Wide generational gap persists on views around Israel-Hamas war: poll

A wide generational gap is apparent in Americans’ views surrounding the war between Israel and Hamas, with the youngest demographic differing from the public at large, according to a new poll. 

The Harvard CAPS-Harris poll found that two-thirds of voters between the ages of 18 and 24 believe Jews as a class are oppressors and should be treated that way, while 73 percent of all voters said this notion is false. 

Mark Penn, the chairman of the Harvard CAPS-Harris poll, said that as additional research is conducted into the knowledge about Israel and Hamas possessed by 18-to-24-year-olds compared with the rest of the public, the more “unbelievable” the findings are. 

He said the finding that two-thirds of the youngest voters view Jewish people as oppressors after 6 million Jewish people were murdered in the Holocaust “stands out as representative of [Generation] Z’s attitude towards Jews and Israelis.” 

The poll also found a stark difference in views of the testimony that three university presidents gave before the House Education and Labor Committee earlier this month. The presidents of Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), along with the now-former president of the University of Pennsylvania (Penn), received widespread backlash over their testimony. 

The most memorable, viral moment came when Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) asked them if calling for genocide against Jewish people would violate their codes of conduct. Each president similarly responded that whether a violation occurred depended on the context and if the words became actions. 

The poll found 62 percent of all voters felt the university presidents did not go far enough in condemning antisemitism on campus in their testimonies, but 67 percent of voters ages 18 to 24 said they did go far enough. 

The youngest voters and voters at large generally agreed that Jewish students on campus are facing harassment, with 68 percent of those 18 to 24 and 76 percent of all respondents saying they are. The Anti-Defamation League reported in late October in the aftermath of Hamas’s attack on Israel that a “significant spike” in antisemitic incidents occurred across the United States. 

But the youngest age group differed from others in how calls for genocide on campus should be handled. About three-quarters of all voters said students who call for genocide of Jewish people should face consequences, but just less than half of those 18 to 24 said the same. 

The president of Penn resigned from her position in the aftermath of the backlash against her testimony, while the presidents of Harvard and MIT have remained. 

Free speech advocates said after their testimony that they were correct that context matters for determining what speech is protected by the First Amendment, but critics said these universities do not otherwise have histories of protecting free speech on campus. 

The Harvard CAPS-Harris Poll survey was conducted from Dec. 13 to 14 and surveyed 2,034 registered voters. It is a collaboration of the Center for American Political Studies at Harvard University and the Harris Poll. 

The survey is an online sample drawn from the Harris Panel and weighted to reflect known demographics. As a representative online sample, it does not report a probability confidence interval.