Florida Reps more pro-Israel than Dems
Miami Herald - August 4, 2006
MIAMI HERALD POLL | THE MIDDLE EAST
Conflict reveals partisan split
A Miami Herald poll found Republicans more likely than Democrats to
support Israel’s actions in the Middle East conflict.
BY MARC CAPUTO
Even when it comes to the bombing of Beirut, there’s a partisan
divide in Florida, where more than half of Democratic voters — but
only a quarter of Republicans — say Israel has gone too far in its
campaign, according to a Miami Herald poll.
The split is even more pronounced among those who say Israel hasn’t
done enough damage in response to Hezbollah’s kidnapping and missile
attacks from southern Lebanon, with 19 percent of Republicans saying
the Israeli response should be harsher, compared with 5 percent of
Democrats, according to the poll of 1,007 likely Republican and
Democratic voters conducted for the newspaper by Zogby International.
Amid the differences of opinion, Republicans see a chance to chip
away at a base of the Democratic Party: Jewish voters, who tend to
favor pro-Israeli policies.
”There’s certainly a political opportunity here,” said veteran
Republican strategist Roger Stone. “There was a time when
Republicans couldn’t get a Jewish vote. And that has changed as the
Democratic Party has become more isolationist and the Bush
administration has moved closer to Israel.”
The dividends of the Republican effort to peel off Jewish –
particularly Orthodox Jewish — votes was clear between 2000 and
2004, when Bush improved his share of the vote by 30 percent in
targeted South Florida Jewish precincts, according to a new book, One
Party Country: The Republican Plan for Dominance in the 21st Century.
For Dan Gelber, the Florida House’s incoming Democratic leader from
Miami Beach, there’s no need to panic: he points out that the vast
majority of Jews still vote Democratic. Though 54 percent of
Democrats oppose the amount of bombing, Gelber said he needs to make
sure that his party doesn’t forsake its base.
”It’s up to Democratic leaders who care about Israel to make sure my
party understands the importance of Israel and counters some of the
media hype that impacts short-term poll numbers,” Gelber said.
The poll shows a closer opinion margin among those who say the
bombing campaign is just right: 39 percent of Republicans and 27
percent of Democrats, with 17 percent and 14 percent unsure,
respectively. The poll’s margin of error is 4.5 percentage points.
Gelber also noted that poll numbers often hinge on “what pictures
are on television that night.”
Indeed, according to a Thursday Los Angeles Times poll concerning
attitudes toward the conflict, Americans were more likely to favor an
active U.S.-led peaceful solution as the conflict became more bloody.
That poll also showed a partisan divide, with more Republicans than
Democrats aligning with Israel’s response.
To date, 860 Lebanese have been killed compared with 65 Israelis,
according to the countries’ embassy websites.
Gelber said the bloodshed from Iraq might also be creating a
‘’spillover effect” among Democrats, who are suffering so much
”Iraq fatigue” that they’re linking the conflicts.
The Miami Herald poll clearly shows this difference, with 73 percent
of Democrats saying they’re ‘’strongly opposed” to the Iraq War,
compared with 45 percent of Republicans, who ‘’strongly support” the
war. Only 31 percent of Republicans ‘’somewhat support” the war,
while 14 percent of Democrats ‘’somewhat oppose” it.
Iraq aside, the poll shows that support for Israel is strongest in
South Florida among Republicans and Democrats. Among Republicans,
North Floridians are the most opposed to the level of the bombing
campaign. Among Democrats, opposition runs strongest along the
Interstate 4 corridor.
For Arab-American Republicans such as Khaled Suffari, the poll
numbers come as no surprise. He said Arabs and Muslims are less
politically active and have found it almost impossible to make it
into Republican circles ever since Sept. 11. Beyond partisan strategy
and ethnicity, Suffari said, there’s another reason for such strong
Republican support of Israel.
”It’s the Fox News syndrome,” Suffari said of the cable news
channel. “Republicans watch it and it’s like brainwashing. The
coverage of the bombing of Lebanon is more fair on Israeli television
than it is on Fox.”