Poll: Traditional Jews Choosing Likud-Beytenu, Orthodox Prefer Jewish Home
by JNS.org
Times of Israel – There’s no “Jewish vote” in the state of Israel. Or rather, as The Times of Israel pre-election poll shows, there’re at least a half-dozen variants of the “Jewish vote” for which political parties are competing. These include four distinct streams of self-described observance — secular, traditional, Orthodox, and ultra-Orthodox — and two types of self-described ethnic Jewish heritage — Ashkenazi and Sephardi/Mizrahi. Each stream or heritage type forms a distinct bloc with its own voting patterns and trends. Indeed, in Israel, it’s not just religion, but religious observance and heritage, that help to define voters and parties.
Among likely voters, 44% in our survey define themselves as secular, 24% traditional (masorti), 13% Orthodox (dati), 8% ultra-Orthodox (haredi), and 10% non-Jewish.