More registered voters in the US now view Israel negatively rather than positively, according to a poll released on Monday by NBC News.
The poll found that 39 percent of US voters now view Israel negatively, while 32 percent view it positively. That is a sharp drop in positive attitudes towards Israel compared to 2023, when 47 percent had a positive view and just 24 percent a negative one.Â
Perhaps most notable of all, support for Israel has plunged among independents, a key voter bloc that helped deliver US President Donald Trump to the White House in 2024.
In 2023, 40 percent of independents had a favourable view of Israel, with just 22 percent viewing the country negatively. Fast forward to 2026, and negative views of Israel have more than doubled to 48 percent, while support has shrunk to 21 percent.
On 7 October 2023, Hamas led an attack on southern Israel that killed roughly 1,200 people. Israel responded with a ferocious assault on Gaza that has killed over 72,000 Palestinians. The United Nations, human rights experts, and many world leaders have concluded that Israel has committed acts of genocide in its offensive.
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The assault on Gaza occurred against the backdrop of a wider regional war that saw Israel attack Lebanon, Syria and even Qatar. It has since entered a devastating war on Iran alongside the US.
Rise in sympathy for Palestinians
The negative view of Israel coincides with a rise in sympathy for Palestinians.Â
The poll found that 40 percent of respondents sympathise with Palestinians, while 39 percent said they sympathise with Israel in the long-running Israeli-Palestinian conflict, NBC reported.
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The first time NBC polled US registered voters in November 2013, only 13 percent said they sided with the Palestinians.
The vast majority of registered Democrats now side with Palestinians: 67 percent compared to just 18 percent in 2013. Now, only 17 percent of registered Democrats side with Israel.
Among registered Republicans, support for Israel is still ironclad at 69 percent, barely moving from 67 percent in 2013. However, other polling suggests a wide divide between young and older registered Republicans.
Young Republicans, those under the age of 50, especially, are now more likely to have an unfavourable view of Israel, with 50 percent polling in that direction, according to a Pew Research poll published in April 2025.
The NBC poll confirms the trend of a wide-scale plunge in support for Israel among young voters in the US. Just 13 percent of young voters, who the NBC poll identifies as between the ages of 18 and 34, hold a favourable view of Israel, while 63 percent have a negative opinion. In 2023, 37 percent of young voters held an unfavourable view of Israel, 26 percent a positive view, and 37 percent were neutral.
Across all age groups, positive views of Israel have sunk compared to 2023. There was a particularly sharp drop in favourability among 50 to 64-year-old voters, with 58 percent holding a favourable view of Israel in 2023 and just 37 percent doing so in 2026. Negative views on Israel also doubled from 15 percent to 30 percent in this demographic.