LONDON: A majority of voters in Britain support a ban on the sale of arms to Israel, according to a YouGov poll.
The survey of more than 2,000 people was commissioned by Action for Humanity and conducted before Monday’s airstrike by Israeli forces that killed seven aid workers, including three Britons.
The poll, reported by The Guardian on Wednesday, found that 56 percent of respondents favored a ban on the export of arms and spare parts, compared to 17 percent who did not.
Support for a ban was strongest among those planning to vote for Labour in the upcoming elections, with 71 percent in favor versus 9 percent against.
Seventy percent of Liberal Democrat voters support the ban, while among Conservative supporters, just 38 percent were in favor, with 36 percent against it.
In the poll, 59 percent of people said Israel was violating human rights in Gaza, with two out of three Conservative voters thinking that, The Guardian reported.
The findings will be disappointing for Israel, which has historically relied on strong UK support. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly said that his country’s efforts to destroy Hamas as a fighting force were dependent on Western backing.
Some senior Israeli politicians have expressed concerns that Israel is slipping into pariah status on the world stage.
Nearly 33,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, but the deaths of the British, Polish, Canadian and Australian aid workers appear to have created a tipping point for Western powers.
The incident prompted several Conservative politicians on Wednesday to call on the British government to stop exporting arms to Israel.
