Israel is losing American Jews.
A new nationwide poll conducted by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research has found a host of indications of the sea change in American Jewish attitudes about genocide in Gaza, and their relationship to Zionism itself.
The poll revealed NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani is more popular — by far — than Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
This may be surprising. We’ve heard ad nauseum from the Anti-Defamation League and an all-too credulous media that Jews in Mamdani’s New York live in constant fear.
The AP-NORC poll revealed 44% of American Jews actually hold a favorable opinion of Mamdani. That’s the most of any politician polled, and it’s far more favorable than for Netanyahu, viewed favorably by only 32% of American Jews and negatively by a whopping 59%.
Further, researchers found only 23% of U.S. Jews said the term “Zionist” described them extremely or very well. That’s consistent with polling from earlier this year that found most U.S. Jews — 63% — do not self-identify as Zionists.
That’s not all: Thirty-eight percent of U.S. Jews percent believe the U.S has been too supportive of Israel, and 30% believe Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.
What does this polling tell us?
We can all sense the massive shift in public opinion that is underway.
It’s not just U.S. Jews that are changing their minds about Israel. Half of all Americans believe Israel is committing genocide, and 60% of U.S. adults have an unfavorable view of Israel. The same is true across party lines: Polling from May showed nearly three-quarters of Democratic supporters now oppose military funding to Israel, up from 45% three years ago, and a growing number of Republicans and Independents believe the U.S. is too supportive of Israel, too.
To justify the unjustifiable, the Israeli government and its supporters sold Jews the insidious lie that Palestinian dispossession is the price that must be paid for Jewish safety. For Palestinians in particular, and for Jews and non-Jews, too, to question this lie was to risk being labeled an antisemite and blacklisted from mainstream public life, or worse.
But for 30 years, JVP members in communities across the United States have been steadily chipping away at this lie. At the Passover table, in the halls of power, during backyard Shabbats, on the campaign trail, in their living rooms, and in mass protests that draw hundreds or thousands, they’re carving out spaces for anti-Zionist Jews to be their full selves and showing that a growing contingent of U.S. Jews reject the conflation of support for Palestine with antisemitism. And they’re bringing huge numbers of people along with them.
Now, the lie that has for decades upheld U.S. popular support for Israel is cracking under the weight of our movements. We’re seeing that shift start to translate to material change — including nearly half of the Senate voting to block weapons and bulldozers to Israel this April — but it’s not happening fast enough. That’s why we can’t afford to let up the pressure for even a moment.
For years, Israeli leaders have traveled the world with impunity, despite their widely documented war crimes and egregious violations of international law in their atrocities against Palestinians. Since Israel’s genocide began, however, the tide has started to shift. In 2024, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu and former Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant — the man who declared Israel’s genocidal intent on October 9, 2023, saying “we are fighting human animals and we act accordingly.” A growing list of countries has since publicly committed to arresting Netanyahu and Gallant if they enter their territory.
There is no such active warrant for Ben-Gvir, but rights groups argued that he should be prosecuted for his role as “one of the chief architects and champions of the genocide against the Palestinian people.” In a complaint to the NY State Attorney General, the Center for Constitutional Rights and the Hind Rajab Foundation — which seeks legal action against the perpetrators of the Israeli genocide — laid out Ben-Gvir’s numerous war crimes and acts of genocide, including leading the transformation of the Israeli prison system into an outright “network of torture camps.”
There’s significant and growing precedent for their legal argument. Ten European countries in total have now banned both Ben-Gvir and fellow extremist settler and Israeli Minister Bezalel Smotrich: the UK, Canada, Australia, the Netherlands, Spain, Belgium, Norway, Ireland, New Zealand and France. Many have also slapped sanctions on the racist, far-right leaders, including freezing their assets, related to their genocidal actions and leadership of the violent extremist settler movement in the West Bank. Countries including France, Spain and Italy have also called for European sanctions on Ben-Gvir after videos of him abusing detained humanitarian flotilla prisoners were made public in May.
Act now:
Call to block $3.3 billion in military funding to Israel.
For decades we watched a Washington consensus fuel Israel’s atrocities with unquestioning support. The only question in Congress was who could procure more money, more weapons for Israel.
But today, we have a chance to help crack this consensus apart. In just a few hours, the House of Representatives will vote on an amendment that would block $3.3 billion in military funding to Israel.
This is shaping up to be a major battle within the Democratic party – with Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries opposing the cuts to military funding and the Congressional Caucus supporting the cuts.
The vote is coming up in a matter of hours and representatives are scrambling to make a decision quickly — call your representative now.
“They clearly want one individual and it’s not me.”
We’re reading the Guardian on the growing tensions within the Democratic party surrounding the Democratic Senate primary in Michigan. Abdul El Sayed and Haley Stevens remain locked in an increasingly fractious battle, with the central fault line US support for Israel.
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