When asking about a potential cease-fire, the poll gave two choices. The first endorsed a ceasefire because “Israel had enough achievements, soldiers have died, and it is time to stop.” The second said Israel cannot accept a cease-fire because “Hamas continues firing missiles on Israel, not all the tunnels have been found, and Hamas has not surrendered.”
Only 9.7 percent chose option one, 86.5% option two, and 3.8% said they did not know. Men were more likely to want the operation to continue than women.
http://www.jpost.com/Operation-Protective-Edge/Poll-865-percent-of-Israelis-oppose-cease-fire-369064
Why are these Gaza wars so popular with Israelis? Palestinian rocket attacks into Israel and the threat of Hamas tunnel incursions naturally play a role. Israelis feel like they’re under attack from a militant group that means to destroy their country (even though it can’t yet), and thus feel justified launching a military response.
In the long run, this anger at militant groups is making the Israeli electorate increasingly hawkish and skeptical of peace overtures from the Palestinians. After the peace process collapsed in 2000, followed shortly after by the Second Intifada and then the Hamas takeover of Gaza, the Israeli electorate has empowered parties that have been skeptical of the peace process. There’s pretty solid political science, broken down nicely here, demonstrating that rocket attacks and suicide bombings have translated into more votes for right-wing parties. That said, the July poll still found that a majority of Israelis were in favor of renewing negotiations with the Palestinians.
http://www.vox.com/2014/7/31/5955077/israeli-support-for-the-gaza-war-is-basically-unanimous
As a complete outsider to Israeli politics etc, I think that it’s maybe worth making a distinction between the actions of the government and the general feelings of the people. As I understand it the majority of Israelis lived in a time when suicide bombers were a thing and the rocket attacks weren’t just spitballs, you know? The fear is no longer valid but the memory of the fear still seems to be guiding the public opinion. The government just seems to be exploiting that for votes/land/aid money.
Israeli “retaliations” have always been disproportionate and targeted civilians callously.
It’s true that the Israeli public had lived through some unpleasant and scary times in the past but these feelings which you’ve alluded to are actually born out of Israel’s victim complex and the dogma that every act of violence perpetrated against a Jew by a non-Jew is a manifestation of latent anti-Semitism. Yes, suicide bombings were a terrible thing but if you view them in a wider historical context you’d see that they were in no way the ‘beginning’ of the hostilities and that Israel has done some shitty things to Palestinians over the years which might have contributed to the escalation of violence over the years; this worldview is in many ways considered heretical (or even treasonous) in Israel, you’re automatically labeled a self-hating Jew and you’re reminded that gentiles have never needed a cause to hate jews and that it’s absurd to try to justify their clearly anti-Semitic actions by pointing to the existence of a vicious cycle that has been fueled by Israeli aggression for decades.
The feelings of Israelis are illegitimate cause they represent a historical narrative that is greatly removed from reality and prevents any possibility of normalization and deescalation.
Parlance Province 