Poll: Israelis split on which US presidential candidate is looking out for them

When asked which candidate will better serve Israel’s interests, 34% of the respondents chose Trump and 29% Clinton.

By LAHAV HARKOV
Updated: OCTOBER 24, 2016 23:16
Trump and Clinton (photo credit: screenshot)
Trump and Clinton
(photo credit: screenshot)
Jewish Israelis are almost evenly split on whether Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton or Republican candidate Donald Trump is better for Israel, according to a poll conducted for the 102 FM Tel Aviv Radio station by the Maagar Mochot research institute.
Asked which candidate will better serve Israel’s interests, 34% of respondents who included Jewish Israelis and Arab Israelis chose Trump and 29% Clinton. The most popular response was “I don’t know,” with 37%.
Jewish Israelis’ responses were evenly divided, with 49% of those with an opinion choosing Clinton and 51% choosing Trump, but Arab Israelis were almost three times more likely to say that Trump (74%) is looking out for Israel than Clinton (26%).
Asked about media bias, 34% of Israelis said the local media favor Clinton, 21% it was more pro-Trump, 21% said it treated them equally, while 24% did not know.
Israeli Arabs were more likely to say the press favors Clinton (66%) over Trump (15%), than Jews, of which 40% said the media favor Clinton and 30% said they has a bias toward Trump.
The poll was conducted on Thursday, the day after the two candidates had their third and final debate. Maagar Mochot polled their online panel of 503 respondents, a representative sample of Israeli adults. The margin of error for the poll is 4.5%.