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Israel is not the same country it was before October 7. It never will be again. The only question now is whether the world is ready to accept that.
By ZVIKA KLEIN FEBRUARY 4, 2025 17:42 Updated: FEBRUARY 4, 2025 17:43Israel has changed. The center has changed. The right and the left have changed.
Nearly a year and a half after October 7, Israelis are more conservative, more hawkish, and more pragmatic than they’ve ever been—for obvious reasons. The world might still be debating the morality of Israel’s war in Gaza, but Israelis no longer have that luxury. We don’t get to view this war as a theoretical exercise or a topic for a panel discussion in Brussels. For us in Israel, our current reality is about survival.
The enemy’s entire strategy and ideology are built on one goal: to wipe Israel off the map. It’s not just Hamas—we’re talking about an entire culture of incitement, where killing Jews is glorified, terrorism is rewarded with salaries, and “resistance” means launching rockets at Israeli cities while hiding behind civilians.
Most Palestinians in Gaza support Hamas. That is a huge problem. The world seems to want Israel to pretend otherwise, to believe in some magical moderate Palestinian leadership that doesn’t actually exist. Israelis, however, are done pretending.
So, yes, the center has shifted to the right. The right has moved even further right. And the left? It has largely disappeared.
One of the clearest signs of this shift is the widespread support for former US president Donald Trump’s proposal to relocate Gaza’s Arab population to other countries. A Jewish People Policy Institute (JPPI) survey, released ahead of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Tuesday meeting with Trump, found that seven out of ten Israelis support the idea of relocating Gaza’s Arab residents elsewhere. Among Jewish Israelis, 52% consider it a viable plan, while another 30% say it is desirable but not realistic. More than 80% of Jewish Israelis support the idea in some form. Among Arab Israelis, 54% call the plan “immoral.” Among Jewish Israelis, however, only 3% consider it immoral.
The remarkable transformation
This is a remarkable transformation. Just a few years ago, any talk of relocating Palestinians was considered fringe. Parties such as Moledet, headed by the late minister Rehavam Ze'evi, were supposed to be ‘far-right,’ but in today’s reality, would he be considered such? Now, it is mainstream policy discussion, and not because Israelis have become extremists, but because they have woken up.
If October 7 proved anything, it’s that Israel cannot afford to live next to another terror state. According to a January 29, 2025, survey by Direct Polls for the right-wing pro-Settelment organization the Sovereignty Movement and Pulse of Israel, 71% of Israelis oppose the establishment of a Palestinian state. This is up from 59% before October 7, meaning 12% of Israelis who previously supported Palestinian statehood have changed their position. That’s a tectonic realignment.
Support for Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria has also surged, with 68% of Israelis backing some form of sovereignty. A quarter of Israelis favor full sovereignty over the entire area, alongside policies encouraging Arab migration. In contrast, others support applying sovereignty to the Jordan Valley, to Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, or only to Area C. Israelis have accepted a simple truth: a Palestinian state would not bring peace. It would bring more October 7s.
If there is one issue that unfortunately divides Israelis, it is the hostage deal. Everyone wants the hostages home. The question is, at what cost? A January 20, 2025, INSS poll found that 70% of Israelis supported a deal to release hostages and implement a ceasefire before the agreement took effect, theJPPI poll found that 55% believe it is acceptable to meet some Hamas demands to secure the release of hostages, even if fighting resumes later, while 73% oppose any deal that leaves Hamas in power and 59% reject a partial hostage release deal in exchange for a ceasefire.
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At the same time, 66% of Israelis say bringing home all hostages is more critical than dismantling Hamas, according to January 12, 2025, aChord Institute poll.
There is no easy answer. The Israeli public understands that Hamas is using our morality against us. The question is whether we should allow it to keep doing so.
The return of Trump to the White House has reignited discussions about a potential Israeli-Saudi peace agreement. However, according to the Direct Polls survey, more than half of Israelis oppose a peace agreement with Saudi Arabia if it requires recognizing a Palestinian state.
Conversely, the mentioned aChord Institute poll found that 60% of Israelis would support a Trump-led peace initiative that includes normalization with Saudi Arabia and a pathway to Palestinian statehood. This contradiction reflects the tension in Israeli public opinion. Israelis want regional integration, but they do not trust that a Palestinian state would lead to peace.
The July 2024 Palestinian-Israeli Pulse survey confirms what Israelis already understand: most Palestinians don’t support the kind of peace the world envisions. Just 40% back a two-state solution, barely ahead of those who prefer a single Palestinian state (33%) or a binational state (25%). Worse, 63% reject a detailed peace plan with a demilitarized Palestine, Israeli withdrawal, and a shared Jerusalem—terms long pushed as “realistic.” The report suggests incentives could shift opinions, but that assumes a willingness to compromise that simply isn’t there.
It is easy to sit in New York, London, or Paris and offer opinions about Israel’s war in Gaza. It is easy to criticize Israelis for becoming more conservative or more hawkish. But unless you’ve lived through October 7—unless you’ve seen your neighbors slaughtered, your children kidnapped, your cities shelled—you have no idea what we have been going through.
Israelis are not shifting to the right because of ideology. They are shifting to the right because they feel as if they have no choice. We are under attack by an enemy that celebrates massacres, glorifies murderers, and educates its children to kill Jews. Most Palestinians in Gaza, as well as in the West Bank support Hamas. That is not a side issue. That is the main issue.
Israel is not the same country it was before October 7. It never will be again. The only question now is whether the world is ready to accept that.
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