What Israelis want – and what they reject

As a senior fellow at JPPI, I was involved in drafting, analyzing, and publishing a new survey yesterday – one component of a very ambitious Pluralism Index that JPPI launched yesterday. News reports about JPPI’s data appeared in many media outlets, and you can read all about it here, here, and here.

As a member of the Pluralism team (the Index was devised by Prof. Steven Popper), I had an opportunity to work on the data and think about it a lot – and some of these thoughts are worth sharing. Today I will address just one part of the survey: a question in which we asked Israelis to say which groups in Israeli society contribute to Israel’s success. The answers were in the format of a ranking – 1 means negative contribution, 2 somewhat negative, 3 somewhat positive, 4 positive contribution.

We offered respondents 21 groups to rank. Some are political groups – right wing people, left wing people, some are geographically defined groups such as settlers or northern Tel Avivians, some are ethnic or religious groups like Muslim Arabs or Reform Jews or Druze, we asked about immigrants from France, Russia and Ethiopia, we asked about Diaspora Jews and Israelis abroad.

Here is the ranking by order, the numbers are the average ranking for each group from 1 to 4. My comments follow the graph:

1. Soldiers are kings and queens. And at the bottom of the list are the two groups who do not contribute to Israel’s military effort – Muslim Arabs and Haredis. Israelis don’t always say or do the right thing, but their assessment of contributing groups is in many cases quite logical and consistent. It is not based on race or religion: The Druze serve in the IDF, and hence they are ranked positively. Religious Zionists serve and contribute, and hence they are ranked positively.

2. There are many supposed discrepancies in this assessment of groups. How can it be that “secular”, “ashkenazi”, and “Kibbutznic” Israelis ranked high, but “left wingers” (that is, generally speaking, Israelis who tend to be secular, Ashkenazi and in many cases Kibbutznics) are ranked so low? Not a problem: when Israelis think about these groups they think about their images. Kibbutznics are people who volunteer to elite units in the IDF, work the land, have ideals and are civilized. Left wingers are highly critical of Israel and in many occasions alienated from Israeli society. When Israelis think about Kibbutznics they do not think about politics. When they think about left wingers they do think about politics. Compartmentalization is part of the process of ranking such groups. It works for the left, and also for the right. Religious Zionists are ranked high; their political reincarnation, the settlers, rank much lower. Again, one thinks about religious Zionists as dedicated, idealistic, communal, volunteering members of Israel’s society. One thinks about settlers – many of whom are Zionist religious – as a political group. A controversial political group.

3. The low ranking of Arab Muslims is troubling, but not surprising. In a state of constant political confrontation, it is not easy for Jewish Israelis to see beyond the statements, headlines, and actions of politicians and provocateurs. But two Israeli groups also rank Muslim Christians as one of the three groups at the bottom of their list – Religious Zionists and Haredis. Is their ranking based on religious sentiments? With the ranking of Haredis one could substantiate such suspicions by looking at the bottom three groups according to their ranking: Arab Christians – non-Jews; Arab Muslims – non Jews; and Reform Jews – who, according to what Haredis say in another question, also aren’t “real Jews.”

4. It is interesting to note that Israelis deem the contribution of Diaspora Jews above that of Israelis who left abroad. That is to say: Israelis instinctively feel that living as a Jew in the diaspora is somehow better than leaving Israel to live as a Jew in the diaspora.

5. The low ranking of Reform Jews is not unanimous. Haredis rank them at the very bottom – lower than all other groups. Religious Israelis rank them second from the bottom. Liberal religious Jews – in Israel this means self-defined liberal Orthodox – rank them third from the bottom (I must say that was a surprise). For these groups the term “Reform” is perceived negatively. But remember, Reform Judaism does not see these groups (Orthodox Israelis) as a target audience for its activities. So maybe what they say about “Reform Judaism” does not really matter.

6. Israelis of “Left wing” tendencies are also ranked at the bottom. They are a very small political group – between 4% and 5% in our survey. They are a group that seems to be more critical of Israel than it used to be, more frustrated by its inability to have an impact on Israel’s policies, more alienated from Israel’s society. The left’s alienation ignites a backlash – other groups are becoming alienated from the left and tend to see its actions as having a negative effect on Israel’s success. The marginalization of the left is not a new phenomenon, but the JPPI survey shows that it is real.

7. Take the three groups at the bottom: Muslim Arabs, Haredis and left wingers. What is the common characteristic that these groups share? That’s easy: all three are groups that refuse to be a part of the Israeli mainstream. They reject the mainstream, and the mainstream rejects them back. They are highly critical and often bluntly dismissive of the Israeli mainstream – and the Israeli mainstream is highly critical of them. One of the things that the JPPI survey shows is that Israelis have a longing for unity. They agree in very high numbers that all Jews – secular, traditional, and religious – are good Jews. They want their government to be considerate of minority opinion. They feel comfortable in being who they are in Israel. And they are suspicious of groups that are disruptive when it comes to having this sense of unity: Arab Muslims, who reject the Zionist ethos; Haredis, who do not share the burden; and left wingers, who don't accept Israel’s self-image as a generally righteous country.