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Notes -
New data from Pew on the Israel-Palestinian topic
Negative views of Israel have increased, but in a unique way according to demographics. 50% of Republican-leaning Americans under 50yo have a negative view, up from 35% in 2022. For the Dem-leaning in this age bracket, there’s been only a 3% shift toward negative views. For 50yo+ Republicans, negative views have increased by just 3% to sit at 23%; but for Dems in this age bracket, there’s been a 13% increase to 66%. Most of the shift in the public’s dislike of Israel has occurred among younger Republicans and older Democrats. This is interesting data, because there’s been an idea circulating that the shift in public perception of Israel is driven by younger minority progressives. And while that’s a big part, the data really tells us that Americans have changed their view in recent years in ways unaccounted for by demographic change, but which can be explained by the war. Because in just three years, from 2022 to 2025, we’re seeing huge shifts in regards to views on Israel while demographics have only changed slightly.
I think this shift is clear when looking at the media young people consume. Theo Von inconspicuously doing an “early life check” on the Sackler family in his interview with JD Vance; Shane Gillis on KillTony a few days ago; the popular youth streamer “iShowSpeed” refusing to talk to people if they mention they are Israeli. Pro-Israel Americans need a feasible game plan for dealing with this shift which doesn’t fall victim to the Streisand Effect. The current strategy of deporting foreign national students is bad, because the negative publicity far outweighs the tiny changes on university campuses. Zone of Interest came out in 2023, and our media reported on October 7th crimes well enough, yet these clearly didn’t move the needle on public favorability. There doesn’t appear to be any youth figure who can shift perceptions.
It's fascinating the way people frame what things constitute facts about reality, and what things are supposed to be changeable.
This turn in public opinion was not just entirely predictable given Israel's actions, but it was undoubtedly the plan within Hamas before 10/7. Hamas was never under the impression that they were going to sweep from there to Jerusalem, they were hoping to do something so horrible that Israel would "have" to respond, Israel's response would lead to global backlash against Israel, and bring the conflict back to front of mind.
This was obvious from the word go. The goal from the beginning was to bait Israel into committing atrocities.
Why was world opinion widely treated as something changeable, while Israel's reaction wasn't? "Any country in this position would have to invade!" "You can't expect Israel to restrain itself!" "People need to realize that Israel has the right to defend itself!"
It's interesting to me that people who frame themselves as hard-nosed-unemotional-realists refuse to accept public opinion as an aspect of reality. Especially for Israel, a country that has always depended on western public opinion. I guess we need to have someone write a popular Warhammer 40k fanfic in which a grizzled commissar with some kind of cyberpunk eye patch gives a speech about sacrificing lives for public opinion gains, and then it will fit into their framing of themselves as hard-nosed-unemotional-realists.
I'm realizing that realism is just a different form of woolly headed idealism. In the same way they decry foreign policy idealists who want to see a rules based international order, they live in an imaginary world where war is the only reality and might makes right.
Yes. The (unlikely) path to Hamas victory is made out of dead Palestinian kids killed by Israeli bombs.
Netanyahu is basically playing into the hands of Hamas. But he is fine with that, because the long term prospects of Israel are not what he cares about. He simply cares about remaining in power. Without the threat of terrorism, few people would vote for a hardliner like him.
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