Trump beats Clinton among Americans in Israel

Poll of American absentee voters in Israel shows Trump ahead of Clinton by five percentage points.

1 min read

The New Arab

03 Nov, 2016

Around 30,000 American-Israelis will vote in this years US presidential election [AFP]

Republican Presidential nominee Donald Trump is the most popular presidential candidate among Americans living in Israel, a poll by The Jerusalem Post has revealed.

The exit poll of absentees showed that 49 percent of respondents chose the business tycoon over Democtaric nominee Hillary Clinton, who received 44 percent of the Israeli-American vote.

The poll was conducted by iVoteIsrael and KEEVOON Global Research between Monday and Wednesday this week, with the full state-by-state results to be released on Thursday.

Only 2 percent of those polled said they would vote for Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson - a man who revealed his ignorance of Middle Eastern affairs when he infamously asked "what is Aleppo" in a recent TV interview.

Around 30,000 votes in the US election will come from Israel this year. This is significantly lower than US voter turnout in Israel in 2012, which saw over 80,000 dual nationals cast their ballots.

Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton was shown to be the Arabs' favourite candidate in polls surveying several Arab countries recently. She is also ahead among Arab Americans.