American Public Opinion toward Israel

This is a first rate study of the evolution of American attitudes toward Israel since World War Two. Using quantitative survey data, the authors convincingly argue that Israel, which at one time had strong bipartisan support in the United States, has now become a partisan issue in US politics.

Robert O. Freedman, Johns Hopkins University

The idea that US Middle East policy has been hijacked by a small cabal of Jews is disturbingly resilient. Scrutinizing decades of US survey data, Cavari and Freedman put that fiction to rest, demonstrating the large partisan divide over Israel that actually drives US policy. Unfortunately, the growth of hyper-partisanship in the US has been matched by partisan gridlock in Israel. Any hope for Middle East peace, therefore, must grapple with the thorny issue of ideologically driven partisanship.

Peter Hays Gries, University of Manchester

Who would have thought, back in 1948, that Israel would come to occupy such a central place in American public opinion or that its most fervent American supporters would come to include Evangelical Christians as well as American Jews and to include proportionally more Republicans than Democrats? Amnon Cavari and Guy Freedman have conducted a sweeping, intelligent, and thoughtful review of American attitudes toward Israel from 1944 through 2019, looking at both changes over time and differences between segments of the American population. Their book will be of interest to, and a valuable resource for students of American public opinion and voting behavior, American foreign policy, and the relations, political and otherwise, between the U.S. and Israel

Robert C. Luskin, University of Texas at Austin

The first comprehensive book on American public opinion towards Israel since the end of the Cold War. Timely, and rigorous; a must read for anyone interested in the US-Israeli relationship.

Jonathan Rynhold, Bar Ilan University