The anti-settlement group Peace Now group have released findings of a study which indicates most Jewish settlers in the Palestinian territories would quit their communities if the government ordered them out and offered financial compensation.
The survey found that 68 percent of settlers "recognise the authority of the democratic institutions of the country to decide on a withdrawal from the settlements and will conform to such a decision."
The Israeli group, which supports a withdrawal back to the 1967 frontiers, said only six percent would oppose the decision using illegal means, while 26 percent "will obey such a decision following a struggle by legal means."
The survey, carried out over a period of three months, also reveals that a 59 percent majority of settlers would choose financial compensation as their preferred option in case of withdrawal, while 10 percent would favour being relocated in Israel proper.
Only nine percent would insist on remaining in their settlement, while 23 percent said they would choose to be relocated in another settlement in the occupied territories, the Peace Now survey said.
The survey, unprecedented in its scope and depth, was supervised by an academic committee of professors from Tel Aviv University and conducted by the Hopp Research company on 3,200 households, in every settlement numbering 150 inhabitants and in most of the smaller ones.
There are an estimated 200,000 settlers spread out over up to 200 communities, although accurate figures are not available. Another 200,000 Jews live in occupied and annexed east Jerusalem.
Jewish settlements, one of the root causes of the Palestinian uprising which has raged since September 2000, are considered illegal by the international community.
AFP