Americans largely support Israel -- but sympathy for Palestinians is on the rise
Marc Ramirez, USA TODAY
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Last weekend in Atlanta, as hundreds of pro-Palestinian demonstrators rallied downtown, one sign stood out in particular: “We can’t breathe since 1948,” it read – a nod to the social unrest of the last year that has followed the murder of George Floyd.
Experts say it’s a reflection of the way that American support for the Palestinian cause is growing, a trend that a recent Gallup poll showed was on the rise even before the most recent Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
“It’s not a huge surprise that a lot of non-white Americans can empathize and identify with Palestinians because of their own history of oppression and settler colonialism,” said Khaled Elgindy, senior fellow at the Middle East Institute in Washington, D.C. “The old image of Israel as David fighting the Arab Goliath, if it was ever true, is now completely obsolete. Israel is not the underdog anymore, and people realize that.”