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What the polls say about Americans’ support for Israel, Biden and the war in Gaza
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Younger voters are less likely to back Israel, support among Democrats for Israel’s conduct has declined and Americans overall are wary of being drawn into a Middle East war.
Those are three takeaways from a series of polls on Israel, the Palestinians and the war in Gaza that have been published in the more than three weeks since Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7. In that attack, Hamas terrorists killed 1,400, wounded thousands, took more than 200 captives and sparked a war in which Israel’s stated goal is to depose the terror group, which controls the Gaza Strip.
More than 8,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli strikes, and Israeli casualties are mounting as its military deepens a ground invasion of Gaza.
The stark age divide was demonstrated by a poll published Thursday by Quinnipiac. Respondents were asked “Do you approve or disapprove of the way Israel is responding to the October 7th Hamas terrorist attack?” Half approved and 35% disapproved overall. But only 32% of respondents aged 18-34 approved of Israel’s response, as opposed to about 58% of those aged 50 and older.
Respondents also were worried about antisemitism, with reports showing that it has spiked in recent years and increased even more dramatically since Oct. 7. Asked “How serious a problem do you think that prejudice against Jewish people is today,” 38% said it was very serious and 37% said it was somewhat serious.
The Quinnipiac poll was conducted on Oct. 26, reaching 1,610 voters by phone, and had a margin of error of 2.4%.
Polls taken closer to the Hamas invasion found greater support overall for Israel, but that that backing still diminished rapidly as respondents dropped in age.
An Oct. 8-10 poll by the Economist/YouGov asked “In the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, are your sympathies more with…” and found a 42%-9% divide overall in favor of Israel. “About equal,” a possible response in that poll, got 22%. But for those aged 18-29, 25% sympathized more with Israel, 19% with the Palestinians, and 25% “about equal.” For those 65 and above, 62% favored Israel, 3% favored the Palestinians and 18% responded “about equal.” That poll reached 1,500 adults online and has a margin of error of 3 percentage points.
The Economist/YouGov poll and a Fox poll taken from Oct. 7-9 also show greater support among Democratic voters for Israel at the outset of the war, which dropped precipitously by the time Quinnipiac asked its questions late last week.
The Fox poll, which had a margin of error of 3.5%, showed Democrats siding with Israel over the Palestinians 59% to 25%, while Republicans sided with Israel 79% to 11%. The YouGov poll showed 26% percent of Democrats sympathizing with Israel, 15% sympathizing with the Palestinians and 26% saying they sympathized equally with both. (For Republicans in the YouGov poll, the numbers are 64% sympathizing with Israel, 3% sympathizing with the Palestinians, and 13% sympathizing equally with both.)
Three weeks later, Quinnipiac, asking whether respondents approve or disapprove of Israel’s response, found that 49% of Democrats disapprove while 33% approve. Three-quarters of Republicans approve, while 14% disapprove.
While President Joe Biden’s administration has provided weaponry and diplomatic support to Israel, both he and his Israeli counterparts have said that Israeli troops alone will fight the war. The Quinnipiac poll suggests Americans may not trust that assurance. Asked “How concerned are you that the United States will be drawn into a military conflict in the Middle East,” 43% of respondents said they were very concerned and 41% said they were somewhat concerned — a total of 84%.
Other polls provide a mixed picture of how Americans feel about Biden’s vocal support for Israel. A NewsNation/Decision Desk HQ poll of 1,000 registered voters from Oct. 23 and 24 found that 52% approved of Biden’s handling of the war between Israel and Hamas.
But a poll from Oct. 18 and 19 from the left-leaning Data for Progress found that 66% of all respondents, and majorities of Republicans, Democrats and independents, agreed with the statement, “The U.S. should call for a ceasefire and a de-escalation of violence in Gaza. The U.S. should leverage its close diplomatic relationship with Israel to prevent further violence and civilian deaths.”
That poll surveyed 1,329 likely voters and had a margin of error of 3%.
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The post What the polls say about Americans’ support for Israel, Biden and the war in Gaza appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Smotrich Says Defense Ministry to Spur Voluntary Emigration from Gaza
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich attends an inauguration event for Israel’s new light rail line for the Tel Aviv metropolitan area, in Petah Tikva, Israel, Aug. 17, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
i24 News – Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said on Sunday that the government would establish an administration to encourage the voluntary migration of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip.
“We are establishing a migration administration, we are preparing for this under the leadership of the Prime Minister [Benjamin Netanyahu] and Defense Minister [Israel Katz],” he said at a Land of Israel Caucus at the Knesset, Israel’s parliament. “The budget will not be an obstacle.”
Referring to the plan championed by US President Donald Trump, Smotrich noted the “profound and deep hatred towards Israel” in Gaza, adding that “sources in the American government” agreed “that it’s impossible for two million people with hatred towards Israel to remain at a stone’s throw from the border.”
The administration would be under the Defense Ministry, with the goal of facilitating Trump’s plan to build a “Riviera of the Middle East” and the relocation of hundreds of thousands of Gazans for rebuilding efforts.
“If we remove 5,000 a day, it will take a year,” Smotrich said. “The logistics are complex because you need to know who is going to which country. It’s a potential for historical change.”
The post Smotrich Says Defense Ministry to Spur Voluntary Emigration from Gaza first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Defense Ministry: 16,000 Wounded in War, About Half Under 30
A general view shows the plenum at the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, in Jerusalem. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
i24 News – The Knesset’s (Israeli parliament’s) Special Committee for Foreign Workers held a discussion on Sunday to examine the needs of wounded and disabled IDF soldiers and the response foreign caregivers could provide.
During the discussion, data from the Defense Minister revealed that the number of registered IDF wounded and disabled veterans rose from 62,000 to 78,000 since the war began on October 7, 2023. “Most of them are reservists and 51 percent of the wounded are up to 30 years old,” the ministry’s report said. The number will increase, the ministry assesses, as post-trauma cases emerge.
The committee chairwoman, Knesset member Etty Atiya (Likud), emphasized the need to reduce unnecessary bureaucracy for the wounded and to remove obstacles. “There is no dispute that the IDF disabled have sacrificed their bodies and souls for the people of Israel, for the state of Israel,” she said. Addressing the veterans, she continued: “And we, as public representatives and public servants alike, must do everything, but everything, to improve your lives in any way possible, to alleviate your pain and the distress of your family members who are no less affected than you.”
Currently, extensions are being given to the IDF veterans on a three-month basis, which Atiya said creates uncertainty and fear among the patients.
“The committee calls on the Interior Minister [Moshe Arbel] to approve as soon as possible the temporary order on our table, so that it will reach the approval of the Knesset,” she said, adding that she “intends to personally approach the Director General of the Population Authority [Shlomo Mor-Yosef] on the matter in order to promote a quick and stable solution.”
The post Defense Ministry: 16,000 Wounded in War, About Half Under 30 first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Over 1,300 Killed in Syria as New Regime Accused of Massacring Civilians
Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad speaks during an interview with Sky News Arabia in Damascus, Syria in this handout picture released by the Syrian Presidency on August 8, 2023. Syrian Presidency/Handout via REUTERS
i24 News – Over 1,300 people were killed in two days of fighting in Syria between security forces under the new Syrian Islamist leaders and fighters from ousted president Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite sect on the other hand, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights on Sunday.
Since Thursday, 1,311 people had been killed, according to the Observatory, including 830 civilians, mainly Alawites, 231 Syrian government security personnel, and 250 Assad loyalists.
The intense fighting broke out late last week as the Alawite militias launched an offensive against the new government’s fighters in the coastal region of the country, prompting a massive deployment ordered by new leader Ahmed al-Sharaa.
“We must preserve national unity and civil peace as much as possible and… we will be able to live together in this country,” al-Sharaa said, as quoted in the BBC.
The death toll represents the most severe escalations since Assad was ousted late last year, and is one of the most costly in terms of human lives since the civil war began in 2011.
The counter-offensive launched by al-Sharaa’s forces was marked by reported revenge killings and atrocities in the Latakia region, a stronghold of the Alawite minority in the country.
The post Over 1,300 Killed in Syria as New Regime Accused of Massacring Civilians first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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