One of the most divisive political elections in recent memory is expected to occur in 2024: the presidential race. However, President Joe Biden is at odds with some of his most important supporters—younger voters—due to his strong backing of Israel while the Gaza War rages.
line
The 22-year-old Abdul Osmanu is unsure if he will be able to vote for President Joe Biden once more. He claimed that the Biden administration’s backing of Israel while it is bombarding Gaza is a major factor in their reluctance.
Mr. Osmanu, who was elected to his local town council in 2021, stated, “As a lover of peace, a Muslim, and a black man, it’s terrible to see the repression of the Palestinian people.” “It’d be tough for me, in my conscience, to vote for a president aiding and abetting that in many ways.”
The teenage voter from Connecticut told the BBC that he was debating whether to cast a blank ballot for president in 2024 or to support a third-party candidate. He and a large number of other young people, however, find it difficult to accept Donald Trump’s reelection.
It seems that more and more young Democratic voters—like Mr. Osmanu—are diverging from President Biden on the subject of Israel and the Gaza crisis. Democrats should be concerned because their resistance to Mr. Biden’s policies may jeopardize a crucial base of support that served as the elder statesman’s electoral foundation in 2020.
Young voters have been exposed to news and social media images of bloodshed and devastation coming from Gaza for the previous two months. They have tracked the death toll as it has risen to more over 20,000 Palestinians, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which is run by Hamas.
Simultaneously, they have seen as Mr. Biden publicly supported Israel’s declared endeavor to destroy Hamas following the 1,200 deaths in Israel on October 7th by them and their allies. It still has about a hundred hostages in Gaza.
The BBC conducted interviews with six young Democratic activists and voters from throughout the United States and studied polling data. A growing sense of political disagreement among young voters appears to be indicated by data and interviews in the run-up to the 2024 election.
The Biden team chose not to respond.
However, according to a recent New York Times/Siena poll, registered voters between the ages of 18 and 29 stated they were more inclined to support the Palestinian cause than Israel. The poll found that while older generations had more positive opinions of Israel, respondents between the ages of 18 and 29 had generally negative opinions of the nation and its counteroffensive against Hamas.
Young voters are the ones who disagree most to Mr. Biden’s handling of the war, despite the fact that a large majority of registered voters—57 percent—disapprove of it. According to the Times/Siena poll, 72% of voters between the ages of 18 and 29 disapprove of Mr. Biden’s efforts.
The 22-year-old native of Iowa, Anna Bosking, intends to support Mr. Biden once more. But since enrolling in a university course on Middle Eastern politics, talking to Gaza-based classmates, and reading firsthand reports on social media, she has grown increasingly disapproving of America’s alliance with Israel.
“Before this conflict I always thought Israel was a consistent ally that we would always support, and I never had any issues,” she stated to the BBC. “But I think the American people have been forced to consider the historical context in the situation.”
One possible reason for the divide is that young Democrats, particularly progressives, are also more likely to connect the cause of Palestinian statehood to the fights for social justice playing out in the US.
“A lot of the organisations that I’m present in have made strong connections to what the Palestinians experience, and want to continue to uplift their struggle,” said Michael Abramson, the 25-year-old policy director of Young Democrats of Maricopa County in Arizona.
Mr. Abramson organizes Democrats in a crucial county in Arizona. Though he was certain that young people in Arizona would support other candidates and ballot issues, such abortion, he expressed uncertainty about whether he and other young people would support the Democratic nominee, whom he referred to as “the lesser of two evils”.
Democrats’ success in the 2020 presidential election and the 2022 midterm elections was largely attributed to the youthful voter base. To bolster support, the Democratic infrastructure usually invests millions of dollars in youth involvement and outreach.
Furthermore, not all youthful voters disapproved of Mr. Biden’s stance on Israel.
Twenty-year-old Jessica Schwab, a student at Columbia University in New York, stated that she believed Mr. Biden was managing the situation effectively and that she did not want to see Mr. Trump re-elected.
“He’s standing with Israel and providing them with military supplies, and general funding in their defence,” she continued. “But I do like how he is also asking for humanitarian pauses, and inserting some sort of breathing room to reduce the amount of casualties that are occurring in Gaza.”
Supporters of Mr. Biden also point out that the 2024 election is over a year away and that if given the option between Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump, younger Democrats would rejoin the party.
“It’s a choice between two candidates,” stated Jack Lobel of Voters of Tomorrow, a group that advocates for Gen-Z voters. “And so while President Biden’s policies towards Gaza might be upsetting some young people, that’s not going to change the fact that he and Donald Trump are two very different people.”
