A few months ago, Israeli media became saturated with the survey results published by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research suggesting about a third of Gazans and about a fifth of PA Arabs saying they were considering emigration. I didn’t cover it because the survey had been conducted in September 2023. I figured I’d wait for the results of a survey that would be conducted after October 7, 2023, expecting the figures of Arabs looking for a way out of their misery to skyrocket.
No such survey has been offered yet by PCPSR, but on July 10 this year, the center reported the results of a survey conducted between May 26 and June 1 which they summarized:
“More than 60% of Gazans report losing family members in the current war on Gaza, but two-thirds of the public continue to support the October 7 attack, and 80% believe it put the Palestinian issue at the center of global attention. About half of Gazans expect Hamas to win the war and return to rule the Gaza Strip; a quarter of Gazans expect Israel to win. Increased demand for the resignation of President Abbas is accompanied by a rise in Hamas’ and Marwan Barghouti’s popularity. Increased support for armed struggle is accompanied by a drop in support for the two-state solution; more than 60% support the dissolution of the PA.”
KNOCK KNOCK, IT’S HAMAS POLLING
That’s the last survey to be found on the PCPSR website. I’m not sure there will be more, and if there are, I don’t think self-respecting journalists would accord the results the same level of respect. Here’s why:
The IDF announced on Thursday that Hamas falsified the results of PCPSR’s public opinion polls to create a false representation of public support for the terror organization’s actions and its leaders. According to the army, documents found in tunnels in the Gaza Strip showed an effort on the part of Hamas to change the results before returning them to the polling institute and to use them to discredit senior officials in the Palestinian Authority.
#busted ?: The IDF just exposed Hamas for manipulating public opinion surveys by the Palestinian polling institute (PSR) to fake support for its leaders, especially after the October 7 massacre.
The documents, found during operations in Gaza, show how Hamas altered PSR's March… pic.twitter.com/Y2AoAy1bBv
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) August 29, 2024
According to the IDF, in one of the documents found in the Gaza Strip, the author, a member of Hamas, wrote that the terror organization had finished compiling the results of the survey, and had returned the fake results to the research institute for publication.
For example, in a survey conducted in March 2024, PCPSR reported that 62% of the population in the Gaza Strip are satisfied with the performance of Hamas in the war. According to an IDF, the original survey result was only 31.9%.
In another PCPSR survey question, the IDF says the document shows the original figure according to which only 30.7% of Gaza residents supported Hamas’s decision to attack Israel on October 7. According to the fabricated published results, 71 % believed that the decision was correct.
In another document revealed by the IDF, Hamas detailed the different ways to influence public opinion and media coverage. In the document, the authors focused on their attempts to damage the image of various senior PA officials, including PLO executive committee chairman Hussein al-Sheikh, the head of general intelligence Majed Faraj, and former PA Prime Minister Muhammad Ashteyeh.
Dr. Khalil Shikaki, who founded PCPSR in 1993, issued a statement saying, “Although we usually thoroughly investigate any allegation against our data collection, as we’ve begun to do in this case, the conduct of the data collection team in Gaza – with whom we have been working for more than 20 years – was exemplary. Our control system includes several layers, and is designed to detect improper conduct.”
“Our data processing software is capable of identifying and flagging any significant manipulation, but the polling institute does not interfere in politics and therefore can issue a statement on the matter,” Shikaki continued, adding, “In my opinion, which is based on what I saw – and I didn’t see everything – it sounds like a battle of versions between the Israeli army and Hamas in an attempt to influence public opinion. I hate to see the Israeli army putting us at the forefront of this war, but our response will be, as always, to investigate and strengthen our control.”
As far as yours truly is concerned, I will certainly add several grains of salt to my reading of Dr. Shikaki’s next survey. In the past, I believed the PCPSR’s work was only biased in its terminology regarding Israel and the various terrorist groups. Now I’ll have to evaluate the figures as well, and I’m not so sure how, seeing as there is no other reputable polling service in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza.
Here’s the thing: I have been convinced for almost a year now that there are no innocent Gazans. I based my decisive impression, among other things, on the PCPSR’s data regarding widespread support for Hamas in the Strip. It may be time to reevaluate this assertion. Of course that would be easier if the “innocent” Gazans hadn’t returned escaping Israeli hostages to their Hamas captors, nor actively participated in the October 7th massacre, nor helped hide Israeli hostages in their homes…
