Every third Israeli woman, victim of sexual assault

Since 2008 there has been a steep increase in the proportion of divorcees among female murder victims in Israel, according to a report released by Haaretz on Monday.

The violence index was constructed from official data on murder, robbery and sexual violence reported against women from 2003 until end of 2011, and is broken down by the victims' age, family status and religion.

The index shows a startling rise in the frequency of cases of violence against single women (from 60 per 100,000 women in 2003 to 1000 per 100,000 in 2010) - a nearly twenty-fold increase.

And according to the survey of 800 women from various sectors of the population, 76 percent of Jewish women and 79 percent of Arab women report living "in constant fear" of sexual assault. The survey found that one in every three women can expect to be sexually assaulted during the course of her life.