A new poll conducted on behalf of the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews in the Israeli Arab population is raising red flags – and reinforcing recent warnings by President Reuven Rivlin about the rising popularity of Da’esh (ISIS) in that population.

Rivlin said that according to figures gleaned from “research studies, arrests, testimonies and covert analyses,” there is increasing support for Da’esh among Israeli Arabs.

The survey, conducted by the Stat-net Institute, polled a sample of 500 low-income Israeli Arabs. The findings showed that 67 percent of Israeli Arabs feel discriminated against, and 71 percent feel that low-income Israeli Jews receive more state aid than they do. Further, 54 percent of Israeli Arabs feel the government – including Israeli Arab Mks – do not care about their interests.

The poll was commissioned to measure the impact of The Fellowship’s financial support for low-income Israeli-Arab citizens, according to IFCJ founder and director Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein. Instead, it came up with clanging bells and warning signs.

“The survey shows Israel should be caring more for its Arab citizens and investing in them the same way it does with its most vulnerable Jewish citizens, not only for moral reasons but also to counter the threat of political extremism and to promote patriotism. If we don’t invest in Israel’s citizens, ISIS will,” said IFCJ founder and director, Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein.

“We found a direct correlation between Israeli Arabs’ feelings of being treated equally to Jews and their sense of belonging to society and even their willingness to serve,” added Eckstein. “If we can change the numbers, we can avoid Israeli Arabs becoming a strategic threat.”

The IFCJ has invested more than $35 million on social welfare programs for Israeli Arabs in recent years, he said. Those investments included programs to help the elderly, children, and at-risk youth, and on drug abuse prevention, emergency financial aid, job empowerment for women, and other initiatives.

The survey found that among the low-income Israeli Arabs who felt they are being treated unfairly compared to poor Israeli Jews, only 20 percent said they “feel strongly or very strongly connected to Israel.”

Only 38 percent of Israeli Arabs who feel they lack equal rights in Israel said they would perform national service.

Of those who felt they were treated equally, 58 percent of Israeli Arabs said they would perform national service.

Rivlin warned a week ago (Jan. 18) that Israeli Arab teens are growing more enamored with becoming Da’esh operatives for the ISIS terror organization.

“The Islamic State is already here – that is no longer a secret,” Rivlin told participants at the ninth annual international conference of the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS). “I am not speaking about territories bordering the State of Israel – but within Israel itself.” He, too, added that it is in the best interest of Israel to offer its Arab population a better future than the fantasies promised by terror groups such as Da’esh.

Rivlin said it is in the best interest of the state to offer Israel’s Arabs a better future than that promised by groups such as Da’esh. “If children are growing up without a dream, without hope or without aspirations, with the feeling that their blood and their lives are of a lesser value in the State of Israel, then we must think of how to offer them a dream, hope and faith,” Rivlin said.

A vast majority of Israelis endorse the idea of offering new immigrants more economic and employment benefits — even at the expense of native Israelis.

The surprising information was revealed in a survey conducted by the Sampling, Consultation and Research Center, whose results were revealed Sunday at the weekly government cabinet meeting.

The news comes in light of an alarming wave of anti-Semitism that has struck Europe.

A whopping majority of 83 percent of Israelis in the survey expressed their belief that the State of Israel should take actions in the labor market that would grant special privileges to new immigrants.

Fifty-three percent of the survey’s respondents suggested that Israel provide financial benefits to employers who hire new immigrants.

Thirty percent recommended even requiring public agencies and large private business to set a floor benchmark of employment positions for new immigrants, even though such a policy would come at the expense of the native Israeli labor force.

Two- thirds of Israelis are concerned for the safety of Jews in the Diaspora, according to the survey.

Thirty-nine percent of Israelis believe that European Jews should escape the growing anti-Semitism in Europe by immigrating to the Jewish homeland.

Yaakov Hagoel, Deputy Chairman of the World Zionist Organization revealed the results of the survey at Sunday’s cabinet meeting.

“In light of the concern for the safety of the Jews of Europe, we have established a committee to deal with immigration barriers and we asked to check the position of the Israeli public in this regard,” Hagoel explained.

At the same time, 46 percent of Israelis recognize that many Jews in Europe continue to live there for social and economic reasons.

“The results are surprising, even to us,” commented Hagoel. “Despite the difficult economic situation in Israel, the Jews are brothers to each other in every place in the world.”

Hagoel was expected to discuss the need to reduce and remove the many barriers that new immigrants often experience in the employment sector.

Many new immigrants arrive in Israel as educated professionals with experience and potential to contribute to Israel but encounter bureaucratic hurdles. They are very often not recognized in their professional field. Professionals such as attorneys and doctors with certifications from abroad are not automatically recognized in Israel, but must instead go through a convoluted process to re-earn certification in Israel.

Hagoel was to present the establishment of a group of World Zionist Organization staff members who will work on removing the unnecessary barriers faced by new immigrants.

“There is no day more fitting than International Holocaust Memorial Day to raise this important issue to the cabinet,” Hagoel said.

Americans are deeply conflicted over whether the United Nations should give birth to a new Arab country in the heart of Israel’s geographic borders, and call it “Palestine.”

The Gallup polling organization surveyed the U.S. population this month to determine how America feels about this issue. Pollsters conducted telephone interviews Feb. 8-11, 2015 with a random sample of 837 adults ages 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.

(The margin of sampling error was plus-minus four percentage points at the 95 percent confidence level.)

The organization uncovered a conflict that splits the country almost right down the middle.

A majority of Americans still does not support the idea, however, even though they elected to vote passively: only 42 percent of those polled favored the establishment of an independent Palestinian state comprised of Judea, Samaria and Gaza, a drop from the 46 percent of one year ago, and a full 20 percent would not express an opinion at all.

Just 38 percent were opposed to the idea, however. The numbers grow higher the older the sample.

Older Americans aged 55 and up were opposed (43 percent) to the creation of an independent Palestinian state. Those younger (41 percent) were in favor – and 16 percent had no opinion.

Those with higher levels of education were more likely to favor PA statehood; however, 48 percent of Republicans opposed it, and just 33 percent of GOP members supported it. In the Democratic Party the majority supported PA statehood.

That last point in particular may have some bearing when it comes to U.S. national elections in 2016, and the run for the White House.

A Bezeq survey of Israeli reliance on the Internet and apps showed some interesting results, according to a Calcalist report. 522 Israelis over the age 18 were surveyed.

70% of Israelis rely on WhatsApp and feel they can’t live without it, up from 54% in 2013.

WhatsApp market penetration is an astounding 80% of the population. 70% of Israelis have a WhatsApp group for their family.

But what Israelis don’t like are all the WhatsApp groups. Only 42% like WhatsApp groups, 31% don’t like to use the groups, 17% have had enough with all the groups, and 10% said they simply don’t quit the various groups they belong to because they don’t want their friends to see they quit the group.

The survey didn’t ask how many use WhatsApp while driving.

On its heels is Waze, with 57% of Israelis believing they can’t live without the social GPS app, up from 46% in 2013.

38% said they wouldn’t give up on email.

Compared to 2013, Facebook dropped from 37% to only 32% describing it as an indispensable.

A mere 10% feel that Skype in indispensable to their lives.

75% of Israelis watch movies or TV shows on the Internet.

On average Israeli watch 40% of their movies on the Internet, 40% on TV, 13% in the theater, and 7% on DVD.

52% of Israelis prefer to surf the internet on their computer. 48% prefer their mobile device.

The average age an Israeli gets his or her first smartphone is 11 years old, with the youngest at 7.5 years.

62% of Israeli parents track their children’s usage. 78% of parents limit the time their children use the internet. 44% of children download apps without permission, and 22% use their parents phones without permission.

82% of Israelis made an online purchase in the past year. 60% booked a flight or hotel room overseas.

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Israel’s universities are ranking among the best in the world, but its record on gender equality is not nearly that good, according to statistics gathered in recent reports.

Five of Israel’s leading higher education institutions were ranked among the top 500 inaugural 2015 Best Global Universities published by US News and World Report on Tuesday.

Factors used to rank the universities included global research reputation, publications, international collaboration, total citations, number of highly cited papers and number of PhDs awarded.

The highest Israeli ranking was won by the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, at #102. Tel Aviv University followed with a ranking of 148, then Hebrew University of Jerusalem at 152 and Technion Israel Institute of Technology at 236. Ben Gurion University of the Negev rounded out the list with a ranking of 431.

The gap between the genders in Israel, however, has increased according to the World Economic Forum 2014 Gender Gap Report, released Tuesday October 28.

Israel is still the top-ranking nation in the Middle East, at 113.

But it dropped by 12 slots since last year, and now has an overall rating of 65.

Scored at 0.700 on a scale where 0 reflects inequality and 1 is complete equality, Israel is barely above the two-thirds mark – hardly an accomplishment for a modern-day Western industrialized nation.

Global and regional comparisons between nations are ranked in four categories: economic participation and opportunity for the two genders, educational attainment, health and survival and political empowerment.

For Israel to rank at 65 in the Middle East, among nations where women are still required to remain completely covered in public and forbidden to leave home without a male escort age 9 and above, let alone drive a car, means the “Start Up Nation” still has to get the key in the ignition before the nation’s leaders feel confident they have made it on to the road.

A full 51 percent of the public want a coalition government composed of Likud-Beitenu (31 MKs), Yesh Atid (19), Habayit Hayehudi (12), Tzipi Livni’s The Movement (6) and Kadima (2), according to a new Ma’agar Hamochot survey presented on Monday on a Channel 10 program.

According to the survey, only 35% of the public support letting the Haredi parties join the new government in place of Yair Lapid’s party.

A full 76% do not want new elections and prefer the new government be established based on the current Knesset’s makeup.

44% of respondents said they would rather the party they voted for compromise on principles, in order to join the coalition. Only 33% prefer that their party stick to its principles, even at the cost of sitting in the opposition.

And then there are 23% who want their party to maintain its principles, and also join the government. Talk about eating your cake and staying trim, too.

MK Ayelet Shaked (Jewish Home), appearing on the same Channel 10 show, revealed that “more serious talks” are being conducted between Likud-Beitenu and her party. “If Netanyahu wants he can form a stable government with a Jewish home,” she said, but cautioned that “the Kendall outline is not a real solution” to the “equal burden” issue.

According to Haredi and Likud-Beitenu sources, Professor Eugene Kendall has proposed a solution to Haredi conscription which would make it easier for Haredi youths to enter IDF service. The proposal has not been published anywhere, but there is reported to be a wide gap between it and the Lapid proposal.

“We are working with Yesh Atid on an agreed equal burden solution,” Shaked told Channel 10.

“If Netanyahu wants to make a change, can lead the way together with Jewish home, Yesh Atid and The Movement,” Shaked concluded, emphatically ignoring the Haredi parties. “We and Yesh Atid agree on almost 100% of the socioeconomic issues, and disagree on the political issue.”

By “the political issue,” Shaked referred to the peace process, conveniently ignoring the fact that both Tzipi Livni and Yair Lapid advocate the transfer of some 100,000 Jews living on the wrong side of the security fence in Judea and Samaria.

In a poll commissioned by Israel’s Reshet B, 45.4 percent of Israelis said they were against the view that “two-states for two peoples is the desired solution for a peace agreement with the Palestinians,” while only 40.6 percent said they were in favor.

Fourteen percent had no answer.

The poll of 500 potential voters was conducted by Geocartographia by telephone yesterday and had a 4.2 percent margin of error.

That showing of only 40.6 percent in favor of the two-state solution comes on the heels of another set of polls which claimed that Israelis supported the two-state solution by a margin of 67-68 percent.

The wording of those polls was criticized for presenting a fantasy scenario in which, according to Ha’aretz, the Palestinians would give up their claim to the “right of return” to the State of Israel and “[t]he Palestinian state would be demilitarized and its boundaries would be based on the 1967 lines with exchanges of equal-sized territory” which “would take into consideration Israel’s security needs and would retain the large settlement blocs in Israeli hands.”

The Geocarographia poll also asked Israelis for whom they were planning to vote, and gave the Jewish Home party 17.5 seats and the Strength to Israel party 6 seats, both of the parties’ best showings yet.

For full results relating to the Knesset elections click here.