This poll was conducted over a three day period: August 11, 12, and 13, 1994. A number of political events preceded the poll, summarized below:

1. August is the fourth month following the establishment of the Palestinian National Authority in the Gaza Strip and Jericho, a period of preparation for the national authority and its initial implementation. There is still a lack of financing for this administration where the donor countries are withholding promised funds from the authority in Jericho and Gaza. At the same time, elections for the PISGA council that were supposed to take place last month were postponed again until December 1994. Also, at the same time, municipal councils were appointed in Nablus, where elections had last taken place in 1976, and Gaza, which had not had municipal elections since 1945. Also, the national authority banned two newspapers, Al-Nahar and Akhbar al-Balad from entering the autonomous areas, leading to discussion in Palestinian society where supporters of the ban believe that these papers are loyal to a foreign government and opponents of this ban fear that the authority is interfering in freedom of the press.

2. The Jordanian-Israeli agreement signed in Washington on July 25th led to tension in Jordanian-Palestinian relations. The discussion centered around the topic of sovereignty over Islamic holy sites in Jerusalem since the Jordanian-Israeli agreement gave top priority to the historic role of Jordan in these places.

3. The Israeli-Palestinian negotiations continued without much progress in relation to transfer of authority in the rest of the West Bank and a number of other topics including the control of the crossing points and safe passage from Jericho to Gaza. Also, the topic of releasing Palestinian political prisoners from Israeli jails is of great concern to Palestinians.

4. With regard to the economic situation, there is general and specific awareness in the Gaza Strip that it is bad and there is need for a great effort to improve it, especially since the Israeli authorities have prohibited most of the workers from returning to work by not granting permits and making the procedure to get them more difficult. This led to a Palestinian-Israeli confrontation at the Eretz checkpoint on July 17 which resulted in two Palestinian deaths, 100 wounded Palestinians, 21 wounded Israeli soldiers, and the burning of over 100 buses and a gas station.

The questionnaire was designed through consultations with experts. The format was changed during this poll in order to expedite the coding and data entry process. Researchers were asked to mark respondents' answers in boxes next to the questions, making it possible to enter the coded data directly from the questionnaire and eliminating the need for code sheets. Besides saving time, this process increased accuracy since it eliminated a step with potential for clerical error. While a separate coding step was no longer necessary, coders did check each questionnaire to ensure that they were completed properly prior to the data entry. A pre-test involving fifty questionnaires was conducted in the Jenin and Nablus areas prior to the poll.

A number of new variables were added to the original questionnaire. These variables included day and date of interview, time and place of interview (i.e., public forum or household), and length of interview. This is in addition to a question regarding following the news and information on all localities included in the survey.

SPU researchers adopted a multi-stage sample selection process. In fact, for this poll two samples were utilized rather than one.

Public Forum Sampling

The first sample was drawn by using public forum interviews. Here, Nablus, Tulkarm, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Jericho, and Hebron were divided into 13 polling districts. Interviews were conducted in the largest town in each district. The choice of interview stations was based on our previous experience in the last ten polls. Respondents were selected by using a numerical system where fieldworkers would choose individuals passing by a specific point in their interview area (a utility poll, crosswalk, etc) and interview the sixth person to cross that point. Then, the fieldworkers would interview the twelfth person, and so on. The size of the sample obtained through public interviews is 792. The bulk of these interviews was conducted Thursday, August 11, between 8 a.m. and 2 p.m.

Household Sampling

The second sample consisted of 770 household interviews. The sample was selected from the districts of Jenin, Ramallah, and the Gaza Strip. The process of sample selection began with the creation of lists of all locations in these three areas according to population size and distribution, type of locality (city, town, village, and refugee camp) and degree of development. A simple random sample of locations to be surveyed was selected from these lists.

Fieldworkers and researchers created maps for these localities. These maps detailed the boundaries, main streets, and clusters of residential neighborhoods in these localities, which were further divided into a umber of sampling units with each unit comprising an average of three hundred housing units. The sample units to be surveyed were selected randomly. Households were selected based on a systematic sampling. For example, if the fieldworker estimated the number of houses in the sampling unit to be three hundred and is assigned twenty interviews, the fieldworker divided the 300 by 20, obtaining 15. Therefore, the fieldworker would conduct the first interview in the fifteenth house, and the second in the thirtieth, and so on. Fieldworkers were asked to start their sample selection of housing units from a well-defined point in the area such as a post office, mosque, business, etc which was noted on their map created in consultation with CPRS researchers.

To select the individual within the chosen household to be interviewed, fieldworkers had to flip a coin twice. The first flip was to choose gender of the respondent and the second to choose whether the respondent is to be older or younger than forty years. When in the household, fieldworkers would conduct the interview with the person who has the characteristics that they selected in this manner. (CPRS is in the process of evaluating the scientific merits and practical implications of household interviews in polling in the West Bank and Gaza. CPRS will compare the pros and cons of public forum interviews with those of household interviews. For more details, please call CPRS staff.) It is obvious that household interviews resulted in a higher percentage of housewives and older individuals.

We received 1023 questionnaires form the West Bank and 539 from Gaza, for a total of 1562 interviews.

(Expressed as a % of the total sample)

Area of Residence								Following the News
West Bank "including Jerusalem" Gaza Strip		65.5% 34.5%	City Town Village Refugee Camps		38.6% 09.9% 30.2% 21.3			Always Often Sometimes Never		31.3% 25.7% 36.6% 06.4%
Age				Sex					Education
18-22 23-26 27-30 31-35 36-42 43-50 51+		16.6% 17.0% 16.5% 13.0% 13.8% 11.5% 11.6%		Males Females		59.5% 40.5%				Up to 9 years (elem./prep) Up to 12 years (Tawjihi) 2 year College University (BA) MA + Phd.	35.6% 32.8% 15.6% 15.1% 0.9%
Refugee Status		Marital Status			Area					Occupation
Ref. NonRef.	42.1 57.9	Single Married Divorced & Widowed		27.7% 68.6% 03.7%	Nablus Tulkarem Jenin Jericho Ramallah Hebron Bethlehem Jerusalem Gaza A Gaza B Gaza C Gaza D Gaza E Gaza F		11.8 08.8 06.7 02.4 07.6 13.7 07.2 07.3 05.4 06.4 06.3 05.1 06.4 04.9			Laborers Merchants Craftsmen Students Housewives Farmers Employees* Specialists** Unemployed Retired	11.1% 08.8% 11.1% 08.9% 26.0% 1.8% 17.7% 2.2% 8.4% 0.8%

* Employees: Schoolteacher, Government Employee, Nurse, Lower-level Company Employee, Secretary, etc.
** Specialists: University Teacher, Engineer, Doctor, Lawyer, Pharmacist, Executive, etc.
***A new question for the demographic section as an initial attempt to measure information access and basis for Palestinian opinions.
****Gaza A) Jabalyia, al-Nazla; B) Rimal; C) al-Zaytoun, Sabra; D) Deir Balah, Bureij; E) Khan Younis Area; F) Rafah.

Our data collectors have participated in a number of workshops where the goals of the poll were discussed. They were also lectured on household interviewing, confidence building, mapping, sampling techniques, survey methods, and scientific research. Four special training seminars for data collectors were conducted during this month, attended by a total of sixty-four fieldworkers.

Data collectors worked in groups supervised by qualified researchers. CPRS researchers made random visits to interview stations and discussed the research process with data collectors. More than fifty percent of our data collectors were female, so as to ensure the representation of women in the sample. Interviews took place over a three day period, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, and were conducted on a face-to-face basis. Data collectors were assigned a limited number of interviews (an average of 35 for public forum and 15 for households) to allow for careful interviewing. In general, the public forum of interviews contributed to a 10% non-response rate which was not included in the sample. Household interviews resulted in a lower non-response rate, estimated at 5%. However, respondents were more careful in declaring their opinions in regard to political affiliation, especially in the Ramallah area, which could be a sign of political sophistication rather than fear. A large number of non-respondents were women not accustomed to talking to strangers in public places, probably due to cultural constraints. Some non-respondents, we believe, were reluctant to state their political affiliation out of fear, particularly in the household interviews.

              Palestinian   Jordanian %   Palestinian-  Arab-Islamic  No Opinion %  
              %                           Jordanian     Shared %                    
                                          Shared %                                  
Hamas             51.7      ---           05.7          38.4          04.3          
Is. Jihad         54.3      ---           ---           43.5          02.2          
Is. Inds.         44.6      ---           12.3          35.4          07.7          
PFLP              83.2      02.1          ---           14.6          ---           
DFLP              74.2      ---           12.9          12.9          ---           
Fateh             75.6      00.2          07.4          16.2          00.7          
Feda              94.3      ---           05.7          ---           ---           
H. el-Sha'b       88.5      ---           03.8          07.7          ---           
Nat'l Ind         67.7      00.8          21.3          08.7          01.6          
Other             63.8      02.9          04.3          26.1          02.9          
No one            57.2      02.3          07.7          27.9          05.0          

There is also a relationship between the extent of following the news and perspective on sovereignty over the holy sites in Jerusalem, where the support for Palestinian sovereignty is higher among those following the news (71%) than among those not following the news (59.6%).

The poll confirms that 40.6% of Palestinians believe that the Jordanian-Israeli agreement that was signed in Washington last month will have a negative effect on Jordanian-Palestinian relations. This is compared with 25.4% who felt that the agreement will not have any effect on these relations, and 18.6% who felt that the agreement would have a positive effect. This is related to a large extent to following the news, where 48.9% of those who follow the news "always" believe that the agreement will leave a negative effect on Jordanian-Palestinian relations, compared with 31.6% of those who do not follow the news. (See Table 2).

Table 2

Attitude Towards Jordanian-Israeli Agreement's Effects on Jordanian-Palestinian Relations by Following the News

                 No effect %      Positive         Negative         No opinion %     
                                  effect %         effect %                          
Always                25.3        16.7             48.9             09.1             
Often                 26.8        19.8             41.0             12.4             
Sometimes             25.0        28.3             35.2             18.5             
Never                 21.1        12.6             31.6             34.7             

                     Support %            Oppose %             No Opinion %         
Hamas                       11.8          72.5                 15.6                 
Is.Jihad                    11.1          66.7                 22.2                 
Is. Inds                    15.9          68.3                 15.9                 
PFLP                        12.5          81.3                 06.3                 
DFLP                        09.7          77.4                 12.9                 
Fateh                       22.2          59.9                 17.9                 
Feda                        25.7          62.9                 11.4                 
H. el-Sha'b                 04.0          88.0                 08.0                 
Nat'l Inds.                 10.3          79.4                 10.3                 
Other                       10.1          68.1                 21.7                 
No Opinion                  10.0          55.7                 34.2                 

In addition, we find a relationship between educational attainment and position on the ban of distribution of the two newspapers, where opposition to the ban increases among the more educated. (See Table 4).

Table 4

Attitude Towards Ban of Newspapers by Education

                     I support the ban %  I oppose the ban %   No opinion %         
Up to 9 years               16.7          58.4                 24.9                 
Tawjihi                     15.0          68.3                 16.7                 
2 year college              14.3          74.0                 11.7                 
B.A./B.S.                   15.9          74.4                 09.7                 
M.A./M.S./PhD               14.3          71.4                 14.3                 

Yet again we find that there is a relationship between position on the ban and following the news, where 67.7% of those claiming to follow the news "always" oppose the ban, as opposed to fewer, 47.9%, among those who do not follow the news, yet oppose the ban.

The answers to the question regarding the general relationship between the press and government confirmed Palestinian support for freedom of the press. Poll results show that most Palestinians (55.2%) support without restrictions the freedom of Palestinian and non-Palestinian press, whether supporting or opposing government. Another 25.4% supported freedom of Palestinian press, whether supporting the official line of the authority or opposing it. Only 12.7% limited their support to freedom for Palestinian press supporting the official line of the authority only.

We find that support for freedom of the press extends across party lines. For example, 73% of PFLP and DFLP supporters support freedom of the press without restrictions, along with 69% of Hizb el-Sha'b and 66% of Hamas. We find fewer supporters of freedom of the press without restriction from Fateh (47.5%) and Feda (37%), with an additional 37% of Feda supporters supporting freedom of Palestinian press regardless of support or opposition to the authority. Here also we find that the more educated Palestinians are the most supportive of freedom of the press without restriction.