Arab Israelis living in mixed cities feel that they have less personal security than those living in Arab cities, a new survey found. Of those surveyed in the mixed cities, 80.6% Arab Israelis, called Palestinian citizens of Israel in the survey, were worried or very worried by property offenses, as opposed to 63.7% of all Palestinian citizens of Israel; and 79.9% reported they were worried about violence against women, in comparison to 65.8% in the national population Arab Israelis.
The survey by the Abraham Initiatives, the 2020 Personal Security Survey of Arab Society in Mixed Cities, was conducted in November-December 2020, based on a sampling of six mixed cities (Haifa, Akko, Lod, Ramla, Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and Ma’alot-Tarshiha), and included 304 Arab Israelis who were interviewed in person, in the Arabic language, in their homes. In addition, a comparative study of the Jewish citizens in mixed cities was conducted, including 125 respondents who answered a phone and online questionnaire.
Among the data revealed in the study: 60.8% of the Palestinian citizens of Israel in mixed cities felt a lack of personal security in the cities where they live in 2020, as opposed to 27.5% of the Jewish citizens surveyed in mixed cities who felt that way; The rate of residents of mixed cities who report an absence of personal security is higher than the rate of those surveyed for the country-at-large, which is 37.2% of the Palestinian citizens of Israel and 10.6% of the Jews throughout the country; 82.9% of the Palestinian citizens of Israel residing in mixed cities were worried by violence and crime, more than the total number of Palestinian citizens of Israel (75.8% of whom were worried by the violence, and 74% were worried by crime); The phenomenon of greatest concern in the mixed cities regarding violence and crime in 2020 was shooting and use of firearms, which worries 83.8% of the Palestinian citizens of Israel in the mixed cities.
In addition, 38.1% of the Palestinian citizens of Israel residing in mixed cities noted that the location where they experience the greatest threat to their sense of personal security is in the city where they reside. Some 31.4% noted that the place where they feel most threatened is the street. This is in contrast to the Arab Israelis living throughout the country, in which 25.3% of the citizens feel threatened in the community where they reside, and 17.4% experience a lack of personal security on the street.