Global support for Israel plummets amid Gaza war, new data reveals

Washington DC (Quds News Network) – New data provided obtained by the US-based TIME magazine indicates a significant decline in global support for Israel following the ongoing war on Gaza.

The net favorability, calculated by subtracting the percentage of negative views from positive views, plummeted by an average of 18.5 percentage points worldwide between September and December, with 42 out of 43 countries experiencing a decrease, said the magazine, quoting data obtained from the Morning Consult, a business intelligence company.

China, South Africa, Brazil, and several Latin American nations transitioned from positive to negative perceptions of Israel. Even wealthy countries with existing negative views, such as Japan, South Korea, and the U.K., witnessed steep declines. Japan’s net favorability dropped from -39.9 to -62.0, South Korea from -5.5 to -47.8, and the U.K. from -17.1 to -29.8.

Morning Consult’s Deputy Head of Political Intelligence, Sonnet Frisbie, remarks on the challenging international landscape for Israel, emphasizing the data’s reflection of global sentiments. “The data shows just how tough of a road Israel has right now in the international community.”

Despite this global trend, the United States stands as the sole affluent nation with sustained net positive views of Israel. The drop in net favorability was relatively modest, decreasing only by 2.2 percentage points from September to December.

However, the data also highlights a cost to Washington’s support for Israel, especially in Arab nations. In Egypt, the U.S. witnessed a shift from a positive favorability of 41.1 to a negative favorability of -14.9 during the same period. A similar trend occurred in Saudi Arabia, where the U.S. saw a decline from a positive favorability of 12.2 to -10.5.

Sonnet Frisbie anticipates challenges for Saudi Arabia in continuing cooperation with Israel and pursuing a planned normalization deal facilitated by the U.S., emphasizing the impact of shifting public opinion on diplomatic initiatives in the region.

“A lot of cooperation between Gulf leaders and Israel has been done with Gulf leaders carefully messaging to their domestic populations and tiptoeing around public opinion. I think this gives this a lot less space to do that,” Frisbie says.