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Almost half of Americans back sanctions on Israel

December 5, 2016 at 1:03 pm

Almost half of Americans support economic sanctions as a US response to new Israeli settlements, according to a national poll conducted on behalf of the Brookings Institute.

The figure of 46 per cent is up from 37 per cent when the same question was asked a year ago.

The results of the poll, “American attitudes on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict”, were published on Friday as part of the Saban Forum, “an annual dialogue between American and Israeli leaders.”

Support for sanctions or other forms of serious action is at 60 per cent among Democrats, compared to 31 per cent of Republicans. However, both of those figures are up from 2015, when support for sanctions stood at 49 per cent among Democrats, and 26 per cent among Republicans.

On the issue of President Barack Obama supporting or sponsoring a United Nations resolution to end Israeli settlement construction in the occupied West Bank before leaving office, 40 per cent of Americans support this, 23 per cent neither oppose nor support, and 33 per cent oppose this resolution.

Again, there is a party-based division on this question, with 65 per cent of Democrats supporting such an anti-settlement resolution, while only 16 per cent of Republicans do.