With about three months to municipal elections throughout Israel, the election fever is felt in many areas, including local and regional councils located throughout Yehuda and Shomron, home to close to 250,000 registered voters.

According to a Srugim report, the regional council with the largest number of voters is the Binyamin Regional Council, with 37,902 voters, with council’s actual size being more than double, numbering close to 80,000 residents. On the other hand, Maale Ephraim on the Shomron – Jordan Valley Highway, has 1,186 registered voters, while a local council receives official status with 2,000 residents.

In general, the residents of Yehuda and Shomron are younger than the national average. According to the latest election information, approximately 53% of the residents of Yehuda, Shomron and the Jordan Valley are over the age of 18, while the average in the entire State of Israel stands at 73%.

Two cities in the first quintile are among the largest in Yehuda and Shomron as well as chareidi: Modi’in Illit in West Binyamin with 28,799 voters and Betar Illit in Yehuda with 25,823. Between the two chareidi cities there is Maale Adumim, with 28,740 voters.

In other words, the large concentrations of residents are found in chareidi communities relative to secular or religious cities.

A sharp transition can be seen between the Gush Etzion Regional Council and the Efrat Local Council, with a gap of slightly more than half, with the neighboring councils of Shomron and Ariel standing above them, and with fewer numbers are the communities of Oranit, Alfei Menashe, Karnei Shomron, Kiryat Arba and Har Hebron.

Among the surprising regional councils are Har Hebron and the Jordan Valley, which are low in the table, but are alive and influential in both areas of the country.

Data published by the Yesha Council in January on the population of Yehuda, Shomron and the Jordan Valley for 2017 show interesting results, with Israeli settlements in the area numbering 150 settlements with 435,708 residents, but in 2017 there was also a decline in the number of people who came to live in Yehuda and Shomron, as well as the number of persons per family. In addition, the population is equally divided between national religious, chareidi and secular.

An analysis of the data shows that the annual growth in the population of the region in 2017 is 3.4% per year, with an average annual growth rate of 4.5% per year in the past decade. More than twice the average growth rate in the State of Israel, which stood at 2.0% in 2016.

The largest city is Modi’in Illit and the largest yishuv is Kochav Yaakov. The largest yishuvim in Yehuda and Shomron are, of course, the cities according to the number of residents: Modi’in Illit, Betar Illit, Maale Adumim and Ariel, with a total of 190,591 residents. However, the numbers of eligible voters show different data. There are 93,403 residents in the local councils in Yehuda and Shomron, and 145,909 residents live in the regional councils.

The largest yishuv which is not a local council, or a city, is Kochav Yaakov in Binyamin, followed by Shaare Tikva in the Shomron Regional Council, Geva Binyamin (Adam), Talmon, Kfar Adumim and Eli in the Binyamin Regional Council.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)