That Israel's Jewish public has moved sharply to the right in recent years is well known. There's a rightwing government to prove it – and so beyond challenge is Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, and so confident about his hold on power, that he has called early elections for January. Indeed the government will shift even further to the right with this week's dramatic announcement that Netanyahu's Likud party will join forces for the elections with the foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman'sYisrael Beiteinu (Israel Our Home).

Lieberman, who speaks for many of the Russian immigrants who form about 20% of the population, stands well to the right of even the rightwing Likud, so Netanyahu could run into problems with some of his own members in addition to their resentment at being pushed down the list for parliamentary seats. If the link endures greater curtailment of civil liberties can be expected, harsher attitudes towards Israeli Arabs who also form about 20% of the population, and less influence for Jewish religious parties.

Even with all this, the extent of the hostility expressed by Israeli Jews towards the country's Arab citizens, reported in an opinion survey this week, still comes as a shock: among much else, 42% said they don't want their children in the same school class with Arab children and 42% don't want to live in the same building with Arabs.

A second look moderates the shock. The survey notes that those with the strongest anti-Arab prejudices are religious and ultra-Orthodox Jews – and this is no surprise. Rabbis incite feelings against Arabs and issue circulars urging Jews not to rent or sell property to Arabs.

The ultra-Orthodox go further and not only shun Arabs but, perhaps even more, fellow Jews and especially those who are secular. The ultra-Orthodox keep their children in their own separate schools and live in their own separate neighbourhoods. Not only do they keep seculars and Arabs, and indeed the whole world, at bay but they also discriminate among themselves: many Ashkenazim (Jews of Western origin) viewSephardim (Jews who originate mainly from Arab countries) as less "pure" in their practice of Judaism and thus some Ashkenazi schools for girls impose a quota for Sephardim.

The survey's picture is very different for the secular – who form the majority of Israel's Jews: 73% did not object to having Arabs in their children's school, and 68% would live in an apartment building alongside Arabs.

These are remarkably positive views in light of the effect of the Palestinian suicide bombings during the Second Intifada in driving many Israeli Jews to the right, plus the continuing threats to Israel's existence by Iran and Palestinian militants and their supporters in the world. The firing of rockets and mortars – more than 80 this week – at southern Israel from the Gaza Strip by Hamas and others adds to antipathy towards Palestinians. Rightwing leaders gain support by playing on Jewish fears.

The survey's handling of Jewish views about the West Bank, based on a hypothetical annexation by Israel, raises questions about the way it was conducted and how the results were presented to the public: 69% of Israeli Jews, according to the survey, would oppose giving the West Bank's 2.5 million Palestinians the vote inside Israel. The summary of the survey is headlined: "In case of annexation, most Jews will support apartheid."

I know about apartheid. I was born in South Africa and spent 26 years as a journalist specialising in reporting apartheid; I have also written several books about it. I only left South Africa because my newspaper, the Rand Daily Mail, of which I was then deputy editor, was closed down by its commercial owners under pressure from the government. We paid the price for being the country's leading voice against apartheid.

I also am familiar with Israel. I have lived in Jerusalem since 1997 and for more than 12 years was founder director of the Yakar Center for Social Concern whose purpose was to promote dialogue between Jews and Christians, Jews and Muslims, and Israelis and Palestinians. I was surprised by the survey's findings: could it really be true that most Jews in Israel support apartheid?

Scratch this a little bit and there is a much simpler explanation than alleged "apartheid" for so many opposing giving Palestinians the vote: to do so would, in demographic terms, mean the end of Israel as a Jewish state; on the other hand, denying Palestinians the vote in a one-nation state would end Israel's democratic basis.

With all the survey's references to "apartheid" it cannot be said how those interviewed understood the word. Was it explained to them? How?

The apartheid theme was projected strongly in Haaretz, Israel's liberal newspaper. The writer, Gideon Levy, is famed for his exposes of the evils of occupation; he is also one of the small, perhaps tiny, number of Israeli journalists and academics who seek to pin the "apartheid" tag on Israel.

He wrote that, "a sweeping 74% majority is in favour of separate roads for Israelis and Palestinians in the West Bank". But the sentence that follows needs to be noted: 24% believed separate roads were "a good situation" and 54% believed they were "a necessary situation". Decoded, this gets to the heart of the issue of the separate roads which Israel has built for some settlements. Critics say this is apartheid. But as the 54% indicate, they see it as a security issue; that is, it is the (expensive and extravagant) way to counter drive-by and roadside shootings which have killed many settlers. Nor (and this is little understood) are the roads only for Jews: the cars allowed on it are those with Israeli black and yellow number plates, irrespective of whether the driver is an Israeli Jew or Arab; the barred cars are those with Palestinian green and white plates.

Levy's report said that the survey had been commissioned by the US-based New Israel Fund's Yisraela Goldblum Fund. But the New Israel Fund, a major player in fostering equality and democracy in Israel,quickly announced that it had nothing to do with the survey. With equal speed its deputy communications director, Noam Shelef, wrote in New York's Daily Beast that the survey actually shows that Israelis want to separate themselves from the West Bank: "So, claiming the poll demonstrates support for 'apartheid' is spin at its worst." He said it "seems to amount to a misrepresentation of the data".

Whatever attitudes might be claimed for Israel's Jewish public the situation on the ground does not support accusations of apartheid. The Arab population, some 20%, certainly suffers discrimination but to liken their lot to apartheid South Africa is baseless, indeed ridiculous. Arabs have the vote, which in itself makes them fundamentally different from South Africa's black population under apartheid. And even the current rightwing government says that it wants to overcome Arab disadvantage and promises action to upgrade education and housing and increase job opportunities. Of course time will show how genuine it is.

The West Bank is a linked but separate issue: it's a military occupation which, in its nature, is violent and discriminatory. Trying to put an erroneous apartheid label on it confuses and distorts and is propagandistic.

Why do I dismiss the apartheid analogies so emphatically? Because I straddle both apartheid South Africa and Israel today and have knowledge of the good and the ill in both societies.

• The original headline of this article, "Israel is hostile towards Arabs, but it is not an apartheid state", was changed at 17:46 on 26 October 2012 at the request of the author