Now come the true feelings
By Ephraim Yaar and Tamar Hermann
Haaretz, December 22, 2004
Arafat's collective image among the Palestinian public shows a much more critical evaluation than was previously thought.
Given the unquestioned authority - formal and informal - that Yasser Arafat possessed, many expected that the chances of peace between Israel and the Palestinians would end with Arafat's death, since only he had the authority to achieve peace based on a compromise that would be acceptable to his people.
Others, however, believed that notwithstanding Arafat's lofty status, there were also considerable feelings under the surface of dissatisfaction and criticism of his leadership. The corruption that spread in its institutions and among circles close to the regime was not invisible to the Palestinian public, and even if it was not personally attributed to Arafat, he too was implicated.
It is interesting, then, to find out what the Palestinian public thinks about Arafat's leadership and contribution and how it assesses the political reality that has emerged in the weeks since his death. A no less interesting question is how the Israeli public thinks the Palestinian public views Arafat. In other words, does the Israeli public believe that Arafat was - in the eyes of his own people - a good leader?
Here one must distinguish, of course, between the Israeli Jewish public and the Israeli Arab public. Among the Jewish public, as many past Peace Indexes have shown, Arafat was perceived as an incorrigible terrorist and as responsible for the collapse of the entire Oslo process. A majority of the Israeli Arab public, however, always supported Arafat's policy and leadership and saw him as a very positive figure.
Thus we sought to determine whether the Israeli Arabs' assessment of Arafat's leadership - again, from the Palestinian standpoint - is closer to that of the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza or to that of the Israeli Jewish public. We believe the answer to this question can tell us much about the collective identity of the Arab citizens of Israel, and about the degree of distance or closeness between their "cognitive map" and that of the Palestinian population in the territories on the one hand, and of the Jewish population in Israel on the other.
To answer these questions, we initiated two parallel opinion surveys. One was held among the Palestinian population in the West Bank and Gaza (sample size: 1,200) by the Jerusalem Media and Communication Center (JMCC), one of the veteran and principal public opinion survey institutes in Palestinian society; the second survey was conducted in Israel by the Tami Steinmetz Center for Peace Research in cooperation with the Evans Program for Conflict Resolution and Bridging, both of which are at Tel Aviv University. The two surveys were conducted contiguously - the Israeli one on November 29-30, the Palestinian one on December 4-5.
Regarding Arafat's leadership in general, it emerges that although 39 percent of the Palestinians see him as a "very good leader," 44 percent define him as a "moderately good leader," and 15 percent as a "moderately poor" or "very poor" one. Thus, while a large majority of the Palestinian public tends to evaluate Arafat's leadership positively, not a few now have reservations or are critical of his role.
As for how the Palestinians assess Arafat's contribution in specific areas, an even more complex picture emerges that includes, again, not inconsiderable criticism. Indeed, only regarding one area - putting the Palestinian issue on the world agenda - is there currently almost full agreement among the Palestinians that Arafat did more good than harm.
As for advancing the Palestinian people's struggle for political independence, a large majority (72 percent) indeed believe that he did more good, but a not insignificant minority - almost one-fourth - think he caused more harm. Moreover, on three issues - advancing the peace process with Israel, creating a democratic system of government that acts according to law and developing the Palestinian economy - the percentage of criticism of Arafat in the Palestinian public is quite high.
Thus, the percentage of those with positive assessments on the peace issue comes to 53 percent, but 41 percent have negative views. On the two other issues, the negative assessments actually exceed the positive ones: 44 percent think Arafat contributed to promoting democratic governance, but 50 precent think that in this regard he did more harm than good. A similar picture emerges for the economic area: whereas only 43 percent see his role as positive, 52 percent assess his contribution as negative.
The conclusion that arises from these results is that the collective memory of Arafat among the Palestinians, at least today when significant historical perspective is lacking, is not overwhelmingly positive, and that the widespread image of a revered leader, immune to criticism by his people, was apparently exaggerated.
This perhaps sheds light on why the percentage of those in the Palestinian public who are optimistic about the chances of reaching a peace agreement with Israel after Arafat's death (44 percent) slightly exceeds the proportion of those who are pessimistic (38 percent). Similarly, the percentage of those positively assessing the functioning of the Palestinian leadership since Arafat's death (48 percent) exceeds the percentage of those assessing it negatively (43 percent).
At the same time, the Palestinian public tends to be pessimistic about the chances that the elections in the authority will lead to the election of a leader with clear authority who will be able to run the PA and take control on the ground: 58 percent think the chances of this are moderately low or very low, and only 35 percent believe these chances are good.
Despite the fact that the Israeli interviewees, both Jews and Arabs, were asked to consider Arafat's record from the Palestinian standpoint, a large majority of the Jewish respondents (about two-thirds) think he was a very poor or moderately poor leader, while only about one-fourth (27 percent) evaluate him as a moderately good or very good one in Palestinian terms.
As for Arafat's contribution in specific areas, only in regard to one of them - putting the Palestinian issue on the world agenda - is there disagreement, with a substantial minority (43 percent) saying he contributed more positively to advancing the issue while 50 percent think he caused more harm. On all the other issues, however, and particularly advancing peace, democracy and the economy, there is almost full agreement in the Jewish public that from the Palestinian standpoint Arafat caused his people more harm than good.
Given these negative assessments of Arafat and his leadership, it is no surprise that following his death, a large majority of the Israeli Jewish public (some 70 percent) is now more optimistic about the chances for peace. Some 20 percent think Arafat's death has not changed anything, and only 9 percent have grown more pessimistic. Correspondingly, and similarly to the views of the Palestinian public, the percentage of those who think the Palestinian leadership is running the authority very well or moderately well (35 percent) is slightly higher than the percentage of negative assessments (some 28 percent), while the most common answer, for understandable reasons, is "don't know" (38 percent).
Finally, and again similar to the views of the Palestinian public, a considerable majority of the Israeli Jewish public (62 percent) thinks the chances that the upcoming Palestinian Authority elections will lead to the election of a leadership with clear authority are moderately low or very low. Only about one-fourth (26 percent) see the chances of such a leadership emerging as moderately high or high.
The survey reveals that the Israeli Arabs' assessment of Arafat's leadership from the Palestinian standpoint is extremely positive, even exceeding, somewhat ironically, the evaluation of the Palestinians themselves. Thus, 92 percent of the interviewees see him as a good or very good leader, whereas the corresponding percentage among the Palestinians was 82 percent. Only 6 percent of the Israeli Arabs assess Arafat as a poor or very poor leader, while among the Palestinians in the territories this total came to 15 percent.
A slightly more mixed picture emerges when assessing Arafat's contribution in specific areas that we examined. With regard to putting the Palestinian issue on the international agenda, the percentage of those claiming he did more good than harm - 75 percent - is slightly lower than the corresponding percentage among the Palestinians, although the proportion of those who think he did more harm - 15 percent - is identical in the two groups.
A similar pattern was found on the issue of advancing the Palestinian people's struggle for political independence: About two-thirds say that in this regard he did more good than harm, while about one-fourth say the opposite.
However, in regard to two issues - advancing the peace process and establishing a sound democratic government - Arafat's image among the Israeli Arabs is clearly more positive than among the Palestinians in the territories. Thus, 59 percent think he did more good than harm in advancing the peace process (among the Palestinians, as noted, 53 percent) and 61 percent say this in regard to establishing a democratic government, while among the Palestinians the corresponding percentage comes to only 44 percent. On the issue of developing the Palestinian economy, the tendency to negative assessments is similar in the two groups.
Like the Jews and the Palestinians in general, the Israeli Arabs also tend to be more optimistic about the chances for peace, and are proportionately closer in this regard to the Israeli Jewish public than to the Palestinian public, with 58 percent being more optimistic and 21 percent more pessimistic.
At the same time, the Israeli Arabs view more positively than the other two groups the functioning of the authority's leadership since Arafat's death: 58 percent give it a good or very good grade, while only about one-fourth see this functioning as moderately poor or very poor.
Likewise, the Arab public tends to be less pessimistic than the two other groups in assessing the chances that the elections in the authority will lead to the election of a leadership with authority and ability to govern: Although 51 percent think the chances of this are very low or moderately low, 45 percent assess these chances as moderately high or very high (as noted, the corresponding percentages among the Palestinians are 58 percent and 33 percent, and in the Jewish public, 62 percent and 26 percent).
In sum, it is important to emphasize that beyond the disparities between them, at least on the issue of peace, all three groups appear to anticipate a better future in the post-Arafat era.
