Poll: U.S. Voters Sympathetic To Israel, But Skeptical Of Its Military Campaign

A plurality of American voters believe that Israel should stop its military campaign in Gaza.

A plurality of U.S. voters believe that Israel should stop its military campaign in the Gaza Strip, according to a New York Times/Siena College poll released Tuesday, even as many remain broadly sympathetic to the foreign nation.

Forty-four percent of American voters say that Israel should stop the military campaign, while only 39% believe it should continue. The poll also found that just 30% of voters believe Israel is “taking enough precautions to avoid civilian casualties,” while 48% believe the country is not taking enough steps.

The results show how the military campaign in Gaza — launched in response to an Oct. 7 attack by the militant group Hamas, which killed over 1,000 people in Israel — has strained typically steadfast American support for the country, especially among demographics core to the success of the Democratic Party.

Israel’s military campaign has killed more than 20,000 people, and caused widespread shortages of food and power in Gaza — the small piece of land ruled by Hamas, which itself was propped up by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government to decrease chances for a two-state solution in the region.

Three-fifths of Democratic voters believe that Israel’s military campaign should end, compared with 48% of independent voters and 24% of Republicans. One of the biggest divisions is by age: Just 33% of voters over 65 want the campaign to end, compared with two-third of voters ages 18 to 29. Majorities of Black and Hispanic voters also believe that Israel should end the campaign.