The majority of Israeli Jews favor drafting ultra-Orthodox men into the army,
according to a poll released by The Israel Democracy Institute think tank on
Wednesday.
According to the 2013 Peace Index Poll, whose questions relate
to universal military service and haredi enlistment, 41 percent of Jewish
Israelis said the next government must create guidelines of universal service
for ultra-Orthodox and Arab citizens, while another 32% said universal service
should apply to haredim but not Arabs.
Some 23% of those polled said
universal service should not be required of either sector, and 2% said universal
conscription should be mandatory for Arabs but not the
ultra-Orthodox.
The issue of haredi enlistment in national service is one
of the most central issues in the negotiations being conducted between the
various political parties seeking to form a new government.
A senior Yesh
Atid source told The Jerusalem Post on Tuesday that he was unaware of any other
issue being discussed in the coalition talks at the moment other than that of
haredi enlistment, a statement that a Bayit Yehudi source corroborated with the
Post.
The IDI poll also examined the relative importance attributed to
haredi enlistment and their integration into the work force. Among Jewish
Israelis, 44% of those questioned said it was most important that the ultra-
Orthodox join the workforce but not necessarily serve in the army, 31% said it
is most important that the ultra- Orthodox serve in the army, 19% said serving
in the army and joining the workforce are equally important and 5% said neither
are important.
Additionally, the survey looked at the electorate’s
motives in deciding for whom to vote in the recent election.
The poll
found that 51% of Jewish voters decided to vote for a party based on domestic
issues (such as religion, society and the economy), 23% voted based on foreign
and diplomatic issues and 23% made their decision based on both sets of issues
equally.
Some 54% of Likud Beytenu voters and 43% of those who voted for
The Tzipi Livni Party ascribed greatest importance to diplomatic and defense
issues, while 80% of Yesh Atid voters and 65% of Labor voters said domestic
concerns were more important.
Some 54% of Jewish voters based their vote
on party ideology, 24% voted based on the party leader, while 17% based their
decision on both factors equally.
Meretz voters were the most inclined to
vote on ideology, with 91% doing so, while Likud Beytenu voters were least
inclined to do so with just 30% voting along ideological lines.
A
majority (57%) of the Jewish public was satisfied with the election results.
Among Yesh Atid voters, 74% expressed satisfaction with the results, while 72%
of Bayit Yehudi voters said they were happy too. Sixty-one percent of Likud
Beytenu and Tzipi Livni Party voters were also satisfied with the results, while
only 36% of Shas supporters were happy with the outcome and 0% of Kadima voters
expressed satisfaction with the election result. Only 37% of the Arab public was
satisfied.
The survey, conducted from February 3 to 4, included 606
respondents, constituting a representative sample of the adult Jewish population
of Israel. The measurement error for a sample of this size is 4.5 percentage
points.