Israel Palestine Conflict: Two State Solution Opposition Growing In US, New Poll Indicates

A higher percentage of Americans now oppose an independent Palestinian state than at any point this millennium, a Gallup poll released Monday has indicated. Americans are almost split on support for an independent Palestinian state on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, with 45 percent of respondents in support and 42 percent against.

The number of those opposed was the highest it has been since Gallup began polling in 1999, when the percentage of Americans against an intendent Palestine state was just 26 percent. In large part, that shift has been as a result of Republicans increasingly siding with Israel in the Middle East conflict.

Only 25 percent of Republicans were in favor of an independent Palestinian state compared to 61 percent of Democrats. Republican support peaked at 60 percent in 2003, when then President George W. Bush supported the Road Map for Peace and a two-state solution.

However, Republicans in the U.S. have increasingly aligned themselves with the right-wing Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who addressed the Republican-controlled Congress in 2015, and has also vowed that there will not be an independent Palestinian state while he is in office.

When the administration of President Barack Obama abstained from a United Nations vote to end Israel settlement construction last December, then-President-elect Donald Trump tweeted vowing that he would again make the U.S. a “great friend” to Israel.

Yet Trump has adopted a somewhat more balanced tone in response to Israel’s acceleration of settlement construction since he entered the White House.

“They [settlements] don't help the process,” Trump who has also taken a step back on his promise to move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, told Israel newspaper Israel Hayom Friday.

“I want Israel to be reasonable with respect to peace. I want to see peace happen. It should happen. Maybe there is even a chance for a bigger peace than just Israel and the Palestinians. I would like to see a level of reasonableness of both parties, and I think we have a good chance of doing that."

The new poll showed there was little balance in the minds of Republican voters, however. Eighty-two percent of Republicans say their sympathies lie with Israel in the decades-long dispute, compared to 47 percent of Democrats. Overall, 62 percent of Americans say they sympathize more with Israelis, with just 19 percent siding with Palestinians.