Oversight of boycott of settlement goods in PA
Photo: Issam Rimawi
Palestinians won't buy from settlements, but will work in them
According to survey conducted by Truman Institute and Palestinian policy research center, 72% of Palestinians support boycott on settlements, but 60% opposed to prohibition on working in them. Poll also finds support for final-status peace agreement up both in Israel, PA
Seventy-two percent of Palestinians support the boycott on products made in West Bank settlements imposed recently by the Palestinian Authority, but 60% are against the prohibition against Palestinians working in them, according to a poll conducted jointly by the Harry S. Truman Institute for the Advancement of Peace at the Hebrew University and the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research based in Ramallah.
The poll, whose results were published Tuesday, was conducted from June 6-16 and surveyed a range of issues on the Israeli-Palestinian agenda.
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On the matter of the boycott of settlement products, the poll shows that 44% of Palestinians believe that it will harm proximity talks with Israel, while others were divided as to whether it would promote talks or would have no effect at all. Among Israelis, half believed the boycott would not change anything, whereas 37% believe it will damage talks, and 8% believe it will benefit them.
A significant portion of the poll was dedicated to questions related to the Gaza flotilla raid and its implications. On the Palestinian side, 63% believed that the Palestinians "won" on the matter.
The Israeli side, on the other hand, is occupied mainly with placing responsibility for the debacle. Some 50% of Israelis place responsibility for the flotilla affair on its organizations, while just 28% think the political echelons who decided to commandeer the ships is responsibility for it. Some 13% placed responsibility on the military establishment.
Palestinian support for peace agreement up 11%
The poll's results show that the support for a peace agreement is on the rise on both sides. Both the Israeli and the Palestinian publics are displaying increasing support for a final-status agreement along the lines offered by former US President Bill Clinton at Camp David Summit in Taba at the end of 2000.
According to the poll, most Israelis support the draft proffered then with 52% in support and 37% in opposition. This is a similar show of support as was observed from 2006 to 2008, but is higher than the 2009 figures (46%). The Palestinians are split on the issue, with 49% in support and 49% in opposition to the deal. However, this is a positive trend in comparison with last year, when 38% of Palestinian responded they support the Clinton plan.
Despite the increase in willingness to compromise on both sides, neither the Palestinian nor the Israelis believe that an independent Palestinian state will be established alongside Israel within the next five years. Two-thirds of the Israeli public and two-thirds of the Palestinian public believe that the chances that an independent Palestinian state be established are low or non-existent.
The Palestinian sample polled is representative of the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem populations aged 18 and older. Some 1,270 respondents were polled in face-to-face interviews conducted at 127 different locations throughout the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The sampling error is 3%. The interviews were conducted from June 10-13, 2010.
The Israeli figures were collected via telephone interviews conducted on a 810-person sample representative of the adult population in Israel. The interviews were conducted in Hebrew, Arabic, and Russian from June 6-16, 2010. The sampling error is 3.5%.
The poll was planned and managed by Prof. Yaacov Shamir from the Truman Institute and the Prof. Khalil Shikaki, who heads PSR. The poll was conducted with the support of the Ford Foundation (Cairo) and the Adenauer Foundation (Jerusalem and Ramallah).
