Israeli public support for war in Gaza wanes as fighting restarts

A poll released in March found that 73% of Israelis supported negotiating with Hamas over an end to the fighting

- Dov Lieber & Carrie Keller-Lynn

Israel returned to fighting in Gaza on Tuesday, but without clear public backing amid a wave of political turmoil that has caused trust in the government to plummet.

It is a very different environment than when Israel first launched its battle against Hamas 17 months ago, after the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks left around 1,200 dead and some 250 taken hostage, according to Israeli authorities.

Israelis at the time set aside bitter internal political disputes that had filled the streets with protesters and fell in behind the war effort.

Then, the public was united in wanting to see Hamas punished and neutralized. Now, with the group already battered, many Israelis, even some on the right, are more concerned with freeing the hostages still alive in Gaza and feel only a negotiated settlement to the war can bring them back.

The shift in opinion was prompted by the images of two dozen Israeli hostages released over the past two months, often in poor shape, with injuries or obvious malnutrition that shocked Israelis and heightened concerns about the fate of the remaining 59 hostages, as many as 24 of whom Israel thinks might still be alive.

In addition, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is reviving old disputes by taking another run at legislation that would give him more control over the country's judicial system, a move that sparked a year of mass demonstrations leading up to the war.

He also is seeking to preserve the fast-growing ultraorthodox population's exemption from military service. And, he has further purged the security establishment of those who favored a cease-fire and is maneuvering to fire Ronen Bar, the head of Israel's Shin Bet internal security service, arguing that he has lost his trust.

"The fault line runs on the question of the hostages," said Yossi Klein Halevi, a senior fellow of the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem. "It doesn't get any more loaded than this convergence of grievances."