Den demografiske bombe i Palæstina desarmeret

Mens han stadig var i live plejede den ægyptiske terrorleder Yassir Arafat at true israelerne med de arabiske kvinders børnerigdom:

"The womb of the Arab woman,..is my strongest weapon."

Gode nyheder fra Palæstina: jøderne får flere og flere børn, mens arabernes fødselstal styrtdykker. Dette ifølge nye tal fra Israels Centrale Bureau for Statistik og Verdensbanken. Dermed er et af arabernes mægtigste våben blevet desarmeret, i hvert fald for en tid:

In demographic information made public this month by the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics (ICBS), the decline in Arab fertility rates within the 1967 borders (the Green Line) has been shown to exceed the ICBS's own predictions by 20 years. Similarly, the "Contending that there is a demographic machete at the throat of the Jewish State is either drastically mistaken or outrageously misleading!"latest ICBS statistics show a Jewish fertility rate that is higher than the ICBS's most generous forecasts.

According to the ICBS study, released on November 5, the Jewish birthrate has increased in pre-1967 Israel from 2.6 to 2.8 during the period from 1996 to 2006. During the same period, Muslim Arabs have seen a drop in birthrates from 4.7 to 4.0, with the Druze population's fertility rates dropping slightly further (from 3.4 to 2.6) and Christian Arabs showing a lower rate of decline
(from 2.7 to 2.2).

According to Ettinger and the AIDRG, "Since 1948, the ICBS has tended to under-project Jewish fertility, over-project Arab fertility, ignore the scope of Arab emigration and minimize the scope of potential Jewish Aliya (immigration). It has also overlooked the fact that Jewish demography has not been normative, and certainly not Western in nature. Moreover, the ICBS ignored the fact that Jews and Arabs have reacted differently to unusual economic and military developments."

A World Bank study revealed a dramatic gap between the PA's official predictions of population growth and the actual numbers of children registered for first grade. According to the World Bank researchers, the discrepancy is due to a drop in Arab birthrates and an increase in Arab emigration from Judea, Samaria and Gaza.

Looking at the education system in the Palestinian Authority, the study showed that there had been an 8 percent drop as of September 2006 in the number of children registered for school through fifth grade. This was in sharp opposition to the PA's official forecast of a 24% increase in registered students by September 2006.

Det eneste spørgsmål, der så står tilbage er: hvad er det, israelerne gør rigtigt, og hvordan efterligner vi dem?