Can Israel win back Americans' support? |
Can Israel win back Americans’ support?
There is an uneasy quiet in the Persian Gulf. The ceasefire with Iran, however tenuous, is holding. Israel has emerged intact from one of the most dangerous chapters of its modern history. By every military measure, these are notable achievements that cannot be diminished.
Yet Israel has never been more endangered in one arena vital to its security: the American public square. No honest accounting can ignore what has happened to Israel’s standing in America while the bombs were falling.
Pew Research Center’s April 2026 survey found that nearly six in 10 Americans now view Israel unfavorably. Those holding a “very unfavorable” view have nearly tripled since 2022, rising to 28 percent. Among Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents, unfavorable views have reached 80 percent. Among Republicans under 50, a majority now views Israel unfavorably.
These are not political opinions or protest statistics from a campus demonstration. They are documented, measurable, accelerating facts. Like the writing on Belshazzar’s wall, they are a warning sign that demands to be read and not rationalized away.
Researchers at Tel Aviv’s Institute for National Security Studies have documented the breadth of the problem: Negative sentiment has spread to younger Republicans, evangelical Christians, and Democrats of all ages — constituencies whose support was once assumed rather than earned. If the trend holds, Israel may soon find itself without a reliable base of support in either of America’s political parties. For a nation whose security architecture has rested on bipartisan American support for seven decades, that is a dire development.
Not surprisingly, this did not begin with the Iran war,........