Palestinian Life in the West Bank, East Jerusalem After Oct. 7

This article is the third in a series about life in Israel and in the West Bank and East Jerusalem almost one year after Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, and the Israel-Hamas war began.
Note: Gallup’s past surveys in the State of Palestine* have included Gaza. Gallup was not able to survey Gaza in 2024 because of ongoing security issues. The data in this article represent the views of Palestinians living in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Jewish Israeli-majority areas within the West Bank and East Jerusalem are not included.
LONDON — Although most of the war between Israel and Hamas is being fought in the Gaza Strip, life has changed in the past year for Palestinians living in the nearby West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Here are five key insights into life in these territories since Oct. 7, 2023.
The Cantril Scale, which asks respondents to rate their current and future life on a scale of 0 to 10 (where 10 is the best life possible), gives an insight into people’s wellbeing and how they evaluate their lives.
For the past decade, Palestinians living in the West Bank and East Jerusalem have rated their lives between 5.0 and 5.5 out of 10. In 2023, in the weeks before Oct. 7, they rated their lives at a 5.5, which is as positive as they have been since Gallup began measuring life evaluations there in 2006. Today, almost a year later, Palestinians’ evaluations of their current lives have dropped by nearly 1 point to 4.6, the lowest average in almost two decades.
More people than ever (13%) in the West Bank and East Jerusalem now rate their lives as a 0 out of 10, which is the worst possible life.
Over the past two decades, how people have rated their lives in the West Bank and East Jerusalem has often been closely related to how safe they feel.
Since 2008, a majority of Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem have felt safe walking alone in their area at night, reaching 69% in 2023. But fewer feel safe now, with 56% in 2024 saying they feel safe walking alone at night, the lowest percentage in over a decade.
The past year has seen rising tensions in the West Bank, with a spike in violence after the Oct. 7 attacks. Since then, more than 600 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, according to the United Nations. Israel’s defense forces have launched nearly daily military arrest raids in heavily Palestinian areas as part of counterterrorism operations. There has also been a rise in settler violence and Palestinian attacks on Israelis.
The West Bank and East Jerusalem have a young population, with more than 40% under the age of 18, and more Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem now believe the prospects for their youth are bleak.
The percentages who feel that children are respected (26%) and have the opportunity to learn and grow (22%) both fell in 2024. Since the World Poll began surveying the world — including the Middle East and North Africa — in 2006, no country in that region has scored lower than either of these readings on child welfare from the West Bank and Jerusalem.
The recent conflict has had significant economic consequences as well. Between 2012 and 2023, the proportion of Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem who said their local economy was getting better grew steadily from 17% to 41. In 2024, it fell back sharply to 15%, with 80% saying things are getting worse, the highest level of pessimism on record.
Twenty-eight percent say they are finding things “very difficult” on their present income, almost double the rate in 2023 (15%). Since the war began, real gross domestic product (GDP) has contracted by more than 20% in the West Bank, with almost all businesses facing adverse effects from the war in Gaza, according to the International Labour Organization.
Palestinians’ approval ratings of Mahmoud Abbas — who for nearly two decades has led the Palestinian Authority that controls parts of the West Bank — continued to slide in 2024.
A decade ago in 2014, Abbas’ approval rating reached a high point of 64%, but it has fallen to 29% today in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, with twice as many (59%) now disapproving of his leadership.
Even though the recent conflict between Israel and Hamas has been mostly limited to territory within Gaza, its effects have been felt much more widely in the region. Changing public opinion in the West Bank and East Jerusalem is testament to this. Palestinians there are rating their lives worse, increasingly fearing for their safety and their children’s wellbeing, and growing more pessimistic about their economic future.
*Gallup refers to the Palestinian Territories as the State of Palestine in accordance with the naming conventions used by the United Nations and International Organization for Standardization.
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