A recent poll by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, or FIRE, found many Americans strongly disagree with the pro-Palestine encampments and protests happening on college campuses nationwide.
Around 1,300 people were asked 10 questions about the campus protesters’ methods.
The poll found a large majority of people want to see some form of punishment handed out to encampment participants, FIRE’s Chief Research Advisor Sean Stevens said.
But Stevens said the results were not all that surprising.
“Conservative Americans are far more likely than liberal slash progressive Americans to endorse punishment,” he said. “Moderate Americans look more like conservative Americans, but they’re not as gung-ho about it.”
Stevens said many people view the Israel-Palestine conflict as a moral issue.
And nearly two-thirds of the respondents said the protests have had no impact on their sympathies for the Palestinians.
“It’s like people whose sympathies were with Israel before the attack, have kind of hardened in that stance,” Stevens said. “And people whose sympathies are over the Palestinians have effectively done the same thing.”
Since the militant group Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, he said there’s a broad pattern of people digging further into their beliefs.
Another poll geared more toward college students asking similar questions will be released by early September.
The University of Central Florida Board of Trustees voted to ban encampments on campus Tuesday.
