Americans Sympathetic Toward Israel on Gaza in Poll

[Guest shebavon]

Reading this, I am truly stunned. More encouraged now than ever that Barack might just be able to negotiate a lasting peace accord. I think the heavens are lining up just right. In this case I believe the prevailing view is that Israel once again acted in self-defense, and civilians were held as human shields.

 

Following this self-inflicted tragedy forced on the Gazans by Hamas, perhaps some good may come out of this tragedy.

 

Israel, like Egypt, wants nothing to do with that loony bin.

 

But than again I might just be an incurable optimist. At least I'm happy.

 

The early reports were that Israel was losing the PR war.

 

From Bloomberg News:

 

Americans Sympathetic Toward Israel on Gaza in Poll (Update1)

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By Viola Gienger

 

Jan. 24 (Bloomberg) -- A majority of Americans sympathized more with the Israelis than the Palestinians during the recent war in the Gaza Strip, according to a CNN opinion poll that points to a divergence from European views of the conflict.

 

Sixty percent of Americans in the nationwide survey said they were sympathetic toward the Israelis, compared with 17 percent who supported the Palestinians, CNN reported today on its Web site. A recent European poll showed that 23 percent of French people said the Palestinian Hamas group was primarily responsible for the war while 18 percent mainly blamed Israel.

 

The results indicate Israel successfully communicated in the U.S. its view that it had to defend itself against rocket attacks from the militant Hamas organization that controls Gaza and is considered a terrorist group by the U.S. and European Union. More than 1,300 Palestinians and 13 Israelis died in the 22-day war.

 

The CNN poll showed that 63 percent of Americans felt Israel was justified in taking military action, compared with 30 percent who disagreed. The poll of 1,245 adults was conducted Jan. 12-15, before the Israeli military campaign ended in a cease-fire on Jan. 17. Conducted by Opinion Research Corp., it had a sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

 

The findings largely echo those of a poll conducted by the Washington-based Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, which reported that American sympathy with Israel was unchanged since its military campaign began with an aerial assault on Dec. 27.

 

Military Action

 

Sympathy for Israel exceeded that for the Palestinians by a margin of 49 percent to 11 percent, according to the Pew poll. The results narrowed when respondents were questioned on Israel

[Guest fountainhall]

The results indicate Israel successfully communicated in the U.S. its view that it had to defend itself against rocket attacks from the militant Hamas organization

 

Facts are facts. There is an enormous Israel/Jewish lobby in the US that has been active for decades. I suspect this poll has similar results to other polls about Irsael's actions over that time. If the Palestinians had a similarly active lobby, the results would certainlyu be different in my view.

[Bob]

As you know, what you get from a poll often is how you slant the questions.

 

When I've discussed the situation with my friends, there's fairly unanimous agreement that Hamas caused (gave cover to) the Israeli response by the daily rocket firing and that Israel had the right to respond. There also is fairly unanimous agreement amongst us that some of the civilian deaths were on Hamas' hands, they having purposefully fired rockets from civilian areas and hid in civilian areas.

 

That being said, we also flatly disagreed with the disproportionate response that the Israelis knew would cause substantial civilian policies. In a nutshell, what Israel did was stupid and against its own interests in the long term.

 

I think that most of us here (small-town America) do not like how the US has supported Israel and has largely ignored the plight of the civilians in Gaza and the West Bank - and we're hopeful that the Obama administration will steer a more civilized and neutral approach to help resolve things there.

 

And it'd be my guess that, if the opinion poll questions were neutrally and intelligently crafted, most Americans would take the same view. Asking a question such as "do you support Israel's right to defend itself from the daily rocket attacks across its borders" doesn't really answer anything much.

[Gaybutton]

Facts are facts. There is an enormous Israel/Jewish lobby in the US that has been active for decades.

Facts are facts if you have the facts - all the facts. I'm sorry, but I don't sympathize with people who dislike the idea that there exists an "enormous Israel/Jewish lobby." So what? What do you expect a large group of people with a common interest to do, sit around and keep silent? If people dislike the idea that a Jewish lobby is out there supporting Israel, then form another 'enormous' lobby that doesn't.

 

I see people complain all the time: an enormous Jewish lobby. The Jews own the newspapers. The Jews own the banks. The Jews own the TV stations. Some must think the entire population of Jewish people in the USA gets together somewhere and plans ways to acquire more and gain further influence. And if the Jews really do own all these things and really do have anywhere near as much influence as people keep saying they do, so what? What's the problem about that? If they had the money to buy and invest in these things, and also had brains enough to form a powerful lobby, what's the bad part? That they're Jewish?

 

I never see the same people who complain about the Jews doing much complaining about the influence the Catholic church has. I never see them make the same kinds of complaints about the televangelists. I never see them complain about people like Billy Graham having direct access to many presidents. I never see them complain about giant corporations or lobbies that are Christian owned. But let a Jew own something or have a powerful lobby, that's invariably viewed as something negative.

 

Good luck getting me to hop onto that bandwagon.

[Guest fountainhall]

But let a Jew own something or have a powerful lobby, that's invariably viewed as something negative.

 

That's not exactly what I said or implied. Yes, the Israel lobby is huge - and for obvious reasons. A lot of Jews in the US were displaced from pogroms in central europe or are related to Holocaust victims. Of course they will be vocal and active - and they back up their views with cold hard cash, which is admirable. What I do believe is that were there a Palestinian lobby with even a fraction of the Israel lobby's clout. PR back-up and general lobbying skills, the views of the US people might be slightly different. Not much, perhaps, but slightly.

 

I never see them complain about giant corporations or lobbies that are Christian owned

 

After Enron, Worldcom, Citigroup, the car companies etc. etc.. I suspect that is going to change!

[Guest shebavon]

That's not exactly what I said or implied. Yes, the Israel lobby is huge - and for obvious reasons. A lot of Jews in the US were displaced from pogroms in central europe or are related to Holocaust victims. Of course they will be vocal and active - and they back up their views with cold hard cash, which is admirable. What I do believe is that were there a Palestinian lobby with even a fraction of the Israel lobby's clout. PR back-up and general lobbying skills, the views of the US people might be slightly different. Not much, perhaps, but slightly.

After Enron, Worldcom, Citigroup, the car companies etc. etc.. I suspect that is going to change!

Good work GB on your last post on the topic.

 

It seems Fount is woefully unfamiliar with the Palestinian and Arab American lobbying groups and their spokesman. They are as visible on TV and as well funded as (gee, I'm not sure, Pro-Israeli seems appropriate here, but too many posters equate Jewish with Israeli). I'll go with the politically correct Pro-Israeli. These lobbying groups are not only funded by Palestinian and other Arab Americans, but are hugely funded by our Petrodollars.

 

And we have not yet begun to speak of the petrodollars that are being plowed into the Islamo-terrorist movement, funding the likes of Hezbollah, Hamas, Al Queda, et.al. That too is a form of lobbying, though deadly.

[Guest lvdkeyes]

After Enron, Worldcom, Citigroup, the car companies etc. etc.. I suspect that is going to change!

Call me cynical, but I thing that after the dust settles, it will be back to business as usual.

[Gaybutton]

Call me cynical, but I thing that after the dust settles, it will be back to business as usual.

Unfortunately, that's almost always the way it works.

[Guest fountainhall]

It seems Fount is woefully unfamiliar with the Palestinian and Arab American lobbying groups and their spokesman.

 

Unfamiliar, certainly, if you are talking about the US which is where most of the Pro Israeli (I'll start being politically correct, too) lobby seems to be. Whenever I have visited the US, which is for about 10 days each year for the last 30 years, I have been very aware of Pro Israeli positions in the media etc., but rarely of Arab/Palestinian positions. But then perhaps my visits coincided with a lull in their activity.