Sixty percent of Israelis support relaxing the restrictions in place to allow the country's economy to begin to recover, compared to 30% who fear this will lead to an increase in infection rates, a survey by the Guttman Center for Public Opinion and Policy Research at the Israel Democracy Institute found. IDI is tracking the mood of the country as the crisis progresses with weekly surveys.
Notably, older people are more supportive of getting back to work, with with 63.5% among those aged 35-54 and 71% among those over the age of 55 in favor, compared to 48% among Israelis under the age of 34. Analyzing the numbers differently, 26% of Jewish Israelis said they oppose relaxing the restrictions, 50% of Arab Israelis oppose such a move.
General stress levels among Israeli society have declined over recent weeks. The average Israeli rated his stress level at 5.1 on a scale of 1-10. That compares to 5.64 three weeks ago, 5.46 two weeks ago, and 5.22 a week ago.
levels of trepidation about finances have also declined. When asked "to what extent do you fear or not fear for your economic well-being in the foreseeable future?", 55.1% of respondents said they "greatly fear" or "moderately fear." Over the past few surveys, results have ranged from 57.3% to 67.6%.
This week's survey asked people what they thought about offering assistance to Palestinians.
Some 52% of Israelis (46% of Jewish Israelis and 78% of Arab Israelis) said support providing assistance to the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) to cope with the pandemic. 41% responded that little or no assistance should be provided to the PA by Israel.
Regarding talks of helping Gaza in exchange for prisoners, 68% of Israelis support providing humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip to assist in the treatment of the coronavirus in exchange for an agreement with Hamas regarding the Israeli soldiers missing in action and civilians held captive. Only 19.5% oppose such an agreement.
Confidence in the government's health and finance officials has not dramatically changed since IDI began measuring a month ago. 64% of Israelis trust government health professionals to deal with the coronavirus, and 44% said they trust the government finance and economic officials tasked with providing assistance during this crisis.