Anti-war protests prior to the invasion of Iraq easily dwarfed today's turnouts (impressive as they are) but that didn't stop Dubya and his client state sock puppets from Shock and Awe'ing their way through Iraq with a shit-eating grin. When "Israel's 9/11" happened, it looked like we'd see a repeat of that despite everything, especially in an era where it's more apparent than ever that the Western ruling class does not give two shits about popular will if things quiet down and everyone goes to brunch by the end.
And yet, politicians and MSM talking heads alike who were previously channeling their inner Goebbels and hyping up the audience for Palestinian blood are now timidly stepping back, talking about "humanitarian pauses" just short of a ceasefire (and sometimes slipping up). On occasion, there's actual push-back even from longtime zionists. We're seeing cold-hearted state department ghouls resigning in protest since even they understand the severity of this. Of course, talk is cheap and it's more trying to save face than anything but compared to 20 years ago it's baffling that they don't simply close their eyes and ears and pretend the protests are just dumb Saddam Hamas-loving hippies.
This is less me going 
that things will just end up the same and more being measuredly optimistic. There was a lingering thought in the back of my mind that that the work people have done to propagate, agitate and disrupt would only pay "dividends" in the long run months after Israel finally accomplishes its dreams of acquiring Lebensraum.
I have lots of ideas as to why. The greater public fatigue for forever wars, the proliferation of graphic footage through social media, the lack of the "End of History" high that was present for the War on Terror, the diminishing socio-economic prospects for people in the belly of the beast, Israel's more brazen stance since 2014 and so on. I'm just trying to digest it all.
The Iraq War hadn't begun yet, so there was nothing happening to really drive popular opinion. When it did, it wasn't as brutal as this. We have an obvious genocide unfolding in front of our eyes.
There's nothing close to mainstream media hegemony today. The mainstream media is forced to chase popular opinion, which is shaped far by social media and international media (made available by the former) that accurately reflect conditions.
Iraq War protests were huge, but they didn't actually reflect popular opinion, which was pro-war. Popular opinion today is very firmly on Palestine's side because of the points above.
Because of the above, this poses a genuine electoral threat to Biden, who was already on shaky ground going into 2024.
The radical left is on a general upswing in the US; though still small, it's far more organized and coherent than 20 years ago.
The organizers who lead the Iraq War protests didn't quit after they failed. They assessed their praxis and theory, left Trotskyism, and founded
/ANSWER. Over the intervening decades, PSL has closely followed the Leninist organizing tradition while adapting to present conditions and built the capacity all over the country to organize and lead these protests alongside Palestinian comrades today. In every single city PSL organizers are the forefront of these protests and bring a single consistent, Marxist, and unapologetically anti-imperialist position across the US.
Bush's wars were the beginning of the end for American hegemony. The US imperial apparatus and its global legitimacy have been on decline every year since, and they just don't have the wherewithal to whip the world into shape and act so unilaterally anymore.
I haven't heard of this opinion before and I don't think the timeline adds up? Answer was founded before the Iraq War and was already a lead organizer of Iraq War protests by then https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A.N.S.W.E.R.
Sorry, I should say that the people who founded and ran ANSWER then went on to found PSL in response to the failures of organizing at the time. They left Worker's World and shifted to Marxism Leninism. The organizations are extremely closely linked and ANSWER is essentially an extension of the party now (oversimplifying a bit but essentially true). I just didn't feel like going into that much more detail in my already longest bullet point.
I thought US polling was generally still pro-israel?
Polling is very in favor of a ceasefire, at least a temporary end to weapons shipments, and sympathy is stronger for Palestine. In the vague question of supporting Israel, yeah, there's popular support, but the specifics around this crisis are all in Palestine's favor.