Growing cracks in American political support for Israel are setting off alarm bells in Jerusalem, with Israeli officials and experts increasingly concerned that the decades-old bipartisan consensus surrounding the Jewish state may be undergoing a fundamental — and potentially irreversible — shift.
Those concerns intensified following Abdul El-Sayed’s victory in Michigan’s Democratic Senate primary, which critics view as another indication of Israel’s deteriorating standing within segments of the Democratic Party. At the same time, signs of growing skepticism toward Israel have also emerged among some Republican voters, particularly younger Americans.
Critics of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu argue that his government’s close alignment with President Donald Trump and the Republican Party has come at the expense of maintaining Israel’s traditional relationships across the American political spectrum.
A Washington Post-Ipsos poll cited in the report found that a majority of Americans, including nearly three-quarters of Democrats, support reducing or ending U.S. military assistance to Israel.
Professor Yael Sternhell of Tel Aviv University described the political shift in stark terms, saying, “Hostility and anger toward Israel are today one of the few issues that unite the right and left in American politics.”
According to The Washington Post, dissatisfaction with Israel has surfaced in several major Democratic primary contests, while divisions over Israel are simultaneously becoming more visible among Republican voters.
Analysts say the war in Gaza, together with the perception among some Americans that Israel pushed the Trump administration toward war with Iran, has further accelerated the erosion of support.
Former Israeli Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren warned that Israel now finds itself in an unprecedented political position.
“This is the first time in the history of our relationship with the United States that we don’t have an alternative channel,” Oren said, referring to Israel’s diminished ability to turn to the opposing American political party when relations with one side of the aisle become strained.
The issue is taking on additional urgency as Netanyahu heads toward Israel’s elections in October. Opposition figures and some political analysts have suggested that a change in government could provide an opportunity to reset Israel’s relationship with Washington and rebuild ties with Democrats.
But Oren and other experts warn that the problem may extend far beyond Netanyahu or any particular Israeli government.
They argue that Israel must begin diversifying its foreign-policy relationships and reconsidering its overwhelming dependence on Washington, particularly as younger generations of Americans in both parties increasingly question longstanding U.S. support for Israel.
The concern in Jerusalem is that what was once viewed as a temporary political divide may instead represent a generational transformation — one that could fundamentally reshape the U.S.-Israel relationship for decades to come.
(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)
4 Responses
אין לנו להשען אלא על אבינו שבשמים – אל תבטחו בנדיבים, בבן אדם שאין ךו תשועה
The Democratic party in the US (& in Israel too for that matter) is abandoning good and embracing evil – it’s as simple as that
Since Israel represents good in the world (even if h’v it’s not playing its role as well as it should be!) embracing evil = hating Israel
The Israelis probably overestimated the bi-partisan “consensus”. Prior to 1973, the United States was neutral. Note that in 1967 the United States refused to honor promises to Israel made in return for Israel’s withdrawal from Sinai (and when the Egyptian reoccupied Sinai and declared a blockade of Eliat, the US did nothing, which led to war).
From 1973 to the 1990s, US support for Israel was related to the Cold War (which the US won), and to the War of Terror (which the US lost).
The left wing Democrats never supported Israel, going back to 1948. Most establishment Republicans didn’t either. The main supporters of Israel were the centrist Democrats (many of whom were Jews), and the Christian social conservatives (partially motivated by the belief that supporting Israel would lead to mass conversion of Jews).
The Israelis could have used the time to prepare their state, but instead the zionists focused on fighting the hareidim, and focused on establishing the far left homeland they always dreamed of. Whether Israel will survive is now in serious doubt since its enemies are getting stronger, and the US is losing the ability to do anything helpful even if it wants to.
Akuperma’s comment that “the zionists focused on fighting the Haredim” is such libelous nonsense.
The State of Israel funnels literally *billions* of shekels into Haredi institutions every year. At no time, and in no place, in Jewish history, have Jews ever received anywhere close to as much support for our religious institutions as modern-day Haredim get from the State of Israel.
Two things have changed. First, military exemptions were limited only to a select class of scholars from 1948 (via the famous meeting between Ben Gurion and the Chazon Ish) until 1977, when it was expanded to the entire sector. *Plenty* of Haredim served in the War of Independence and beyond, when Haredi detachment from the rest of the Jewish People was far less pronounced than it is today.
Second, the proportion of the population that is Haredi has exploded, and continues to grow every year. Where Haredim once made up a negligible portion of the population, today they are nearly 15%, and have an even higher percentage of the population among children, signifying that their percentage of the population will continue to grow. Haredi refusal to participate in national defense, and to the economy (Haredim take in more in government resources than they pay out, unlike other Israeli Jews) will, chas ve’Shalom, lead to both the economic and security collapse of the State.
And to those Haredim/Hasidim who are indifferent, or even gleeful, about the prospect of collapse of the State (“three shvuos! sonei Torah!”), you are delusional if you think your lifestyle will be sustainable without the State of Israel. Do you think a Palestinian or binational state will allot billions every year for Haredi education? Or even permit yeshivos, kollelim, or shuls at all? In the Palestinian Authority today, Jews are prohibited from owning land as a matter of law. How do you think they would treat the Jews were they to G-d forbid have power over Israel?
Stop being delusional. The existence of the State of Israel has enabled and continues enable the Haredi lifestyle to flourish in a manner that is unprecedented in the history of the world, and which would not be possible without it. All that government money that is paid to the Haredi sector every year allows people to live, to learn, and allows harbatzos Torah to a degree that has never been experienced in the history of the planet. You may well object to a State in pre-Messianic times on theological grounds (we always pasken from aggadatas, after all), but to deem the State as an institution that *fights* Haredim, rather than provides the means to allow their lifestyle to flourish, reflects profound ignorance of reality.