To think that this really can't be true about young people's thoughts about Israel?

[Another2Cats]

So, I just read an article where they say they have done a poll of young people and, of those under 25, 54% said that they agree with the statement "the state of Israel should not exist". Just 21% disagreed.

Did the polling company manage to just randomly pick a bunch of people that feel this way, or is this genuinely how many young people feel?

IABU to think that this can't really be true? (I am quite prepared to accept that IABU and that this really is what a majority of young people believe)

The link is here:

https://unherd.com/newsroom/majority-of-young-britons-think-israel-should-not-exist/

and this is the text of the article:

A majority of Britain’s young people do not believe Israel should exist, a new UnHerd poll has revealed.

A preliminary finding of an exclusive survey of 1,012 voters about foreign policy, conducted by Focaldata and due to be released tomorrow on UnHerd, found that a striking 54% of 18-24-year-olds agreed with the statement that “the state of Israel should not exist.” Just 21% disagreed.

This finding dovetails with other UnHerd polling on the same issue. In a separate question, young respondents were asked who was more to blame for the war in Gaza. Half blamed the Israeli government, while a quarter answered Hamas. Only 19% responded “all equally”.

The war’s high degree of exposure online and on social media appears to have fuelled interest among Britain’s young. An AI-generated “all eyes on Rafah” graphic was shared more than 44 million times on Instagram recently, with pro-Palestine content also proliferating on TikTok. Critics have argued that the Chinese social media platform has deliberately promoted anti-Israel content, which TikTok has denied, citing the existing attitudes of its young user base.

These attitudes are reflected in further UnHerd polling, which asked young Britons about their level of interest in wars around the world. It found that Britons aged 18-24 are far more interested in the war in Gaza than they are in the Russia-Ukraine conflict or in US-China tensions. Among this group, 38% were very interested in Gaza and 28% were somewhat interested, compared with 19% and 44% who were very or somewhat interested in the war in Ukraine, respectively.

As the Israeli war enters its eighth month, public opinion has slowly shifted in Palestine’s favour. Historic polling shows that popular support for Israel was at its highest shortly after the 7 October attacks at 21%, but this figure has since fallen. Although young people were most sceptical of Israel before the attack, the overall level of support for the Jewish state over the same time frame has plummeted to 16%, according to YouGov figures.

As of this week, a new ceasefire proposal is on the table, and the US is pushing Israel to accept it. The deal would involve the exchange of prisoners for hostages and would pave the way for negotiations. A ceasefire has strong majority support in the UK.

They have but the part they haven't come to terms with is the obvious and clear racism that demands israel continues as a majority Jewish state with no right of return for Palestinians, no freedom of movement for those in occupied territories, asymmetric war fare against an indigenous population and the continued expansion and ethnic cleansing. You've clearly made your peace with that as have the US and UK govts. The kids haven't.

Google is your friend
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zionism

Understanding whar zionism is, is pretty key to understanding the creation of the state of Israel and the settler movement.

Zionists as with most movements are not necessarily all on the same page with regards to how or where but if you're zionist you agree with a homeland for Jewish people in Palestine.
Therefore if you agree that Israel should have been created you agree with zionists/are zionist.

Anti-zionists disagree with the creation of a Jewish state or homeland for various reasons.

I think it is true, quite a few of my colleagues at work are in their early 20's and I would say 90% of them agree that what Israel are doing is wrong. They also will not vote Conservative and are contemplating about voting labour due to Starmers response in October to the atrocity being committed by Israel.
My own children and their friends who are all in their 20's all feel the same, that Israel is completely in the wrong. I tend to agree with them.
I really think the tide is turning and the younger generation are not falling for the false narrative that is being spewed out by the mainstream media which by the way none of them watch, listen or read.

" I take it you didn't read their charter then."

I take it you didn't know that Bibi and his chums funded Hamas as an opposition to Fatah in order to destabilise the movement for a Palestinian state then?

Still though, no Hamas is not recognised as a government. Israel's government is internationally recognised.

If my child was murdered on the 7th October atrocities I wouldn't want ten thousand innocent children murdered in revenge for her death.

They have but the part they haven't come to terms with is the obvious and clear racism that demands israel continues as a majority Jewish state

I used to think that too, but after October 7 I do believe being a majority is necessary for their safety and survival. It's not racism.

Israel as a country is necessary because the first half of the 20th century showed Jewish people they are not safe in any place where they don't have a majority. It's not "just" that Germany perpetrated the Holocaust, so many other nations were collaborators and enablers. Even on the "good guys" side, the US and the UK only intervened when their own personal interests were threatened, a big chunk of their public and political opinion was pro-Nazi. And let's not forget the Jewish refugee ships that were refused landing and sunk. The guilt of Europe and the West in this issue is immense, and it's not like they can say "well, we'll definitely make it safe for you from now on", everyone knows this isn't trustworthy. I'm not sure to what degree young people (or people in general) understand this, because the Holocaust nowadays is often presented as "Germans did bad thing, UK and US were good and defeated them". Which is not entirely accurate.

However: while all countries and nation-states on Earth were founded through violent events (invasions, revolutions etc), Israel did so in recent living memory. A new country was defined and colonised in a place where other people were already living as a majority for centuries- those people were invaded, kicked out and their homes stolen, some are still alive to remember this. Their descendants are being treated as non-human and penned into occupation zones. This is not something you can tell them to just get over (the way some Israel supporters do), especially not while it's still going on. So yes, the way the state of Israel was formed is something that shouldn't have happened and it's the reason why Israel has to be on a continuous war footing, young people (or any people) who say this aren't wrong. I don't know what is the solution. The creation of Israel can't be undone, and Jewish people do need a safe haven. However, two wrongs don't make a right. Palestinians are right that it is their home and that Israelis are invaders there.

You created conditions where people had to fight back because you took their homes, massacred their families and erased their villages. You then complain that because they fought back you need to sustain the racism. You wouldn't parent kids like this. Why does Israel get dispensation to continue a racist legacy and enact further and further injustice?

If you and they think it’s only the ‘mainstream media’ spewing out a false narrative you’re incredibly naive.

With the mainstream media, at least we know what the narrative is, what could be false about it and who’s spinning it. If your sole means of informing yourself is via social media, and you’re swallowing the lines peddled there whole, you don’t have a clue what’s right or wrong or even who’s pushing certain viewpoints.

On the likes of TikTok, amongst the user-generated content (much of which is uninformed bilge anyway, let’s face it), you’re also going to be consuming content from bad-faith players, such as agents of foreign powers like Russia and China, who have a vested interest in influencing social opinion in the west in ways that benefit them, not us.

I hope you’re teaching your kids how to critically assess the info and opinions they hear. That includes grading sources for reliability and accuracy. Much as you would hopefully view a textbook as more reliable than Wiki.

You created conditions where people had to fight back because you took their homes, massacred their families and erased their villages. You then complain that because they fought back you need to sustain the racism. You wouldn't parent kids like this. Why does Israel get dispensation to continue a racist legacy and enact further and further injustice?

Are you actually referring to a mass terrorist attack on civilians including torture, the murder of children, and mass sexual violence, as a fight back? Seriously?

I'm not even going to go into how much you've twisted and oversimplified the actual recent history of the region.

I saw this claim one on MN before, by a poster whose username I haven't seen in a while...

I wonder if it's just a mix up or some kind of bizarre new conspiracy theory.

Well why did you suggest as a response to the comment that the horrors of October 7 don’t justify the killing of 1000s of children “so Israel should be wiped off the map?”

It’s not being silly to wish a country would stop brutally killing children.

Neither do Israelis. They want the hostages back and Hamas hide amongst the population.

What do you suggest Israel should do? What would you want if your teenager was stabbed to death whilst having fun at a concert?

I don't celebrate the deaths, there should never be any killings and I wish the whole thing didn't happen. But equally, Hamas tortured, killed and kidnapped hundreds of young Israeli's, there needs to be retribution against those involved. A deterrent for future attrocities and an incentive for Hamas to return those innocent people.

In 1857 Indian soldiers attacked British people killing 6000 and raping women. In the US indigenous people slit the throats of many 1000s of European settlers and kidnapped children and raped women. The British and Europeans fought back so massively that assymetric war fare on an indigenous population has come to be recognised as a sign of colonial conquest. This is what's happening right now. You can talk about the savagery of the attacks- you won't be alone in doing this. Every leading newspaper in the UK condemned the savagery and amorality of attacks on settlers in America, India, Australia etc. The outrage much like your outrage led to the biggest massacres of human beings on the planet- in Delhi, India and America.

They want their hostages back. The hostages who have been gone from their families for over half a year now.

The hostages that no one thinks of.

There's lots of (deserved) sympathy for civilian Palestinians, especially children, but no sympathy left for the young people taken from the festival in October, having seen their community slaughtered in front of their eyes and god knows what's happened to them since.

It's trendy to support the underdog. The "victim". Israel is under threat constantly. It's now been attacked and all the world is bothered about is whether or not it should defend itself.

Israel can't win. Much of the British public are absolute hypocrites.

What do you suggest Israel do?

-Not kill 1000s of children.

What would you want if your teenager was stabbed to death while enjoying a concert?

-Not for 1000s of children to be killed in her name, and other mothers also left bereft.

I do not agree there needs to be “retribution” if it means killing 1000s of children. So far it hasn’t incentivised the return of the hostages (because I don’t think Hamas care about the children either). My view is every other step that can be taken should be taken to get the hostages returned other than killing children.

Correct! Just look at Iran's recent "congratulations" to young Americans - they're better at propaganda than many realise. Iran is a State that has several terrorist groups around Israel's borders as their proxies.

This is fundamentally not a conflict between Gaza & Israel, Palestinians & Israelis, but all that plus Iran, Hezbollah and even the Houthis in Yemen.

This aspect is often entirely missing from most people's points of view.

Social media is also regarded as one of the threats to Western democracy due to the PsyOps efforts of rogue States such as China, Russia and Iran. It is significant.

Because thread is discussing why a majority of young people think Israel doesn’t have the right to exist.

It’s not (yet another) thread to discuss how awful what Israel is doing.

So if you’re talking about how awful what Israel is doing, it’s not unreasonable to be asked about it in the context of the thread.

Who's keeping quiet? Have you been in London on a Saturday?

The only people who are being forced to be quiet are Jews who are worried for their safety.

Yes, we all know that there's a huge history of conflict between both parties. But recent events escalated due to a mass murder of young innocent people, masterminded by Palestinian terrorists. Israel are being expected to coexist next to a community who wants them dead and gone. That's the reality. That why there won't be peace. There can't be whilst Israel remains at risk.

There is a difference between thinking that what Israel is doing is wrong, and thinking that Israel shouldn’t exist.

The second of those things very much puts you in agreement with Hamas, and other terrorist organisations.

Normally peace movements look for regime change, not wiping a country off the map.

Why is it different in this case?

People point to how Israel was created but lots of countries were created through violence and upheaval. People then point to how Israel is committing atrocities, but lots of countries commit terrible atrocities.

Why is Israel, the world’s only Jewish state, the country that doesn’t deserve to exist?

Forgot to attach this.

Luai Ahmed is from Yemen and his view of Israel changed for the better when he actually visited the country.

The other is a despotic leader who wants to destroy Israel via proxies and destabilise the West, especially the United States.

Most people just see a poor country being decimated by a much richer one. In retaliation for a terrorist attack. Innocent children dying and dying and dying.

You can get into the nitty gritty of the history all you like, but that's what people see right now.

Perhaps other countries shouldn’t exist because of the War on Terror response to 9/11?

Perhaps our own country shouldn’t exist?

Or is ‘this country doesn’t have a right to exist’ not a normal response?

Yes, it's a security problem from Israel's perspective given that they have multiple enemies along their borders at various points.

With Iran being at the centre pulling the strings of its proxies such as Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis.

This is essentially Israel having to fight and secure its borders plus citizens on SEVEN fronts.

That also means a set of very strong internal security measures is also needed such as restrictions on certain groups, Iron Dome, David's Sling, mandatory military service and so on.

The strength of the West is also important for the survival of Israel which explains why Iran has spent years using propaganda against Westerners, especially young people. In that light, social media is a Godsend for hostile States such as Iran, China and Russia.

I agree with you 💯 It’s quite scary how some are wholesale rejecting the info from established news sources and are ripe for being influenced by this sort of propaganda.

I wonder how many young people have the ability to think critically about the sources of their information and how to weight its credibility. When random kids on TikTok are being listened to and Professors of History and foreign affairs experts are not, there’s a problem.

Especially if Josh from Idaho or Mariam from Qatar on TikTok aren’t who they seem, and they’re fronts for Sergei in Moscow or the equivalent in Beijing….