Third of Israelis say corruption has risen
International poll puts Israel in South American league of public perception of political corruption
These are some of the findings of the "global corruption barometer" poll published on Friday, to mark the international day to combat against corruption, as declared by the United Nations.
The poll, carried out by the Transparency International organization, was carried out over the summer in 69 countries, and based its results on the answers of 54,000 people, including 500 Israelis.
Some 79 percent of the Israelis in the poll said that the level of corruption in Israel has risen in the past three years, and 65 percent said the level rose by a lot.
The findings place Israel in the dubious league of 13 countries in which at least 50 percent of the public believes that the level of corruption in their country has greatly risen.
Other countries with such findings include the South American countries of Bolivia, Costa Rica, and Equator, as well India, Nigeria, and the Philippines.
Pessimism
In Israel, political parties are perceived as the most corrupt sector (they received a 4.5 score of corruption out of 5), followed by the Knesset (4.2), the religious establishment (3.8), the police (3.3), income tax and the media (3.3), the private and business sectors (3.2), the electric, water, and phone companies (3.2), the Licensing Agency (3.1), non governmental organizations (3.1), Customs (3.1), health services (3.0), the judicial system (2.9), and, in last place, the IDF (with a grade of 2.5).
Israelis are, however, not alone in their view of parties – respondents in 45 out of 69 countries perceived their political parties as being the most corrupt.
In Israel, only 3 percent believe that the corruption does not influence the political environment.
Doron Navot, a political corruption researcher, said that "this latest report shows the widening gap between the level of corruption in the democratic institutions, especially in political parties and the Knesset, and the safeguarding of appropriate public norms in day to day interaction between the citizen and the authorities."
He added that the poll "expressed the level of crisis which has occurred in recent years in Israeli politics."
