Good question.
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The unprecedented and sustained Israeli protests against the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposed judicial overhaul that threatened to substantially weaken the judiciary have captured news headlines worldwide. They have also coincided with a spike in violence in the occupied Palestinian territories. Although the protests have largely ignored Israel’s military rule over millions of Palestinians, they drew attention to threats to democracy even within Israel’s pre-1967 borders. It is hard to know if these protests have had any impact on the way Americans perceive Israel, and if they did, in what direction. While these protests may have drawn attention to the right-wing government’s autocratic ambitions, they may have also highlighted the existence of a free environment, at least for hundreds of thousands of Israeli citizens, to protest freely and reject the government’s plans. Do Americans see Israel as a vibrant democracy or as something far less?
To find out, we fielded a few questions in our University of Maryland Critical Issues Poll with Ipsos, which I direct with my colleague Stella Rouse. The poll was conducted March 27-April 5, 2023, among 1,203 respondents by Ipsos probabilistic KnowledgePanel (margin of error 3.2%).
We asked: “You may have been following recent developments in Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza. In your opinion which of the following is closer to describing the way Israel looks to you.” We provided the following four options: a vibrant democracy; a flawed democracy; a state with restricted minority rights; a state with segregation similar to apartheid. The results were surprising on many levels.
