The picture elsewhere is growing worse too. In a Pew survey last year, majorities in 20 of 24 countries held negative views of Israel; in Australia, Greece, Indonesia, Japan, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and Turkey the figure was close to or above three-quarters. This has clear policy implications. European Union foreign ministers this month approved sanctions on violent settlers and their backers; the E.U.-Israel Association Agreement was nearly suspended; several European states are pushing to ban imports of goods made in settlements in the occupied territories. Last year, the European Commission concluded there are breaches of Israel’s human-rights obligations under the E.U.-Israel Association Agreement.
The fraying support matters because Israel’s security and economy are tethered to the United States and Europe. The United States supplies advanced weapons and intelligence that underpin Israeli deterrence and gives the state diplomatic support in the United Nations and elsewhere. Europe provides markets, partnerships, investments and funding that is a lifeline for Israeli research and development and academia. Losing public support abroad narrows Israel’s strategic options and makes its long-term security harder to sustain.
Some of the isolation results from forces beyond Israel’s control. American voters tend to put a priority on domestic and economic matters, with Israel rarely figuring as a positive mobilizing issue. Other polls show declining support for Israel relative to the Palestinians. Young Americans put a priority on human rights and are less likely to be religiously affiliated, factors that make them less responsive to traditional pro-Israel appeals. Many younger Americans Jews, especially among Democrats, have decoupled their cultural or religious identity from automatic political defense of Israel and are weakening connections to the civic networks and institutions that once translated sympathy for Israel into durable political backing.
The Israeli government and its supporters prefer to file some of the declining support under antisemitism, and some of it is. The Anti-Defamation League recorded 6,274 antisemitic incidents in the United States last year, more than double what it counted in 2021, and five times as high as a decade ago. Around the world, antisemitic violence in 2025 killed the highest number of Jews in 30 years, according to a report from Tel Aviv University. The murders of two Israeli Embassy staff members outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, the fatal injuries sustained by an elderly woman in Boulder, Colo., who was marching for the release of Israeli hostages from Gaza and the firebombing of Gov. Josh Shapiro’s residence in Pennsylvania on Passover while his family was home, all last year, are among the grim indicators that hostility surrounding Israel can spill into violence against Jews.
But Israelis make a big mistake in treating every new critic as an antisemite. Much criticism stems from Israel’s behavior: in addition to images of devastation and hungry children in Gaza, as part of Israel’s brutal response to the Hamas massacre of Oct. 7, 2023, the world now often sees footage of settlers torching Palestinian homes in the West Bank and reads about Israeli soldiers looting living rooms in Lebanon. Although these incidents represent a small fraction of Israeli conduct, they are framed through a social justice lens and amplified by social media.
