Poll: U.S. Jews Back Iran Strike, Denominations Split On Obama

[Purveyor]

By Eric Fingerhut · September 29, 2009

WASHINGTON (JTA) -- A new survey shows that a majority of American Jews would support a U.S. military strike on Iran to prevent it from developing nuclear weapons -- a significant increase from a year ago.

Fifty-six percent of American Jews would support the “United States taking military action against Iran to prevent it from developing nuclear weapons,” according to the American Jewish Committee's 2009 Annual Survey of Jewish Opinion. That's an increase of 14 percentage points from the AJC survey taken in the fall of 2008. In addition, 66 percent of those surveyed said they would back an Israeli strike on Iran.

The survey of 800 self-identifying Jewish respondents, interviewed between Aug. 30 and Sept. 17, comes as a wide swath of Jewish organizations are rallying support in the Jewish community and elsewhere for increased economic and diplomatic pressure on Iran -- in particular tough sanctions targeting Iran's importation and production of refined petroleum. With a margin of error of plus or minus three percent, the poll would appear to undercut the claims of some who charge that Jewish organizations are out of step with the Jewish public in pushing for pressure on Iran.

The AJC's executive director, David Harris, speculated that there were two possible reasons for the shift in opinion on Iran. More American Jews may now be “aware of the seriousness and growing nature of the threat,” he said, or they might have “more confidence” in the Obama administration to handle a confrontation with Iran than they did with the Bush administration -- which many believed had not properly handled the Iraq war.

The 21-question survey did not ask specifcally about opinion on Iranian sanctions; Harris said time and budgetary contraints prevented the organization from using all the questions it would have liked to ask.

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JTA: http://jta.org/news/article/2009/09/29/1008202/survey-us-jews-favor-strike-on-iran-denominations-split-on-obama