Polls Show U.S. Opinion of Israel Souring; Critics and Defenders Dispute What It Means

American opinion of Israel has turned more negative in 2026 surveys, and the shift is now part of campaigns, congressional votes and fights inside both parties. Pew Research Center found in March that 60% of U.S. adults had an unfavorable view of Israel, up from 42% in 2022. An AP-NORC poll in June found that 40% of Americans say the United States is too supportive of Israel, with Democrats and Republicans moving in different directions. Separately, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) reports that physical assaults on Jewish people reached a record level in 2025, even as its overall incident count fell.

The two trends are often discussed together. The data, however, measure different things: opinion of a country and its government on one side, and reported incidents targeting Jewish people on the other. This report sets out what the major surveys and the ADL audit found, what named participants in the debate say the numbers mean, and where the arguments go beyond the evidence. The Michigan Senate race, covered in our reports on Rep. Haley Stevens' endorsement of Mike Rogers$$ and on the reactions to it, is one place where this dispute is playing out this week.

What the polls show

Pew's survey of 3,507 U.S. adults was conducted March 23 to 29, 2026, about a month into the U.S.- and Israeli-led war in Iran, according to Pew. The center published its findings on April 7. It reports that 60% of adults have a very or somewhat unfavorable view of Israel, up from 53% in 2025, and that 28% have a very unfavorable view, up from 10% in 2022. Pew's methodology document, which 567 Politics did not open, gives the margin of error.

Source: Pew Research Center, April 7, 2026.

The change is uneven. Pew found that 80% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents have an unfavorable view of Israel, up from 69% in 2025 and 53% in 2022. A majority of Republicans and Republican leaners, 58%, view Israel favorably, against 41% unfavorably. But 57% of Republicans ages 18 to 49 hold an unfavorable view, up from 50% a year earlier. Among Republicans, 58% of those 50 and older say they have confidence in Israel's prime minister, compared with 30% of those under 50. Among religious groups, Pew found that 64% of Jewish Americans and 65% of White evangelical Protestants view Israel favorably, while 4% of Muslim Americans do.

A second, larger Pew survey, of 12,574 adults conducted May 4 to 17, 2026, with a margin of error of plus or minus 1.3 points, separated views of people from views of governments. Americans were less negative about the Israeli people than about the Israeli government, and views of Palestinians held steady.

Source: Pew Research Center, July 9, 2026.

In the same 2026 survey, Pew reports that 84% of Americans view Hamas unfavorably (10% favorably) and 69% view the Palestinian Authority unfavorably (23% favorably). Among adults under 30, 32% view the Israeli people favorably and 58% view the Palestinian people favorably. Among Republicans under 30, Pew found the two viewed about equally: 42% favorable toward the Israeli people and 40% toward the Palestinian people.

The AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research surveyed 3,040 adults June 11 to 17, 2026, with a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2.8 points. It found that 40% of Americans say the U.S. is too supportive of Israel, up from 37% in January 2024. The partisan picture moved more: 58% of Democrats now say the U.S. is too supportive, up from 45% in January 2024, while 60% of Republicans say support is about right, up from 33%. About 31% of all adults said Israel's military actions in Gaza are genocide and 20% said they are not; 49% said they did not know enough to say. Among Democrats, 52% said genocide, compared with 13% of Republicans. Half of adults said Hamas' October 7, 2023, attack was not justified, and 7% called it justified. Among Jewish adults, a sample of 1,022 with a margin of error of plus or minus 5.0 points, 38% said U.S. support is too much, 32% said not enough and 28% said about right.

What the ADL counted

The ADL's 2025 Audit of Antisemitic Incidents, released May 6, 2026, is a different kind of measurement. It tallies criminal and non-criminal assault, harassment and vandalism "as reported to ADL by victims, law enforcement, the media and partner organizations and evaluated by ADL's experts." The audit counted 6,274 incidents in 2025, a 33% decrease from 2024 but the third-highest total since the ADL began tracking in 1979. Assaults rose 4% to 203, and assaults involving a deadly weapon rose from 23 to 32. Three people were murdered in antisemitic attacks: two in the May 21, 2025, shooting outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington and one who died after the June 1, 2025, firebombing at a "Run for Their Lives" event in Boulder, Colorado. Incidents on college campuses fell 66%, from 1,694 to 583, which the ADL attributes "in part" to colleges addressing antisemitism.

Of the 2025 incidents, 45% (2,847) were related to Israel or Zionism, down from 58% in 2024. The ADL says anti-Israel rallies with "extreme anti-Israel rhetoric that crossed the line into antisemitism" fell 67% overall and 83% on campuses. The group states that it is "careful to not conflate general criticism of Israel or anti-Israel activism with antisemitism," and that "slightly fewer than half of anti-Israel rallies assessed by ADL contained antisemitic content that qualified to be counted." Its approach, it says, "comports with the IHRA definition of antisemitism," the working definition of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance.

Jonathan Greenblatt, the ADL's CEO, said in the release that the audit "shows it was one of the most violent years for American Jews on record" and that "numbers that would have shocked us five years ago are now our floor." Oren Segal, the ADL's senior vice president for counter-extremism and intelligence, said that "even as overall incidents declined, the surge in physical assaults is a stark reminder that a historically high level of antisemitism puts Jewish lives at risk."

Two limits apply. The audit counts reported incidents, so changes in reporting can move the totals, and the ADL itself says a full understanding "requires other forms of analysis as well, including public opinion polling." The Pew and AP-NORC results, for their part, measure views of Israel, its government and its people, and do not measure antisemitism. Neither dataset on its own tests whether one drives the other.

Where the debate is on the right

The sharpest disputes on the American right have involved commentators and activists as much as polls. After Tucker Carlson interviewed Nick Fuentes on his podcast in late October 2025, the Guardian reported, Carlson criticized Republicans including Sen. Ted Cruz, a former president and the U.S. ambassador to Israel as "Christian Zionists" who have been "seized by this brain virus." Fuentes, whom the Guardian describes as a white supremacist, said in a video afterward: "We are done with the slavish surrender to Israel, the wars, the foreign aid, the policing of antisemitism." The same remarks, as the Guardian quotes them, included statements about Jewish people and the Holocaust that 567 Politics does not repeat here.$

Cruz is a Republican senator from Texas, and his record is on his 567 Politics profile. He told the Republican Jewish Coalition: "If you sit there with someone who says Adolf Hitler was very, very cool and their mission is to combat and defeat 'global Jewry,' and you say nothing, then you are a coward, and you are complicit in that evil." He said he had seen more antisemitism on the right in the last six months than in his entire life.

Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation, defended Carlson in a video, saying Christians can critique Israel without being antisemitic and that conservatives did not need to "reflexively support any foreign government." Roberts said: "I disagree with, even abhor, things that Nick Fuentes says, but canceling him is not the answer either." The Republican Jewish Coalition's CEO, Matt Brooks, told Jewish Insider that Roberts' stance left him "appalled, offended and disgusted." Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer called for people aligned with Heritage to "disavow this dangerous mainstreaming of these hateful ideologies." Jim Geraghty of National Review asked whether Fuentes was "somebody that serious thinkers of the modern right should spend a lot of time engaging with." Our report on Carlson's recent claim about a U.S. nuclear strike on Iran describes how his Iran positions have continued to draw responses.$

Pew's finding that a majority of Republicans under 50 now view Israel unfavorably shows that skepticism of Israel is not confined to the left. Pew did not ask whether those views are connected to Carlson, Fuentes or any other commentator, and 567 Politics found no survey that does.

Where the debate is on the left

In the Democratic Party, the dispute is over how far to distance the party from Israeli government policy and from the lobbying groups that support it. The Guardian reported in July that "nearly half of the House Democratic caucus" voted to cut off aid to Israel in an amendment brought by Rep. Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican whose record is on his 567 Politics profile. J Street, which describes itself as "pro-Israel, pro-peace, pro-democracy," had opposed the amendment and called it an "overly broad and poorly drafted political stunt," while also saying the vote was "sending a strong message … that it is time for a fundamentally different American approach to the US-Israel relationship and the region," the Guardian reports. Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), which supports the cuts, wrote that the vote was "shaping up to be a major battle within the Democratic party" with House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries "opposing the cuts to military funding." Jeffries' record is on his 567 Politics profile; 567 Politics did not find his own statement on the amendment in the sources it opened.$$

"You rarely see a shift in public opinion this rapid," the Democratic pollster Adam Carlson told the Guardian. "The closest thing I can think of is gay marriage, and that [took] almost a decade. This is happening over the course of two or three years." Jeremy Ben-Ami, J Street's president, said in August 2025, in a statement the Guardian describes, "I simply won't defend the indefensible." He told the Guardian that "J Street exists to change American policy" and that "there has to be a shift in Israeli politics for J Street's politics to be viable much longer."

In Michigan, the Guardian reported before the August primary that Rep. Haley Stevens, whose record is on her 567 Politics profile, had "denounced" Israel's prime minister but had also said that Israel "comes to me in my dreams," and that Abdul El-Sayed, now the Democratic Senate nominee, "has accused Israel of committing genocide." The Guardian wrote that El-Sayed was supported by JVP Action and that Stevens was "boosted by millions in outside advertising linked to Aipac." Stevens' House campaign committee shows $10,000, in two transactions, from AIPAC's political action committee in the platform's FEC snapshot for the 2026 cycle (retrieved Oct. 31, 2026); the snapshot excludes independent spending and individual donations. In the final week of the general-election campaign, Al Jazeera reports, Stevens called an independent group's advertisement antisemitic and demanded that El-Sayed condemn it. El-Sayed said his campaign did not produce the ad and disagreed with its message. His record is on his 567 Politics profile. In an August statement quoted by USA Today, El-Sayed said: "Antisemitism is a scourge, and we need to address it in all its forms." The streamer Hasan Piker, in a post on Nov. 1, wrote that "anti israel sentiment is not anti semitic." Our report on the reactions includes the full statements by Piker, Glenn Greenwald and Mehdi Hasan, and what Stevens said.

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How each side reads the numbers

Several groups interpret the same data differently.

JVP argued in a July 15 post titled "Israel is losing American Jews" that "the lie that has for decades upheld U.S. popular support for Israel is cracking under the weight of our movements." It wrote that "a growing contingent of U.S. Jews reject the conflation of support for Palestine with antisemitism." JVP also wrote that "half of all Americans believe Israel is committing genocide." The AP-NORC survey 567 Politics opened found 31% of all adults saying so, with 49% saying they did not know enough to say. JVP also cited a May poll it said showed "nearly three-quarters of Democratic supporters now oppose military funding to Israel"; 567 Politics did not locate that survey.

JVP's post also criticized the ADL, saying "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." That is JVP's characterization of the ADL's message. 567 Politics did not find that phrase in the ADL audit release it opened. JVP cited the AP-NORC finding that 44% of American Jews have a favorable opinion of New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani; that figure is JVP's reading of AP-NORC's data and 567 Politics did not verify it in AP-NORC's own release.

The ADL's position is that the volume of violence against Jews is a separate and serious problem. It says its audit excludes legitimate criticism of Israel, and Greenblatt's statement ties the audit to murders and assaults, not to opinion polls.

The disagreement over causes is not settled by the data. Defenders of Israel's government have argued, in the statements above, that hostile rhetoric about Israel can shade into hostility toward Jews. Critics of the Israeli government, including Piker, El-Sayed and JVP, say criticism of its conduct and of U.S. aid is not antisemitic. The surveys document that opinion has moved, but they did not ask respondents to explain why.

What the data cannot show

• Why opinion moved. Pew and AP-NORC report what people think, not the reasons. Pew notes that its March survey came a month into the Iran war.
• Whether views of the Israeli government translate into views of Jewish people. Pew's May survey separately asks about "the Israeli people" and "the Israeli government"; it does not ask about Jewish people as a group. Pew found 83% of Jewish Americans favorable toward the Israeli people, down from 89% in 2024, and 47% favorable toward the Israeli government, down from 54%.
• Whether incidents track opinion. The ADL's incident count fell in 2025 while Pew's measure of unfavorable views rose, but assaults rose in the same year. Two annual series do not establish a link in either direction.
• The size of the youth shift in each party. Pew's age breakdowns within party come from subsamples and carry larger margins of error than the full surveys.
• How voters weigh the issue. 567 Politics found no survey it opened that measures how much Israel policy changes votes.

Funding context

Campaign-finance snapshots from the 567 Politics system are limited. Hakeem Jeffries' House committee (C00503052, retrieved Oct. 30, 2026, 2026 cycle, Schedule A line F3-11C) shows $5,000 from JStreet PAC in one transaction, and the snapshot lists no committee with "AIPAC" or "Israel" in its name. Thomas Massie's committee (C00509729, retrieved Nov. 2, 2026) and Ted Cruz's committee (C00492785, retrieved Nov. 2, 2026) show no receipts from committees with those words in their names. Because the system's topic registry is partial, these are name searches of the snapshot, not a full review of each donor. The snapshots exclude individual and conduit donations and independent spending, and a pro-Israel PAC is not the Israeli government. Contributions do not show that any member's votes or statements were influenced. For the Michigan candidates, see the funding notes in our Michigan Senate report.

Differing perspectives

What should the shift in U.S. opinion of Israel and the record in antisemitic assaults be taken to mean?

Each position is summarized as its supporters make it, with equal weight and in alphabetical order. A summary is not an endorsement; the evidence for each is weighed in the story above.

• Antisemitism on the right requires a clear response

  Who holds it: Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas); Republican Jewish Coalition CEO Matt Brooks

  Cruz told the Republican Jewish Coalition that anyone who sits with a person who praises Hitler and says nothing is complicit, and that he had seen more antisemitism on the right in six months than in his life. Brooks said he was appalled by Heritage's stance on Tucker Carlson. Heritage's Kevin Roberts replied that Christians can critique Israel without being antisemitic and that canceling Nick Fuentes is not the answer.

  In their words: The Guardian, Oct. 31, 2025 ↗

• Opinion has shifted because the conflation is cracking

  Who holds it: Jewish Voice for Peace

  JVP argues that the long-standing link between support for Israel and Jewish safety is weakening, and that a growing number of U.S. Jews reject conflating support for Palestinian rights with antisemitism. It cites AP-NORC data on Jewish respondents and says public opinion is shifting broadly. It also states that half of Americans see genocide in Gaza, a figure higher than the 31% AP-NORC reported.

  In their words: Jewish Voice for Peace, July 15, 2026 ↗

• Policy should change, with a middle path on aid

  Who holds it: J Street; president Jeremy Ben-Ami

  J Street, a self-described pro-Israel, pro-peace group, opposed the House amendment to cut aid as overly broad while saying the vote signaled that a fundamentally different U.S. approach is due. Ben-Ami says the group exists to change American policy, and that Israeli politics must shift for its approach to stay viable. Critics on the left quoted by the Guardian say the group has not kept pace with Democratic voters.

  In their words: The Guardian, July 29, 2026 ↗

• Violence against Jews is a separate, serious threat

  Who holds it: Anti-Defamation League; CEO Jonathan Greenblatt; Oren Segal

  The ADL says its 2025 audit counted 203 assaults, a record, and three murders, and that this shows a historically high level of antisemitism. It states that it does not count general criticism of Israel or anti-Israel activism as antisemitism, and that fewer than half of the anti-Israel rallies it assessed contained qualifying antisemitic content. Greenblatt says numbers once shocking are now the group's baseline for measuring the threat.

  In their words: ADL press release, May 6, 2026 ↗