Poll: That Israel Is More Divided Than Ever

This event didn't take place abroad but here in Israel, and the women aren't pro-Palestinian activists, say, at a university in the United States or Europe. They're proud right-wing women.

The video and the subsequent online debate help make clear that Hamas' October 7 massacre and the Gaza war haven't ended the hostility in Israeli society. If for a moment you thought society was united, you should look at the 2023 Israeli Democracy Index prepared by the Viterbi Family Center for the Study of Public Opinion and Policy Research.

The center, part of the Israel Democracy Institute, shows that despite the upheaval and all the "Together we will win," Israelis remain split. Usually, this index is published in January. This year the polling took place in June, at the height of the protest against the Netanyahu government's attempt to weaken the judiciary. But after October 7, a revisit was called for, so more polling was done from November to January.

The rifts are widening, even if the new survey reflects strengthening trust in Israeli institutions, save for the government and the Knesset.

For example, the percentage of respondents who have confidence in the Supreme Court hardly changed from June to December at around 42 percent. But the replies based on political camp and religious observance show otherwise. Confidence in the court among Israelis who identify as leftists or centrists strengthened between June and December, while among right-wingers it fell from 26 percent to 21 percent.

And for ultra-Orthodox Israelis, the Haredim, the number fell from 11 percent to 2 percent. For Israelis who declare their religious identity as "traditional and religious," there was no change at 24 percent.

Among Israelis who identity as "traditional and nonreligious," confidence in the court eased from 36 percent to 33 percent, while secular people still have great confidence in that institution: a full two-thirds in both June and December.

Interestingly, religious Zionists have gained confidence in the court: 16 percent in June and 21 percent in December, even if that number remains low.

Among Arab Israelis, however, the number surged from 26 percent to 53 percent. In both polls the court remained an institution in which Arab Israelis have the greatest confidence, and the justices remain popular among leftists and unpopular among the Haredim.

Like the Supreme Court, the media has become a punching bag in recent years, and sure enough, on the right, trust in the media came in at only 15 percent in both June and December. Among leftists, it jumped from 48 percent to 63 percent, and among centrists, from 39 percent to 48.5 percent.

Among the Haredim, trust in the media fell from an already tiny 10 percent in June to 5 percent in December. For Israelis identifying as "traditional and religious," the decline was from 14.5 percent to 10 percent, while for the "traditional and nonreligious" it was from 27 percent to 21.5 percent.

For secular people, trust in the media jumped from 38 percent to 51 percent. Among religious Zionists, the number surged but from a very low base: from 6 percent to 11 percent.

If you're looking for some unity, you'll find it in the low confidence in the government and the Knesset. Interestingly, Arab Israelis showed greater trust in these institutions in December; it could be they were afraid to declare otherwise during a war. But overall confidence was low.

"The Israeli public, across its various population segments, is not satisfied (to say the least) with the functioning of the Israeli political system, and at the same time, cleavages between the groups are growing," Prof. Tamar Hermann, director of the Viterbi Family Center, said in an English-language statement. "Even the events of October 7 and the ensuing war, which were initially viewed as unifying events (as expressed by the slogan 'Together we will win'), can now be seen to have had only a temporary bridging impact on the pre-existing internal divisions."

Surprisingly, perhaps, right-wingers and the Haredim, who have the least confidence in government institutions, are the most optimistic about Israel's future, including the future of democratic government and the country's standing abroad.

Hermann notes that religious people tend to be more optimistic about the future. It also could be that these Israelis are more confident because their political parties are in power.

A new social contract?

Maybe it was unreasonable to believe that October 7 and the war would lead to unity in Israeli society. Maybe it was unreasonable to assume that any event, however terrible, can bridge such large gaps in opinions.

And this goes beyond monumental questions such as whether Israel should be more Jewish or democratic. Even on a presumably simpler question, such as whether the war's main goal should be returning the hostages or destroying Hamas, respondents were divided on a left-right basis. Of course, leftists and centrist secular people favored the hostages, while rightists and religious people favored bashing Hamas.

Either way, Israelis can find solace in the fact that on one subject there is no dispute between Jewish and Arab Israelis, or between the religious and the secular, or among leftists, centrists and rightists: the feasibility of a new sociopolitical contract.

Compared with June, the pollsters found in January that more Israelis believed that such a contract had a high likelihood of happening.

Against the backdrop of the government's attempt to undermine the judiciary and the Gaza war, the Viterbi center asked: "Is a new 'social-political contract' on the way?" It referred to two different relationships: between the citizens and the government, and among the different groups in society.

In June 2023, only a quarter or so of respondents believed there was a high likelihood of a new sociopolitical contract. This went for each of the two relationships. But by January, the number had risen to 35 percent for a new contract between the citizens and the government, and to 43 percent for a new contract among the different groups in society.

Jewish Israelis, anyway, were more optimistic, even if leftists were much less optimistic than centrists and rightists.

As Hermann put it, "Israeli society has stood the test of events in an admirable way. ... This resilience is also expressed in a gradual but still relatively quick return to the routine of work, studies and cultural life, even if some see this as evidence of a collective memory that's too short and maybe even a lack of empathy for those who were physically or psychologically wounded."

Sivan Klingbail