A surprising number of Americans appear to favor taking a hard stance against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. A recent poll orchestrated by The Economist/YouGov reveals that nearly half of the U.S. population supports the idea of arresting Netanyahu due to his controversial actions in the Gaza conflict.
This sentiment is captured by the question of whether the U.S. should honor an International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrant for Netanyahu. According to the poll results, 49 percent of respondents endorse this move, compared to 27 percent who oppose it, while 23 percent remain undecided.
The ICC’s arrest warrant for Netanyahu, issued in November 2024, accuses him of employing starvation as a weapon of war and perpetrating crimes against humanity, including murder and persecution. Moreover, he faces allegations of deliberately ordering attacks on civilian populations in Gaza.
In a recent development, Zohran Mamdani, New York City’s Mayor, retracted an earlier commitment to apprehend Netanyahu should the prime minister visit for the United Nations General Assembly later this year.
“Our hands are tied without independent legal authority to execute this warrant. The federal government is the entity that holds this power,” Mamdani conveyed in a video shared on the social media platform X.
“And I call on them to join the ICC and execute this warrant,” he added.
Israel and the U.S. do not fall under the rulings of the ICC, with both countries never having ratified the court’s founding treaty. The ICC, however, asserts jurisdiction over Palestinian territories.
Forty-seven percent of respondents in The Economist/YouGov poll said that they believe Netanyahu “is guilty of war crimes in Gaza,” while 24 percent disagreed and 29 percent were unsure.
The Economist/YouGov poll took place between July 25 and 27, featuring 1,559 respondents and plus or minus 3.3 percentage points as its margin of error.