The Pew Research Center published a
report about anti-Semitism and Islamophobia in Spain, Poland, Russia, Germany, France, Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. The report dates from 2008 and showed that 46% of the Spaniards had unfavourable views towards the Jews.
Worried about the results of the report, the Spanish Government made the Casa Sefarad-Israel (an institution centred on the study of Jews and dedicated to foment Spanish-Israeli relations) to take on the issue. Finally, a new report was published, which found the following
results:
1.- 58.4% of the Spaniards think that the "Jews have much power because they control the economy and the media". Among university students this attitude encompasses the 62.2%, and among people "interested in politics" this attitude encompasses the 70.5%. All of this means that anti-Semitism in Spain is highly worrying and intolerable, due to its level and to the fact that it's higher among educated and informed people.
2.- 34.6% of the Spaniards have unfavourable or totally unfavourable opinions about the Jews. This attitude encompasses 34% of the far-rightists (who rate the Jews with 4.9 points in a scale from 1 to 10) and 37.7% of centre-left-wingers (who rate the Jews with 4.6 points in a scale from 1 to 10). This case is unique in Europe because far-rightists show less unpleasantness towards the Jews than centre-left-wingers.
3.- Among those who admit to be "unpleasant towards the Jews", 17% of them attribute this attitude to the "Middle East conflict"; 29.6% of them attribute this attitude to "their religion", "their customs", " the way they are", etc.; others among them attribute this attitude to "general unpleasantness", "the power" and "the money"; 17% of them attribute this attitude to reasons they don't know. This means that only a small percentage of the Spaniards show unpleasantness towards the Jews due to "the State of Israel and its policies".
