Of all the security threats faced by Israelis - from the threat of chemical and biological warfare to the possibility of being stabbed in the market by an assailant - the danger that Israelis most worry about is suicide bombing by Islamic militants.

This finding stems from an in-depth public opinion poll conducted in May 1999 by the BESA Center and the Interdisciplinary Center for Counter-Terrorism at the Herzliyah Interdisciplinary College. The poll results were released at a July seminar on "Terrorism and Israeli National Security" organized by the two policy centers, co-sponsored by the Ministry of Education.

[At the symposium on "Terrorism and
Israeli National Security (l. to r.): Doron
Shochat, Uzi Arad, Reuben Paz, Boaz
Ganor, Shabtai Shavit and Hanoch Lavee.

Conducted by the noted pollster, Dr. Yaakov Katz of Bar-Ilan University's School of Education, the survey showed that 72 percent of the public fears suicide bombings; 60 percent fears "regular" terrorism (shootings and stabbings); and 47 percent worries about a possible next war with Arab countries. The vast majority of Israelis (85 percent) very much fear the possibility of being involved in a fatal traffic accident.

Dr. Rafael Ventura of the Herzliyah Center explained at the symposium that Israelis were split when considering the political ramifications of terrorism: 60 percent said that terror attacks led them to want to speed up peace talks with Palestinians; 34 percent said that terrorist attacks led them to believe that the peace talks should be suspended or delayed. Forty-nine percent of those polled thought that the Palestinian Authority was doing "little" or "nothing" to combat terrorism; fifty-one percent felt that the PA was making "reasonable" efforts or "doing a good deal" to stop terrorism.

Former Mossad chief Shabtai Shavit, who chairs the governing council of the Herzliyah Center, addressed the symposium. "There are no easy answers to terrorism, not now and not in the near future," he said. "The Israeli public must have the stamina to endure and persevere, despite terrorism," added Shavit. Maj. Gen. (res.) Meir Dagan, who was the Prime Minister's Advisor on Counter-Terrorism, had a similar message. Dr. Uzi Arad, foreign policy advisor to then-Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, sought to downplay the importance of terrorism in the context of other, greater strategic threats faced by Israel.

Boaz Ganor, director of the Herzliyah Center argued passionately that Israel urgently needs to reach informal but clear agreements on how society reacts to terrorism. "We need an agreement with the press not to sensationalize very attack; we need an agreement among politicians not to dramatize every attack and to immediately demand political responses; and we need to teach schoolchildren to deal with terrorism. Otherwise, our national backbone will be weakened and terrorists will succeed in achieving their ends," Ganor said.

BESA Center director Prof. Efraim Inbar told the audience packed with IDF officers that 'personal security' has become the new code-word within Israeli society for the equivalent of peace with its Arab neighbors. "The new notion of personal security has eclipsed the traditional Israeli preoccupation with assuring security of the Jewish state and its society in the midst of a hostile environment," he said.

"We no longer expect to be eating humus in Damascus, touring the pyramids, or looking for bargains in Arab markets. Normalization is a mirage. What we expect from peace is nothing more, or less, than personal security.

"The importance of personal security has become heightened also due to the changes within Israeli society," Inbar added. "We all observe more emphasis on individualistic values at the expense of promoting collective goals and aspirations. The notion of personal security seems to be the replacement within today's Israel of the weakened fears of collective survival, real or imagined."

BESA associate Prof. Shmuel Sandler (l.)
with the Prime Minister's foreign policy
advisor, Dr. Uzi Arad,
at the symposium.