Israeli-Palestinian conflict doesn’t shift US public support

Does the US public support continued aid to Israel in light of Israeli-Palestinian conflict this year? Gallup polls show that over the last 20 years, majorities have always rated Israel as “very” or “mostly positive;” and those evaluations peaked prior to the May 2021 conflict with 75% of respondents ranking their impression as positive.

The United States has been one of Israel’s strongest allies, using its UN Security Council power to veto at least 53 UN resolutions that condemned Israel and aiding in the development of Israel’s military. According to data from SIPRI, Israel ranks fifth among all recipients of US military funding since 1950, while US missile defense funding alone to Israel totaled $1.3 billion since 2011, key factors in preventing Israeli casualties both in the 2014 and 2021 wars with Gaza.

Public opinion research often finds that people are sensitive to casualties in conflict, shifting support for foreign policies, but this is rarely extended to foreign casualties or to aid policy. If so, one might expect views of Israel to change after disproportionate Palestinian causalities before the May 21st ceasefire, where 243 Palestinians died compared to 12 Israelis.

However, our own national survey research conducted June 24-26 suggests that US public perceptions have not been influenced much by recent conflict. We found Americans scored Israel on average a 6.19 on a 10-point scale, rising to 6.79 among Republicans.

We also tested whether respondents thought aid to Israel should be decreased, increased, or stayed the same. We found not only that a plurality of respondents said it should stay the same, but respondents were only marginally swayed when prompted to think about recent Israeli-Palestinian conflict or even disproportionate Palestinian casualties in this conflict.

The results suggest that recent actions are unlikely to generate calls for tying aid to Israel to peace-building efforts, even as a Gallup Poll from March 2021 found a majority of Democrats wanted the US to pressure Israel to compromise more with the Palestinian Authority. The Biden administration may wish to consider how to leverage US aid to encourage not only an end of hostilities but a durable peace, but absent a broader change in public opinion, it is unlikely any shift by the administration would be due to public pressure.

Timothy S. Rich is an associate professor of political science at Western Kentucky University and director of the International Public Opinion Lab (IPOL).

Kate Hart is a Western Kentucky University honors alumna, currently pursuing her MA in conflict resolution and mediation at Tel Aviv University.

Aurora Speltz is an honors undergraduate researcher at Western Kentucky University, majoring in Arabic, International Affairs and Spanish.

Kerby Gilstrap is an honors undergraduate student at Western Kentucky University. She is majoring in International Affairs, Arabic, and Sustainable Development.