- An April Pew Research poll found 60% of adults hold unfavorable views of Israel — a nearly 20-point spike since 2022.
- The share of Republicans under 50 with negative views of Israel grew by 22 points, from 35% in 2022 to 57% in 2026.
- Jeff Flake, Robert O'Brien and Daniel Shapiro said it was spurred by Middle East wars but has spread to antisemitism.
The U.S. war in Iran appeared to accelerate a yearslong decline in public support for Israel that overlapped with intense military action in the Middle East by both countries.
Some of the nation’s top foreign policy experts told the Deseret News it is unclear whether this bipartisan shift away from America’s longtime ally will have a lasting impact on U.S.-Israel relations.
But the increase in anti-Israel rhetoric, verging on, or sometimes veering directly into antisemitism on the fringes of the political spectrum, is hard to dismiss for American Jews and their advocates.
Anti-Israel sentiment has been especially pronounced among America’s youngest voters. But it should not be discounted as a social media phenomenon, former U.S. Ambassador to Turkey Jeff Flake said.
“I think it’s bigger than that. It’s not just young people, I think it’s across the board,” the former Republican senator from Arizona told the Deseret News. “I think people are expecting us to push back a little more.”
Underlying the criticism of the world’s only Jewish state is a debate over whether America’s close relationship with Israel, and the wars they have conducted together since Oct. 7, 2023, have put America first.
War in Iran
Adherents of a traditional “peace through strength” foreign policy, like former National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien, believe Israeli-centric criticisms of the Iran war are misplaced — and often malicious.
“They’re using this war in Iran to create a false narrative of what it’s about, that somehow we’re doing Israel’s bidding. We’re doing America’s bidding. This is an America First war,” O’Brien told the Deseret News.
Since President Donald Trump initiated “Operation Epic Fury” on Feb. 28, the U.S. government has reported that more than 13,000 targets have been struck, killing more than 3,000 Iranians, according to human rights groups.
On Tuesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced “the operation is over” as the White House had “achieved the objectives” it laid out, and will focus on negotiating a final deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and stop the war.
While Trump has given various versions of his end game in Iran, O’Brien said the goals stayed the same: end their nuclear program, eliminate their long-range missiles and erase their influence through proxy terror groups.
For decades, Iran has flouted diplomatic attempts to curb nuclear enrichment even as they have funded terrorist organizations destabilizing the Middle East, like Hamas and Hezbollah, and vowed to attack the U.S. and Israel.
Israel Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu reportedly asked Trump to get involved in Iran, but the decision ultimately served American interests and has been accompanied by healthy tension between the two countries, O’Brien said.
“I don’t think this goes in any way against what Trump ran on,” O’Brien said. “The fact that Israel benefits, great. ... They’re a good friend of America. They’re as close to the 51st state as any country in the world.”
But increasingly the Trump administration’s message appears to be falling on deaf ears.
A PBS News/NPR/Marist poll released on Wednesday found that 61% of Americans disapprove of how Trump is handling the war in Iran, including 22% of Republicans, up from 15% in March. This was reflected across numerous polls.
Support for the war is particularly low among young voters. An April Marquette Law School survey found that 80% of respondents under 30 said they did not believe there was a good reason to launch the war in the first place.
Some of this opposition may be based in economic anxiety — the latest Deseret News-Hinckley Institute poll found a majority of Americans are very concerned about the Iran War’s impacts on the U.S. economy.
O’Brien pins the blame on news outlets ignoring U.S. military successes and social media influencers exploiting antisemitic tropes that are boosted by algorithms, Islamic radicals and the political left.
Regardless of the cause, negative views of the war have coincided with rapidly falling support for Israel, Israelis and the U.S.-Israel relationship, according to consistent findings among national surveys.
Views toward Israel
In April, a Pew Research poll found 60% of adults hold an unfavorable view of Israel, a seven percentage point increase from the year before and a nearly 20-point spike since 2022 before the wars in Gaza and Iran.
The share with a very unfavorable view of Israel nearly tripled during that time from 10% to 28%. A majority of adults under 50 now rate Israel negatively, including 84% of Democrats and 57% of Republicans.
This builds on a dramatic flip among young Republicans: negative views among Republicans under 50 exploded from 35% in 2022, to 50% in 2025 before landing at 57% — a 22-point transformation in four years.
Anti-Israel passion on the ideological extremes “gained energy” after the Oct. 7 attack against Israelis, which ignited a war with heavy civilian casualties in Gaza, according to former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro.
Criticisms from the left focused on humanitarian concerns, while those from the right centered on globalism undermining American sovereignty, but both converged on Israeli influence in America, Shapiro said.
“The notion that the Jewish people are somehow uniquely disqualified from self-determination in a state of their own ... is where anti-Zionism and antisemitism coexist,” Shapiro told the Deseret News.
While Shapiro considers himself an opponent of the war, he said claims that Netanyahu pulled Trump into Iran against America’s best interests “ignores President Trump’s agency” and Israel’s right to advocate for itself.
Accompanying the downturn in support for aid to Israel and Trump’s handling of U.S.-Israel relations has been a surge in antisemitism unlike any in recent U.S. history.
Assaults against American Jews reached a 46-year high in 2025. A 2025 survey found nearly six in ten U.S. Jews said they experienced antisemitism over the past 12 months and that it is now a normal part of the Jewish experience.
Views on U.S.-Israel have taken on a shocking tone among Gen Z, those born between 1997-2012.
The April the Yale Youth Poll found 55% of voters 18-29 agreed with statements from white nationalist personality Nick Fuentes and progressive Michigan Rep. Rashida Tlaib calling Israel racist and controlling of the U.S.
Young voters who use social media for news were much more likely to believe American Jews are more loyal to Israel than America, that it’s appropriate to boycott Jewish businesses, and Jews in the U.S. have too much power.
These results come as commentators like Tucker Carlson have accommodated Fuentes’ views and Democratic candidates — and the New York Times — have welcomed anti-Israel Marxist influencer Hasan Piker.
The prevalence of voices like Fuentes and Piker, and the fact some politicians are mainstreaming their views, shows “we’re in a bad place,” according to Flake, who served as ambassador under President Joe Biden from 2022-2024.
On this Shapiro, who served under President Barack Obama from 2011 to 2017, and O’Brien, who served under Trump from 2019-2021, are in agreement.
“Responsible Democrats and Republicans need to engage in this debate and not cede ground,” O’Brien said. “Can you imagine a country where Fuentes and Piker have that kind of influence? That’s not America.”