What's left?

The Guttman Institute, part of the Israel Democracy Institute has just released its 2007 Israel Democracy Index. The English translation of the full report is in preparation, but the summary reveals that of the 1203 interviewees, 66% said they were unsatisfied with how Israeli democracy functions, a finding so ambiguous, I don’t know what to make if it. I hope the fuill report will clarify it.

In another ambiguous finding, 79% are concerned with the current situation in Israel and 86% reckon ‘the government is not dealing adequately with the country’s problems’. Unsurprisingly, a significant majority of 68% say ‘the people running the country are motivated by personal interests rather than the public good’, as 75% believe there is a great deal of corruption in Israel.

‘Trust in the IDF’ has dropped by five percentage points to 74% since last year, but 61% of respondents do not rely on statements made by the military echelon on defense matters.

Seventy-nine percent said that the rich and poor do not enjoy good relations and 87% said Jewish-Arab relations were poor.

Jewish and Arab respondents said the other group evidenced a proclivity for violence with 55% of Jews agreeing that ‘Arabs will not reach the cultural level of the Jews’ and 51% of Arab respondents concurring that ‘Jews are racist’.

The big surprise in all this is the finding that 59% of the public favors a socialist-economic approach over capitalism.

If the full report sheds any further light on these figures, I’ll post a follow up in due course.

[Thanks to Arutz 7 for the heads up]