57% of Israeli Jews Concerned About Palestinian Attacks

According to two surveys, while the majority of Jews in various countries describe their sense of security as very good and prioritize their own life and security abroad over issues concerning Israel, the majority of Jews in Israel are worried about being targeted in ongoing terrorist attacks. According to a report by Ynet, over 77% of Jews in countries outside of Israel are very satisfied with their sense of security. While the number of Muslims residing in Europe has significantly increased, and some recent anti-Semitic behaviors have been linked to the rise of Islamic extremism in Europe, 56% of European Jews reported that they do not feel persecuted for being Jewish. Only 21% of Jews outside of Israel said they have suffered from anti-Semitism or witnessed signs of it within their community. This survey was conducted by Jewish communities worldwide ahead of their ninth annual conference, which took place last week in Jerusalem. The survey comes at a time when the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has escalated into a new crisis, with Palestinians adding a religious dimension to the conflict over Al-Aqsa in the early weeks of the crisis. 46% of Jews worldwide said that current events in this conflict have not affected their lives abroad, but 35% believe that the current crisis in Israel has diminished their sense of security in their lives abroad. Israeli media reported that the most significant part of this survey is that most Jews outside of Israel say that their life and the security of their community abroad are more important to them than the issues Israel is facing. This comes as Netanyahu has repeatedly called on Jews worldwide, especially in Europe and America, to be the voice of Israel and to work towards advancing Israel's goals. Last year's calls by Benjamin Netanyahu and some other Israeli officials for Jews in France and other European countries to permanently move to Israel were met with diplomatic silence from European leaders, although Jewish leaders in some countries like France rejected this call. Meanwhile, in the survey, the majority of Jews said they empathize with Israeli Jews and provide assistance in times of crisis. The global Jewish population, including six million in Israel and nearly six million in the United States, has decreased to fourteen million one hundred thousand. 57% of Israeli Jews are concerned about being killed or having their loved ones killed. Recently, as Israel faces a new security crisis, the Israeli Democracy Center, in collaboration with Tel Aviv University, conducted a survey in which 57% of Israeli Jews expressed concern about being targeted in street attacks by Palestinians, such as knife attacks. The results of this survey were published on Friday, November 15, by the Jerusalem Post. 4.14% of Israeli Jews own personal firearms; approximately one in every twenty. This is in addition to a significant increase in police and security forces' patrols in the past month and a half due to street violence and multiple knife attacks by Palestinians on passersby. The increase in security forces on the streets is due to at least 70 knife attacks by Palestinians on passersby and soldiers, as well as several armed attacks and some incidents involving vehicles running over Israelis. While one-third of Jews in the mentioned survey stated that terrorists should be 'punished' on the spot, nearly twenty percent even said they 'strongly' support this view, 42% of Israelis believe that if a terrorist is 'neutralized' and no longer poses a threat, they should not be shot. In some of the recent attacks, when Israeli police arrested the attackers alive, many witnesses clashed with the police to 'punish' the attacker on the spot. However, 78% of Arabs also reported that they are concerned about being easily targeted in the streets; 53% of Arabs said they have changed their daily routines out of fear of the current situation. Israelis have also made changes in their daily lives. Despite this discouraging situation, more than half of the Jews in this survey said that peace talks with the Palestinians should be resumed. 58% of Jews also stated that under the current circumstances, no Jew should go to the Temple Mount and Al-Aqsa to avoid provoking Palestinians. In this survey, 93% of Jews said that the army's performance during the security crisis has been good; 84.5% expressed satisfaction with the police's performance; 71% rated the performance of Shin Bet, Israel's internal security service, positively. Meanwhile, the level of satisfaction among Israeli Jews with Netanyahu's performance and his government's handling of the current security crisis is less than 40%. 49% of Jews and 65.5% of Arab residents of Israel rated Netanyahu's policy regarding the Arab world in this crisis negatively.