Support for Israel in the United States is Dropping

Why is this happening?

A Gallup poll dropped last week that raises new and fundamental questions about the trajectory of the U.S-Israel relationship. It shows the lowest net support for Israel in the United States in more than 25 years and of the 22 countries that were tested, Israel was the most politically polarizing. What is happening and why? What are the implications for both Israel and for American Jews? What can be done to address it?

The gallup poll shows that 54% of Americans have a favorable view of Israel while 41% have an unfavorable view - a 13 point net positive. This might sound OK, except that only four years ago 75% of Americans had a positive view of Americans and only 23% were negative, leading to a 52% net positive view. This is a massive drop. Indeed the 13% net positive rating is the lowest level of support for Israel in the Gallup poll in more than 30 years.

Just as significant is that the partisan gap on Israel is massive. 83% of Republicans now view Israel favorably while only 33% of Democrats and 48% of Independents do. This is also new. Four years ago 76% of Independents and 65% of Democrats had a favorable view of Israel. And the 50 point gap between Republicans and Democrats on this issue is far and away higher than any other country polled (Mexico was second at 36). Basically on the Center and on the Left support for Israel has dropped massively over the past four years.

The polling also shows that Americans are more sympathetic to Israelis than Palestinians by a 13 point margin (46-33), which is also the lowest gap in 25 years and a 20 point drop from the 33 point margin (58-25) in 2021.

The numbers also show a disconnect between older and younger voters. When asked to choose, respondents 55 and over were sympathetic to Israelis over Palestinians by 56-26 margin, while respondents under 34 were sympathetic to Palestinians by 48-29.

So what is going on here? Is it just that Democrats who have long supported Israel overwhelmingly, suddenly became the anti-Israel/antisemtism party as some partisans would have you believe? Nope, the story is much more complicated.

First, you have to remember that Democratic voters tend to be younger. Joe Biden’s generation sees Israel as the scrappy underdog that was created in the aftermath of the Holocaust and fought for its survival in the early wars. My generation grew up with Israel through the Oslo era - seeing Israel as a vibrant and successful country searching for peace. This youngest generation of voters has grown up seeing Israel largely through the prism of Benjamin Netanyhau and right wing politics, and increasingly sees the Palestinian struggle through the prism of civil and minority rights and the challenges we face on those issues in the United States. This is why if you look at the long-term trend there has been a slow peeling away of support over the long-term.

But that by itself doesn’t explain the shift of the past few years. This polling is also a function of the strategy by Prime Minister Netanyahu to insert himself into American politics with a clear and strong preference for the Right, and a strategy by Republicans to try to transform Israel from what used to be a bipartisan issue into a wedge issue.

The seminal moment was Netanyahu’s decision to go behind Obama’s back and work with Republicans and give a joint address to Congress directly opposing one of Obama’s signature foreign policy initiatives - the Iran nuclear agreement. To be clear, reasonable people can disagree on the wisdom of the JCPOA (I supported it but also pointed out some of the weaknesses that needed to be addressed in follow-on actions). But a decision by the leader of Israel to insert himself into US politics given Israel’s dependence on U.S. support, was what was so unprecedented and damaging.

From that point on things were different in Washington. When I worked in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 2012, Israel bills were always overwhelmingly bipartisan. Legislation could pretty easily get 95-100 votes. After the speech that was no longer the case, and Israel became one of the toughest issues in the Democratic caucus. However, despite Netanyahu’s warm embrace of Trump during Trump’s first term, this new tension in Washington wasn’t reflected in the polling as bipartisan support for Israel remained high into Joe Biden’s presidency including in the early years of his term when Naftali Bennet and Yair Lapid were Prime Ministers.

It is really when Netanyahu returned to office in December 2022 with an extremist right wing coalition that Democratic and Independent support started to dramatically drop. Netanyahu quickly returned to his old playbook of inserting himself into U.S. politics in support of Trump. This was especially true with his efforts to distance himself from Biden through 2024 despite Biden’s overwhelming support for Israel since October 7th, and capping it with Trump inviting Netanyahu to be the first head of state to visit the White House just as the gallup poll went into the field.

Two other factors have also come into play. Netanyahu’s latest term coincided almost immediately with efforts at “judicial reform” that threatened the system of checks and balances that led to mass protests from the Israeli opposition. Democrats increasingly associate this kind of behavior with Donald Trump and rightfully view themselves as the party that defends democratic norms, values, and institutions. These events in Israel, put the government on the wrong side of that debate, and undercut the perception of Israel as a Democratic ally.

Finally, there were of course the October 7th attacks, which resulted in a brief surge in support for Israel in the polls, but very quickly were overtaken by concerns for the humanitarian situation in Gaza and Israel’s conduct of the war. What is important to note here is that Americans still overwhelmingly support Israel over Hamas (77-21% in the most recent Harvard Harris Poll). However, it appears that Americans, especially Democrats and Independents, distinguish between Hamas and Palestinian civilians and are likely concerned with Israel’s conduct of the war, which is why there has been such a spike in sympathy for Palestinians over Israelis.

So what are the consequences of all this? For Israel? For American Jews? For the U.S.-Israel relationship? For the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? For rising antisemitism in the United States? And most importantly, what should we do about it? I have lots of thoughts about this, and will write about them in a future post. But if you want to get started now, you can read a some of my earlier pieces about developing a new compelling vision for the American Center Left on Israel.