Zeynep Burcu Uğur

This article investigates the perception and the reaction of Turkish people to Israel’s war in Gaza. For this purpose, we utilized a survey involving 1,393 respondents. First, we documented that there is widespread support for Palestinians from both sides of the political spectrum, Second, 94 percent of people do not believe that Israel’s public statements about protecting civilians are true. Third, an overwhelming percentage of people also joined the economic boycott by not buying Israeli products. Although young voters are less likely to support the Palestinian cause, this relationship disappears once voting preferences are taken into account. This implies that voting preferences matter for understanding the support for Palestinian cause. Compared to those who do not vote or vote for parties with a small base, AK Party and MHP voters are relatively more likely to support and CHP and HDP voters are relatively less likely to support the Palestinian cause. Overall, these results show that there is a strong pro-Palestine sentiment in Türkiye, and companies that have business ties with Israel are going to be hurt economically by the ongoing war due to consumer boycotts.