Israeli checkpoints are the most widely cited problem among Palestinians surveyed in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, with 93% in the West Bank and 85% in East Jerusalem calling them a major concern for themselves and their families.
Job opportunities ranked second in a Pew Research Center survey, with 85% of respondents across the two areas describing access to work as a major problem.
Pew surveyed 1,038 people in Arabic from March 30 through April 28, 2026. The fieldwork began during the U.S.-Israel war with Iran and continued after an initial ceasefire was declared April 7.
The survey did not include Gaza because of security concerns. Pew said 2026 was the first time in several years that it had been able to poll Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Checkpoints affect travel and views of coexistence
Checkpoints separate Palestinian areas from Israeli territory and from other Palestinian areas. Pew said the barriers have become more common since the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel and can make travel to jobs and health care more difficult.
The issue also appeared in open-ended responses about whether Israel and an independent Palestinian state could coexist peacefully. Some respondents said checkpoints separate communities and prevent movement between cities, while others linked reopening crossings to access to jobs in Israel.
Those comments do not represent the share of all respondents holding a particular view because they came from an open-ended question. They illustrate some of the reasons participants gave for believing coexistence is possible or impossible.
Pew's field period is an important limitation because opinions were collected during a regional war and shortly after a ceasefire announcement. The findings also cannot be treated as representative of Palestinians in Gaza.
Economic pressure cuts across the findings
Concern about jobs was highest among lower-income respondents. Ninety percent of Palestinians with household incomes at or below the median for the West Bank and East Jerusalem said work opportunities were a major problem, compared with 78% of those above the median.
The unemployment rate in the West Bank and East Jerusalem was 27.5% at the end of 2025, according to World Bank estimates cited by Pew. Although the region recorded modest economic growth that year, the unemployment rate remained among the highest documented worldwide.
Only 10% of respondents described the Palestinian economy as very or somewhat good. Nine in 10 called economic conditions very or somewhat bad, making the surveyed population the least satisfied with its economy among 37 places Pew studied in 2026.
Crime was also a major concern for roughly three-quarters of respondents. Seventy-five percent in the West Bank and 77% in East Jerusalem described crime as a major problem, with majorities expressing concern across age and income groups.
Education and housing concerns vary by income and location
Seventy-two percent of Palestinians surveyed said the quality of education was a major issue. The share rose to 79% among lower-income households and fell to 63% among those with higher incomes.
Half or fewer described the quality of health services, electricity access, water access and food availability as major problems. Pew did not provide each overall percentage in the source summary, but said lower-income respondents were more likely to cite those basic services.
Housing was the least common of the nine concerns across the full survey but showed a large geographic divide. Fifty-four percent of Palestinians in East Jerusalem called adequate housing a major problem, compared with 28% in the West Bank.
Pew noted that Palestinian households in East Jerusalem face evictions, home demolitions and difficulty obtaining construction permits. Those conditions help explain why housing concerns were more prominent there, though the survey did not establish the cause of each respondent's answer.
The findings describe perceptions rather than independently measured service quality, crime or access. They show how respondents ranked the problems affecting their families during a specific and unusually volatile period.
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