TEL AVIV—Israelis overwhelmingly back their country’s military campaign against Iran, even as they duck daily missile barrages and hope for decisive intervention by the United States, according to a new survey of wartime public opinion.
The poll, conducted by researchers at Agam Labs and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, found that 83 percent of Israeli Jews and 70 percent of the overall public support the campaign to take out Iran’s nuclear and missile capabilities, which Israel launched by surprise overnight on Friday. One percent of Jews and 16 percent of all Israelis would have preferred continued nuclear diplomacy with Iran.
Airstrikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities are even more popular, with more than 90 percent of the public in support, according to the poll. Almost half of the public, including 54 percent of Jews, says Israel should continue bombing the sites even if the United States and other allies stop helping to intercept Iranian barrages. But two-thirds of Israelis describe the Israel-United States alliance as “critical” to national security and only 30 percent would want Israel to defy a demand by President Donald Trump to end the war in favor of a deal.
The results of the poll, which surveyed 1,057 Israelis on Sunday and Monday and has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.2 percent, suggest Israelis are ready to go at it alone to confront what they see as an existential threat from Iran—at least up to a point.
“There is a very broad consensus that we had to attack Iran and that we must continue,” said Nimrod Nir, the CEO of Agam Labs. “It says a lot that half the public would keep going without U.S. backing even though many of those people are not sure we can finish the job alone.”
Public sentiment mirrors Israel’s official position on the war. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has projected confidence that Israel can achieve its goals alone if necessary. At the same time, current and former Israeli officials have conceded that only U.S. bunker-buster bombs can completely destroy the Iranian nuclear program from the air—and have called on Trump to deliver a decisive blow to Iran.
The campaign has taken a toll on Israelis, already beleaguered by more than 20 months of war with Iran and its regional axis of terrorist groups. Iranian ballistic missile and drone strikes on Israeli cities over the past week have killed two dozen people, injured hundreds, and displaced thousands, while forcing schools and businesses to close and throwing daily life for millions into chaos.
But pride and hope have prevailed over fear and despair, with nearly twice as many Israelis citing the former as their dominant feelings in the latest phase of the war, according to the poll. The public has “very high” trust in the air force and the Mossad foreign intelligence agency, which have been on the frontlines in Iran, and “high” trust in the military and emergency services.
Bar Shalev Nathan, a 34-year-old marketing analyst in the West Bank town Tzofim, said she, her husband, and their three young children have been sharing a public shelter with four neighboring families who also do not have a safe room at home. Each night, they have slept on thin mattresses in the concrete structure, which she said is hot and buggy.
Still, she said, “I really don’t mind spending another 30 or 60 nights sleeping on the floor in a shelter, if this means we will eliminate the Iranian threat. … I’m not hopeful. I’m confident. I’m so sure we’ve got this, and it’s going to be sweet in the end.”
Military officials told reporters on Tuesday that Israel will achieve its objectives against Iran’s nuclear program within a week or two.
Yuval Shamir, a 35-year-old engineer in Tel Aviv, described Iran’s retaliation as underwhelming, even though two missiles have struck buildings near his apartment in recent days. Just before an air raid siren interrupted him, he said that no number of missile impacts would dissuade him from backing the campaign.
“It doesn’t matter how many of us they kill now,” he said. “If we let them get the bomb, they will kill us all.”
Israelis are roughly evenly split over whether the ultimate goal of the campaign should be military victory or a stronger deal and whether Israel can independently finish off Iran’s nuclear program, according to the poll. But given the perceived stakes, most see little choice but to try.
A poll by the Israel Democracy Institute, which largely matched Agam Labs’s findings, found that 69 percent of Jews and 63 percent of all Israelis believe Israel was right to launch the campaign, even while assuming that “Iran’s nuclear capabilities cannot be destroyed without help from the United States.”
Shalev Nathan said Israel needs to “eliminate all the ballistic missile capability that Iran currently has, and of course, demolish every part of the nuclear program.” Or, she said, quoting Trump, Iran could agree to “unconditional surrender.”
“I think we can definitely succeed even without U.S. help,” she added. “I think it will be much harder and probably take much longer, but we can and we definitely should do it.”
Shamir said analysts who claim Israel cannot reach Iran’s most heavily fortified nuclear sites, like the Fordow enrichment facility, “don’t know what they’re talking about.”
“We have ways to do it ourselves, even if it takes many bombs or soldiers on the ground,” he said. “I’m sure we have a plan.”
Eyal Barad, a 42-year-old engineer in the Negev city of Kiryat Gat, said he doubted Israel can penetrate sites like Fordow without U.S. bunker-busters. In any case, he predicted, Iran’s ruling mullahs will seek torebuild the nuclear program, even if they eventually agree to a deal saying otherwise. Only regime change—an outcome Israel has increasingly seemed to embrace—could potentially end Iran’s decades-long genocidal crusade against the Jewish state, he said.
“Changing the regime in a different country usually doesn’t end well,” he acknowledged. “But if we leave the regime in place, we will only have succeeded to hurt their pride, and five years from now, they will attack us without warning,” he said.
According to Barad, Israel should learn from its experience with Hamas, an Iran-backed terrorist group in the Gaza Strip. Israel tolerated Hamas’s rule in Gaza for the better part of two decades, until the Iran-backed terrorist group burst out of the strip on Oct. 7, 2023, and carried out the deadliest-ever attack on the country. Kibbutz Nir Oz, where Barad lived with his wife and their three children, was one of the hardest-hit communities on that day.
Barad expressed hope that Israel’s campaign against Iran would also weaken Hamas and create the conditions for an agreement to end the war and free the remaining hostages held in Gaza, including four of his fellow former kibbutz members who are believed to be alive. Agam Labs found that 75 percent of Israelis support such a deal, the inverse of the hawkish national attitude toward Iran.
“There’s no need to keep fighting in Gaza,” Barad said. “Just finish it—especially now that it looks like the Iranians will not be able to continue backing and funding Hamas. It will be harder for Hamas to get stronger again.”
