A study conducted in 1995 showed that Israeli children hate school more than pupils in over two dozen other countries surveyed. Two studies released in 1999 may give a clue as to why: the level of violence in Israeli schools. The studies found 10.3 percent of more than 8,000 Jewish pupils surveyed had brought either a knife, gun, or stick with them to school at least once during the previous month. A study conducted by the Hebrew University's Rami Benvenisti found that of more than 15,000 pupils from 232 Israeli public schools, some 16% of elementary-school pupils, 8% of middle-school pupils and 4% of high-school pupils had skipped school at least once out of fear of an attack. About 43% of Israeli pupils admitted to bullying fellow students, and almost 16% of students had been either pushed, pinched, slapped, kicked or punched by teachers and staff.