Gallup: ‘Americans aren’t as pro-Israel as we’ve been saying’


Gallup hasn’t been telling the truth about American support for Israel vs. Palestine

Gallup explains that its polling, which consistently shows high American sympathy for Israel, is the result of “priming” questions that influence respondents to falsely express pro-Israel leanings. Gallup buried this explosive admission.

by Grant Smith, reposted from AntiWar

[Editor’s note: Grans Smith reported in December 2018 that Gallup, the US government’s go-to for polling, is known to have falsified survey results for years, including in its measurement of support for Israel. Gallup’s poll results have declared “high and growing American sympathy for Israel,” while similarly and identically worded polls conducted by Pew Research and through Google Surveys revealed significantly lower numbers. Nevertheless, news outlets surveyed reveal that Gallup’s poll results are the most used.

Grant continues:

“Gallup launches its annual results early each year under titillating headlines such as “Americans Remain Staunchly in Israel’s Corner” (2018 poll) and “Israel Maintains Positive Image in US” (2017 poll). Gallup’s polls are immediately splashed across newspapers such as the New York Times and the Jerusalem Post and have even been used by the Government Accountability Office as a proxy to assert that Americans support unconditional US foreign assistance to Israel, long the highest recipient of any foreign country.


“Gallup leveraged its self-proclaimed acumen as “the most trusted name in polling” to issue just enough tantalizing polling data to keep US Mint contracts flowing. Gallup seems to be pursuing the [a strategy of providing same strategy with its longer running unverifiable polling on US sympathy for Israelis over Palestinians.”]

Pollster Gallup admitted on March 28 that three decades of polling data contain fundamental flaws “well beyond what we would attribute to normal sampling error.”

Gallup’s admission centers on its high-stakes question of whether Americans have greater sympathy for Israelis or for Palestinians. Gallup loudly trumpeted that Americans “increasingly sympathized with Israel in recent years.” U.S. based Israel affinity organizations and the Congressional Research Service long used Gallup sympathy polls to claim that most Americans support giving most of the US foreign aid budget to Israel.





Source: Gallup

Unfortunately for Gallup, its quiet admission raises more questions than it answers. Why is the organization admitting flawed polling only in a back-page web article with an overly technical title, “Survey Context Effects on Middle East Sympathies” sure to be ignored by polling stakeholders and the mainstream media? Why didn’t Gallup qualify its March 6 poll report, “Americans, but Not Liberal Democrats, Mostly Pro-Israel” reporting February 1-10 World Affairs results with a footnote that it may have reflected “weakly held” views, and offering its February 12-28 results? Why is Gallup still touting telephone-based survey results when online and smartphone polling is consistently providing more accurate results? Lastly, why should Americans trust Gallup, given its history of false claims to bilk US taxpayers through government contracting work?



(also by Grant Smith) Poll: 75% of Americans Oppose Outlawing Boycotts of Israel (polling by IRMEP)

Israeli press review: New poll shows rampant racism in Israel (polling by Israeli TV station)

IRMEP Poll: Most Americans Aren’t Zionists But Democratic and Republican Party Platforms Are

How Israel Spies on US Citizens


The Forward: Did AIPAC Secretly Write Your Rabbi’s Sermon?