’s handling of foreign affairs, compared to just 30.7% of Jews. Regarding security, 42% of Arabs gave the government positive marks, compared to nearly 49% of Jews.