- 389
- 389SHARES
Agence France Presse has failed to substantiate the questionable claim that most Israelis support annexation of the Jordan Valley. The Feb. 3 AFP article (“Israeli settlers stage tractor protest to demand annexation“) alleged that “According to polls in the Israeli press, most Israelis are in favour of annexing the [Jordan Valley] territory.”
CAMERA searched extensively to find polls demonstrating that most Israelis are in favor of annexing the Jordan Valley but did not turn up any results in support of this claim.An INSS poll released in recent days addressed the question of unilateral annexation of settlement blocs, but did not address specifically the Jordan Valley. As The Times of Israel reported:
The INSS study, conducted by public opinion researcher Tzipi Israeli, found that 45 percent of Jewish Israelis are against unilateral annexation of any territory in the West Bank, 26% support annexing existing Israeli settlements in the West Bank, 14% support annexing all areas surrounding Israeli settlements, 8% support annexing the larger Area C, and 7% support annexing the entire West Bank.
A separate recent Walla poll found just one-third of Israelis support unilateral annexation of the Jordan Valley. According to this poll, even among the population who self-identify as right-wing, less than half support a unilateral process. (The AFP article does not specify unilateral annexation.)
CAMERA contacted AFP editors last week to request either substantiation or clarification. Though the wire service failed to provide the polls in question, it also did not clarify its report.