When it comes to Jewish settlements in the West Bank, 40% of the public say they help Israeli national security, while 35% say they hurt. An additional 21% think settlements don’t make much difference to the country’s security.
Plus there's the fact that the country, despite all its internal divisions, managed to put a certain Benjamin Netanyahu -- who has declared the expansion of the settlements to be a "top priority" -- in office 3 times (for some 17 years total so far). And all the mainstream society hate for Oslo and 2SS, and so on.
These are just a few of many obvious indicators. Of course many feel conflicted about the settlements, and only support them the perceived "security" advantages, and so on. But it's just not tenable to say that the settlements "don't really have mainstream support".
When by all indications, the imperative to support and maintain them has been national consensus for several decades now.
That said, I agree with you, I don’t believe this is only a fringe position that has no relevance on current or future policy which breaks international law.
If push came to shove most Israelis wouldn't care at all if settlements are uprooted again just like Israel did in Gaza, the only Israelis out protesting last time Israel took out settlements were religious Zionists: determined, loud, sometimes violent but definitely not mainstream. No one else cared much.
Even the pew numbers you are showing tell that even now the settlements at the very least are controversial in Israel and definitely not mainstream (no majority is saying they help security).
Relevant here is what actually gets enacted as a policy and at what time. The Israeli government knows full well that these settlements are illegal, that they are morally wrong, and that they strip Palestinians of their civil rights, but they keep it as policy to maintain and expend them anyway. With that knowledge we can assume they don’t care about Palestinian civil rights. And as long as the Israeli electorate doesn’t see this as a deal breaker—which demonstrably, they don’t—we can (and honestly should) assume similar policies in Gaza. At the very least we should belief elected official when they claim they want to violate human rights of Palestinians. Especially now as they have demonstrated they are both willing and capable of committing a genocide.
1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SLmD23UpLOo&pp=ygUIcmhvZGVza...
I have no idea what happened in Rhodesia and I don't think yet another comparison (let me guess - it makes Israel look bad right?) is helpful. The reality is the last disengagement from Gaza went absolutely horribly. Palestinians should also have a big burden to prove they can handle Israel disengaging - so far they absolutely haven't - in Gaza they've been using all their money and energy to try create armies and infrastructure to bring Israel down. We should also believe them when they're saying October 7th was just the start and that "from the river to the sea" Palestine is theirs - this is not some "far right" Palestinian talking point but pretty much a unanimous Palestinian position.
I'm not going to engage your genocide allegation, you're free to believe what you want and we're not going to change each other's minds on this.
No worries. We all learn bit by bit. But I think you could have a look at it. Many of the security beliefs that you shared above related to Israel are not new, but like all the others they are wrong, and dehumanising. Those so called security issues were backbone of violent colonisation and Genocides. Americas, Africa and Asia alike.
The notion that the rest are savages, who can't govern for their interest and we must do it for them, is not new, and is inhuman and wrong. And it is not even new to Zionism, which after all, has unfolded to be a pretty sophisticated colonisation process.
BTW, Israel never fully disengaged from Gaza, you can look up on Gaza Freedom Floatilla raid. Those are not the actions of a disengaged regime, but a colonialist entity doing crimes in the name of security. And although they are now separated by occupation, Gaza and West Bank are not different people. One can't continue to occupy one region, storm their holy sites, while repressing other region to be a an open air prison, and say that we have disengaged.
No "mainstream support"?
It's run as an administrative area of the State of Israel, "administered by the Israel Defense Forces Central Command, and military law is applied":