Americans Are Turning Against Israel While Trump Doubles Down On Ethnic-Cleansing

A new Gallup poll shows support for Israel at a historic low, yet Trump is quietly funneling billions to Netanyahu’s war machine—why is he doubling down on funding the slaughter?

A new Gallup poll reveals a profound shift in American attitudes toward Israel. Support for the occupation entity has plummeted to its lowest level in 25 years, with fewer than half of Americans (46%) now expressing sympathy for Israel.

Map from Gallup Poll this week.

Sympathy for Palestinians, meanwhile, has surged to a historic high of 33%, marking a 6% increase from last year. Among Democrats, the shift is even more striking: 59% now favor Palestinians, compared to just 21% who side with Israel. This marks the first time in Gallup’s history that Democratic voters have favored Palestinians over Israel.

And yet, if you listened to Donald Trump’s speech to Congress, you might not have noticed any of this. In a glaring and calculated omission, Trump barely mentioned Gaza or Israel at all. Instead, he boasted about cutting off aid to Ukraine, positioning himself as the great protector of American interests. He spent seven whole minutes listing countries that would no longer receive U.S. funding—conspicuously omitting Israel, which remains the exception to his self-proclaimed “America First” foreign policy.

But silence is not neutrality. Just days before his speech, the Trump administration approved $4 billion in new weapons for Israel under emergency authorities, bypassing even the most perfunctory congressional review. The very next day, Netanyahu imposed yet another siege on Gaza, cutting off food and aid deliveries, violating the fragile ceasefire that had barely held since January. The message from Washington to Tel Aviv was clear: continue the slaughter with our full backing.

ahmedeldin

A post shared by @ahmedeldin

Trump’s selective bravado on foreign aid exposes the hypocrisy of U.S. policy. His administration had no problem abruptly suspending all military support to Ukraine, using it as leverage to push Zelenskyy into a deal with Russia. But when it comes to Israel, there is no such leverage. Both Trump and Biden have refused to use America’s vast influence—its billions of dollars in arms sales, its veto power at the UN—to stop the ongoing genocide in Gaza. Trump’s approach is not a break from Biden’s; it is a doubling down on the same blind and unwavering support for Israel’s far-right leadership, now delivered with a more strategic quiet.

The contrast with Ukraine is particularly revealing. While American politicians loudly condemned Russia’s invasion and imposed sweeping sanctions, the same moral clarity vanishes when Israel commits war crimes against Palestinians. The Biden administration framed the war in Ukraine as a fight for democracy and human rights, rallying public support around the plight of civilians under siege. But in Gaza, where an entire population is being starved and bombed with U.S. weapons, those same leaders suddenly speak in evasions and empty platitudes about “Israel’s right to defend itself.” The glaring double standard has not gone unnoticed—especially by young Americans, who have grown up watching these contradictions play out in real-time.

Polling suggests the American public has noticed. The new Gallup data shows that, for the first time in U.S. history, Democratic voters and independents have turned against Israel. In March 2023, even before Israel’s full-scale assault on Gaza, Gallup found that Democrats sympathized more with Palestinians than Israelis.

March 2023 Gallup Poll

Now, as images of entire neighborhoods reduced to rubble flood social media, that gap has only widened. Democratic support for Israel has collapsed from 56% to just 33%, and even among independents, it has plummeted from 67% to 48%—marking the first time that any party group has dipped below majority support for Israel.

The role of young Americans in this shift cannot be overstated. From campus protests to social media activism, Gen Z has played a decisive role in reshaping the discourse. A December Harvard/Harris poll found that among 18-24-year-olds, 67% believe Jews “as a class” are oppressors, and 60% said the October 7 attack was justified by Palestinian grievances. Meanwhile, a POLITICO-Morning Consult poll in April found that only 15% of Gen Zers are more sympathetic toward Israelis, compared to 40% of Baby Boomers. Unlike previous generations, which were fed a steady diet of pro-Israel narratives in mainstream media, young Americans have direct access to Palestinian voices, videos from the ground, and historical accounts that challenge decades of propaganda.