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Oregon vs Utah Odds

October 28

3:30 p.m. ET

FOX

-6.5

-110

47.5

-110o / -110u

-250

+6.5

-110

47.5

-110o / -110u

+200

The excitement in the Pac-12s final season roles through Rice-Eccles Stadium in Week 9. Oregon will leave the friendly confines of Eugene as -6.5 favorites, although Utah has one of the best home-field advantages in college football.

The Utes are celebrating after a road victory as touchdown underdogs to USC, as head coach Kyle Whittingham summarized how his team feels.

Utah is now a leading contender to win the Pac-12, hosting Oregon in this game with a Week 11 showdown scheduled at Washington.

Oregon also controls its own destiny. A sweep of the remaining schedule will put the Ducks in the conference championship game.

Head coach Dan Lanning rebounded from a loss to Washington by beating Washington State by two scores in Week 8. The Ducks continued to cruise as one of the best offenses in the nation, creating 14 explosives against the Cougars.

Oregon has one of the easiest paths of all Pac-12 teams in regard to the November schedule, as a win in Week 9 will set the Ducks up to be a contender on the national stage.

This game will serve as a Pac-12 knockout game with the winner having an outside chance of making the College Football Playoff.

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As its strength of schedule continues to improve, there has been no drop-off in Oregon's offense.

Quarterback Bo Nix has an outstanding 19:1 ratio in passing touchdowns to interceptions after health played a factor in the Ducks' 2022 decline when the Auburn transfer was limited by an ankle injury.

This season has seen the fifth-year quarterback cut down on rushing attempts, logging just 74 scramble yards compared to 281 a season ago.

Oregon boasts the top offense in the nation from a Quality Drives perspective, starting with the lethal rushing attack of Bucky Irving and Jordan James.

Both running backs average at least 7.6 yards per carry, creating a combined 49 missed tackles on the season. Oregon plays at the second-highest rate in standard downs, as the Ducks are rarely behind the chains.

Nix has been excellent when it comes to throwing the ball with the top overall rank in on-target passes.

No individual player in college football is having an easier season than punter Ross James, as the Ducks have kicked on fourth down just 16 times this season.

The 3-3-5 defense has been fantastic against the pass this season. Oregon ranks top-15 against the pass in terms of Success Rate and explosives, ranking 34th in coverage by PFF.

The Ducks' nickel package runs a heavy amount of Quarters and Cover 1, but excelling against the pass may have little value against the current Utah offense. The Utes run a heavy amount of inside zone from 12 personnel, so Oregon is expected to stuff the box and look to replicate its success against opponents with this run concept.

The general feeling in Week 8 was that the Utes would not be able to keep up with the reigning Heisman Trophy winner from an offensive perspective in the Coliseum.

Utah thrived in shutting down the USC offense, limiting the Trojans to a single methodical drive while producing six tackles for loss.

The Utes kept up on offense, receiving four total touchdowns from quarterback Bryson Barnes. The junior had the best passing game of his career despite three drops by targets.

Utah has found new life on offense through a backup quarterback and a converted safety in Sione Vaki at running back.

The offense was lifeless for most of the season with injuries across the roster, but it blasted the USC defense for 13 explosive plays. The Utes had as many explosive drives as the Trojans, a testament to the rising offense and declining USC defense.

Defensive coordinator Morgan Scalley continues to call one of the best defenses on the West Coast. Utah ranks top-10 in Havoc and Defensive Quality Drives, making it difficult for opposing offenses to move the chains and protect the football.

The 4-2-5 defense has a moderate blitz rate in standard downs, ultimately bumping to 69% in long second- and third-down attempts. The defense has been fantastic in passing downs, ranking as the best in college football in terms of Success Rate.

Where Utah struggles on defense is in standard downs, allowing explosives at a bottom-10 rate in FBS.

Matchup Analysis

Toggle the dropdowns below to hide or show how Oregon and Utah match up statistically:

Betting Prediction, Picks

Oregon's success in early downs will be the determining factor in the Ducks' ability to win and cover the game.

Oregon has the best offense in the nation in standard downs, assisted by the run game with Irving and James. The Ducks are hit at the line of scrimmage at the second-lowest rate nationally, so they should be confident in moving the pile against the Utes' front seven.

Utah has been susceptible to allowing chunk plays in standard downs through the air. The Utes excel in zone coverage, opting to run Cover 1 and Cover 3 on the majority of defensive snaps.

Nix has been excellent against these select coverages, executing a high number of explosives against Cover 1.

Nix leads a passing offense that's best overall in on-target rate, so Utah must crowd wide receivers Troy Franklin and Tez Johnson in coverage. The Utes rank 18th in on-target allowed rate, indicating there should be some resistance to Oregon's downfield passing attack.

The Ducks must lean on one of the best discipline factors of the offense the nation's second-best rank in Havoc Allowed. Protecting the football will be key against an opportunistic Utah defense.

The Utah handicap comes down to its use of inside zone runs against the Ducks' front seven. Barnes, Vaki and running back JaQuinden Jackson run twice as many zone rush concepts inside the tackles than outside, as the Utes rank top-30 in Stuff Rate Allowed and Line Yards.

The Oregon defense has been excellent at defending inside zone when loading the box with seven or more defenders.

The Ducks play a majority of zone coverage snaps in quarters, a consistent thorn in the side of Utah's passing attack.

The Utes will opt to complete passes within 10 yards or behind the line of scrimmage, taking advantage of Oregon in open space. The Ducks rank 110th in broken tackles allowed, a positive sign for Jackson and Vaki.

Action Network projects Oregon as a three-point favorite. An opener of three was quickly steamed to the current market number of a full touchdown.

The Ducks have yet to face an offense with a heavy ground attack, as Washington, Washington State, Stanford and Colorado are all pass-first offenses. Utah will have success running inside zone, creating explosives via missed tackles from the Ducks.

Expect Oregon to utilize its downfield passing attack while the Utes break enough tackles to keep this within a possession.

Pick: Utah +7 (-120 or Better) Over 48 or Better

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Oregon vs Utah Odds, Prediction & Picks | How to Bet Marquee ... - The Action Network

Drover Madness is an event that brings the community together and helps kickstart the basketball seasons Wednesday Oct. 25 in the Drover Fieldhouse.

The womens and mens basketball programs along with the Drover Dancers put together an event that brings the community together and with the help of the Sport Information Department the entire event is broadcasted live.

Throughout the night the guests were introduced to the three teams along with plenty of games to help incorporate members of the community into the event.

Starting off with musical chairs, which is an event for the young audience members, which came down to a good friendly competition between the two head coaches sons, Ayzden Matthews and Zayden Fancis. They both had their teams support throughout the entire game and at the end when Matthews, when he won the close competition he was raised up by the womens team in celebration.

After that the faculty and staff knockout game which was won for the second year in a row by Coach Pav, who had the entire baseball team on their feet cheering him on.

Followed up by the Drover Dash in which two kids dribble down to the other baseline and put on a bigger fitting jersey, shorts, and large shoes and dribble back, the first one to make the layup wins the contest.

Courtesy to the USAO Foundation there was a drawing for two book scholarships, one of the winners was Holden Pate, a USAO sophomore, who at first was bummed since his numbers were off by 40 from the first ticket drawn, but he had the next number announced.

I was surprised and then I was nervous to walk in front of everyone, and even more nervous to answer questions, Pate said.

Next up was the 3-point contest, in which there were two contestants from each program, each contestant had 45 seconds and the one with the most points wins. The contest was won by mens basketball player Logan Dolan who went 10-15 in the contest.

The long awaited TV drawing was won by Jordan Simmons. Simmons is a junior volleyball player.

To finish up the Drover Madness contests, the dunk contest was composed of six mens basketball players, who each had two rounds of 30 seconds to complete one dunk. After many failed dunks, it came down to Jaden Causwell and Jayden Patcha.

I had never attempted this dunk before, I was just talking about it with Manny a couple practices ago, but never got to attempt it before right now, Causwell told Danny Henderson in his post win interview.

To wrap up the night, people could grab a warm plate thanks to Jakes Ribs catering and watch the mens basketball team scrimmage and get a glimpse of the talent the team has in store.

The womens team will open their season as #25, according to this years first pre-season poll that came out Wednesday morning. The mens team will open their season next Wednesday, Nov. 1 against Oklahoma Wesleyan and the women will open their season on Saturday, Nov. 4, followed by the mens game.

Laura Barrios Bardi is a third-year Arts major at the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma.

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A Night of MADNESS! (Photo Essay) The Trend - The Trend Online

As is so often the case, FIFA led the way. Back in 2017 when football's world governing body decided to increase the number of teams competing at the World Cup from 32 to 48, its president Gianni Infantino found it easy to justify the seismic change.

"We are in the 21st century and we have to shape the World Cup of the 21st century," said Infantino of the first change since 1998 to the structure of the world's most perfect sporting event. A change that will come into effect at the next renewal, the 2026 tournament in the United States, Canada and Mexico.

"It is the future. Football is more than just Europe and South America, football is global."

Infantino, bolstered by the unanimous backing of his council, was easily able to frame this as a democratic and inclusive move, rather than the watering down of FIFA's showpiece event to bolster TV rights and secure backing in future elections, as campaign group New FIFA Now argued.

"The football fever you have in a country that qualifies for the World Cup is the biggest promotional tool for football you can have," said Infantino, ignoring the counter-argument that a bloated tournament featuring more weaker teams may struggle to retain its allure.

For the neutral viewers (among which we in this country have had to count ourselves since 2002, alas) it also becomes a less attractive product. The memorable 2022 tournament in Qatar - which was not without its own issues - consisted of 64 games. The next World Cup will feature 104 games, as will the 2030 tournament, which will bizarrely be hosted in six countries across three continents.

How quaint to think Jack Charlton qualified Ireland for a 24-team World Cup and before the 1980s it was a 16-team tournament.

It may be a trend-setter, but FIFA is not alone here. Sporting expansionism is a worldwide problem - tournaments are out of control.

This week we learned the famously lean Rugby World Cup will add four teams in 2027 to bring it to 24 participating countries.

The pool stages of this year's event featured an average scoring margin of 31.6 points per game, so it's unclear what is to be gained by admitting four more teams, other than that fuzzy ambition of "growing the game".

"This incredible Rugby World Cup 2023 tournament has demonstrated the passion and potential that lies beyond the top 10 or 12 nations," according to World Rugby chairman Bill Beaumont. "If we think big and think inclusive. It is not acceptable to accept the status quo. Not acceptable to do nothing."

The cynics among us may say the next instalment in Australia will feature an extra four games (52) to figure out which one of New Zealand and South Africa will be crowned champions, while the optimists will note the introduction of a round of 16 does offer up the real prospect of Ireland winning a first-ever knockout game.

The Cricket World Cup is happening right now. Don't worry, if you've missed the first 28 group stage games there are another 17 still to be played.

The format, adopted four years ago, sees all 10 teams play each other in a league format to identify four semi-finalists. What it lacks in efficiency it gains in attractiveness for those of us who appreciate some unobtrusive background sport during our working day: one game a day for a month and a half with little enough action of consequence as of yet. Apart from defending champions England being all but eliminated.

To be fair to the International Cricket Council (ICC), the current tournament is smaller in terms of teams and games (48) than previous incarnations, which have featured up to 16 teams and 54 games. But it is going back up to 16 teams in 2027.

Of course, we are not immune to this expansionism closer to home either. The group stages of the Tailteann Cup and Sam Maguire have seen the number of Gaelic football championship matches balloon from 60 to 99 in the space of 12 months.

Coupled with splitting the season into inter-county and club-only segments it has greatly increased the number of games to be played in a more narrow window, but perhaps the GAA was one sporting organisation where the training-to-games ratio was skewed too much in favour of the former.

However the GAA have not increased the number of televised games to reflect this increase in matches, which causes problems that the likes of FIFA could not even fathom. Plus the players' union, the Gaelic Players Association, are calling for pre-season tournaments to be done away with to reduce the strain on players.

It is football however - thanks to years of obscene TV rights deals - where the most supersized supersizing has happened. Before 1980 the Euros featured four teams and perhaps Ireland's greatest footballing achievement was to qualify for the eight-team Euro 88. From 1996 to 2012 it was satisfied with 16 teams and 31 games, but since 2016 (when we last qualified) it has been a 24-team tournament with 51 games.

The European Championships will come to these shores in 2028 and there are some who would like to see it expanded to 32 teams, as 24 is not a neat number for any knockout tournament - relying as it does on ranking third-placed teams to fill the round of 16.

But when you consider there are only 55 UEFA members you can see how this is all getting out of hand.

The Champions League is another UEFA competition undergoing a mutation. From next season the tournament will adopt the 'Swiss Model' - last seen bamboozling rugby fans in the Champions Cup - resulting in four more teams (36) and SEVENTY-FOUR more games (189) than this year's competition.

Before we even get to the proposed 32-team Club World Cup you already have global union FIFPRO baulking at the 12-month schedules that see elite players like Mo Salah play 70 matches in the 2021-22 season, or young talents like Bukayo Saka flogged by club and international managers to the point where the attacker played in 87 consecutive Premier League matches for Arsenal.

Are more games what the sport needs?

Away from the questionable merit of introducing more Champions League group stage matches into the world, there are the environmental issues.

Whether it is hosts India playing in nine different cities during the pool stages of the Cricket World Cup, or planeloads of players, staff and fans flying across the Atlantic several times to mark the centenary of the first World Cup, or four more countries flying to Australia to make up the numbers at the next Rugby World Cup, all this expansion has a knock-on effect on the climate crisis.

Which brings us to post-growth economics. The theory is catching hold in recent years as the climate crisis worsens, with academics and even some politicians coming to the realisation that the quest for never-ending growth is not helpful in efforts to cut emissions and reduce reliance on carbon fuels.

At the start of the decade economic anthropologist Jason Hickel expressed the hope that "in the 2020s, we can expect that the climate movement will rally around the Green New Deal and a vision for a completely new economy".

Thus far this decade sport has proved itself to be more Reaganite than post-growth, but with even the Premier League TV rights auction - the goose that laid the golden proverbial - showing signs of a slowdown, is it likely that fans will vote with their eyeballs and their wallets?

The law of diminishing returns is another well known economic theory, known to laymen as 'too much of a good thing'.

In this respect it is likely sport is nearing its own tipping point.

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Sporting expansionism: Tournaments are out of control - RTE.ie

In the ICC World Cup 2023 points table, the Netherlands have advanced from the 10th to the eighth position following a comfortable 87-run victory over Bangladesh.

The Dutch team secured their second win in the competition, accumulating a total of four points from six matches.

Bangladesh has endured their fifth consecutive defeat in the 2023 World Cup. As a result of this loss, the team led by Shakib Al Hasan has descended to the ninth position in the standings. The Tigers now possess only two points after six games.

The defending champions, England, have slipped from the ninth to the 10th position in the 2023 World Cup points table. The Netherlands occupied the 10th spot before their encounter with Bangladesh, but they have now climbed to the eighth position, pushing England to the bottom.

The updated points table is below

Currently, the top four teams in the 2023 World Cup points table are South Africa, India, New Zealand, and Australia. Earlier today, New Zealand and Australia clashed at the HPCA Stadium, with the Aussies narrowly defeating the Black Caps by five runs in a thrilling contest.

India have the opportunity to claim the top position tomorrow. The home team, India, will face England, who are in the 10th position, in Lucknow. If India can overcome the defending champions, the Men in Blue will ascend to the number one spot in the standings with 12 points. A victory against England would almost guarantee India a spot in the semifinals.

Conversely, England is in a do-or-die situation, with every forthcoming match acting as a knockout game for them. Having suffered defeats to South Africa, Afghanistan, and Sri Lanka in their previous three matches, England face an uphill battle in the tournament.

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ICC World Cup 2023 points table after Netherlands beat Bangladesh - Geo Super

The imagery is enticing, the rhythm and rhyme are propulsive. From the river to the sea, runs the popular slogan, Palestine will be free! In recent days that couplet has resounded in squares from Toronto to Berlin. Wearing chequered keffiyeh scarves, Californian pupils declaimed it as they swept down school corridors. Activists projected the words onto a wall of a university in Washington, DC.

What do they mean? Superficially an idealistic vow of liberation, the decades-old expression also contains a threat: the river is the River Jordan, the sea is the Mediterranean and freedom, in this case, implies the destruction of the state of Israel. That is certainly the sense in which Hamas uses the phrase. The children chanting it at the base of Nelsons column in London on October 21st, during a big pro-Palestinian march, may not have grasped the menace. But several marchers who were yelling the words, or bearing them on placards, seemed aware of it, clamming up defensively when asked to explain them.

Anyone whos paying attention knows exactly what that means, says Jonathan Greenblatt of the Anti-Defamation League, an American anti-hate group which, like watchdogs in Britain and elsewhere, has documented a steep rise in antisemitic incidents since Hamass bloody raid on Israel on October 7th. (Islamophobic incidents have multiplied in several countries, too.) The ubiquity of this deceptively hardline mantra points up an important shift in Western attitudes to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Three related forces are driving it: technology, demography and ideology.

The Western left once sympathised with Zionism. That changed markedly after the six-day war of 1967 and the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. Especially since the end of apartheid in South Africa, the Palestinian cause has been a talismanic issue for left-leaning Westerners. Why it acquired this status is a matter of debate. In some analyses, Israel serves as an avatar for American power, or for bygone colonial struggles. Jewish groups and others have wondered why the casualties in, say, Syria or Afghanistanwhere the perpetrators as well as the victims are Muslimstir less bien-pensant concern.

After a period in which the issue receded in prominence in Western diplomacy and headlines, Gazas plight is now inspiring protests and disputes as never before. A glut of open letters by artists and other luminaries have decried Israels bombardment and Western leaders acquiescence to it. (Counter-petitions mourn the atrocities of October 7th and affirm Israels right to self-defence.) Pro-Palestinian rallies have been held in many cities, including some where they were notionally banned.

The recriminations flow both ways. In Britain the BBCs reluctance to refer to Hamas as terrorists led to an outcry and a partial climbdown. Dave Chappelle, an American comedian, reportedly had a spat with punters at a gig in Boston after he lamented the crisis in Gaza. Some American students have been hounded for their stridently anti-Israel views; talks by Palestinian authors have been cancelled. Palestine Legal, which supports pro-Palestinian activists in America, says they are facing a wave of McCarthyite backlash targeting their livelihoods and careers.

Silence is violence, runs another popular protest slogan, a position taken by some on all sides. A range of institutions, from universities to unions, have been berated for the wording of their public statements, or for failing to issue one. Calls for peace have been likened to appeasement. And supporters of both Israel and Palestine make analogies with Ukraine to demonstrate the supposed hypocrisy of the opposing camp. Backers of the Palestinians see Gaza as the victim (like Ukraine) of invasion by a bullying neighbour. Pro-Israelis point to Hamass incursion and liken its barbarity to Russian war crimes.

The polarised passions and viral slogans are in part a sharp manifestation of the echo-chamber effect of social media. Millions of people have watched footage of Hamass depredations in horror. Many others are transfixed instead by images of Gazas agony. In Germany, for instance, where a synagogue has been firebombed and stars of David daubed on Jewish homes, some Islamists exist in parallel societies, relying on digital and overseas news, says Felix Klein, the federal commissioner for antisemitism. So, he adds, do many on the far right, which commits most of the countrys antisemitic crimes. (There, as in America, the two groups have made common cause online.)

Worse, the heart-rending clips and pictures sometimes come from the wrong country or the wrong war, or even from video games. Like the echo-chamber effect, online disinformation is a familiar problem that has seemed as acute as ever in the ongoing crisis.

The blast at the Ahli Arab hospital on October 17th was a supreme example of the reach and clout of falsehoods. Swiftly picked up by major news outfits, misleading reports contributed, in short order, to the cancelling of a summit between Arab leaders and President Joe Biden. Demand for disinformation, reckons Peter Pomerantsev of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, is an even bigger problem than supply. In wartime, people are looking for reasons to confirm their biases, he says glumly. It isnt about the facts.

Screen habits encourage another striking feature of reactions to the war: the gamification of news, whereby irony and taboo-busting are prized, even amid the gravest calamities. The paragliders on which some Hamas murderers flew to Israel were, for a few onlookers, irresistibly meme-worthy. Black Lives Matter Chicago briefly posted an image ofa paraglider with the words, I stand with Palestine. From Chicago to Gaza, runs another of its messages, from the river to the sea.

As for demography: immigration is one factor skewing the culture war in the West over the tragic one in the Middle East. Muslim populations in Western countries are both growing and changing in composition. In the past, notes Yunus Ulusoy of the Centre for Turkish Studies and Integration Research in Essen, the Muslim population in Germany was of predominantly Turkish origin. Now, he says, around 2.1m Muslims in the country have roots in Syria, Iraq and other places that are hostile to Israel. They brought their views of the conflict with themshaped, says Mr Ulusoy, by a sense of solidarity with the ummah, or global Muslim community.

Awareness of Nazism and the Holocaust, meanwhile, which for decades coloured German attitudes to Israel and antisemitism, is waning. Some Muslims, says Professor Julia Bernstein of the Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences, think this awful past is not our history, and that they are now the real victims of prejudice in Germany.

France, notes Dominique Mosi, an eminent French commentator, is home to both the largest Muslim population in western Europe and the biggest Jewish one. It has a traumatic recent history of Islamist terrorism, and a more distant one of collaboration with the Nazis, both of which tend to bolster support for Israel. But it also harbours contrary strains of anti-Americanism and guilt over French colonialism in the Arab world. The result, says Mr Mosi, is a conflict of memories that plays out in politics and on the streets.

In America, the most influential depiction of Israel in popular culture is probably Exodus. A novel by Leon Uris published in 1958, it dramatises the birth of the state and became a film starring Paul Newman. (As a piece of propaganda, said David Ben-Gurion, Israels first prime minister, Exodus was the greatest thing ever written about the country.) Overall, Americans remain much more supportive of Israel than are Europeans. Polls conducted since October 7th show a hardening of support for it among Democrats in particular.

But there is an important demographic wrinkle. As Tim Malloy, a polling analyst at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut, says, younger Americans are much less inclined to back Israel than are their elders. They also think more favourably of the Palestinian people. According to surveys by Pew, this gap in sympathy between American generations is widening (see chart).

Many young voters do not have direct memories of the attacks of September 11th 2001, a calamity which shaped older Americans views of Islamist terrorists such as Hamas. Their diverging outlook also reflects the third force swaying Western attitudes: a binary ideology that emerged from American universities to win converts far and wide.

Seeing the world in Manichean terms can be comforting. It turns confounding issues into simple clashes of good and evil, conferring a halo of virtue on those who pick the right side. As Yascha Mounk, author of The Identity Trap, argues, the emerging ideology offers just this form of comfort, sorting the world into opposing categoriescoloniser and colonised, oppressors and oppressedoften along racial lines. In essence it transposes the terms of American debates over race onto other places and problems. The American brand of anti-colonialism, quips Mr Mounk, is astonishingly colonialist.

In a polarised age, lots of people infer their opinions from their political allegiance rather than the other way round. This, thinks Mr Mounk, is part of the new ideologys appeal: it furnishes an all-purpose vocabulary to apply to any conflict. In this schema, the powerless can do no wrong, least of all to the powerfuland nobody can be both. Liberation movements of all kinds are linked, as communist insurgencies purported to be during the cold war. As flares in the colours of the Palestinian flag were set off at Piccadilly Circus, a protester in London holding a Queers for Palestine sign explained that All the struggles are connected.

This philosophy is tailor-made for the posturing and character-limits of social-media posts, perhaps one reason it is gaining adherents. But it prohibits the balance and nuanced judgments that intractable real-world hostilities demand. In particular, because the Palestinians are cast as powerless, and Israel is classed as powerful, it follows that Israelis cannot qualify as victims. Never mind the exile of Mizrahi Jews from Arab countries to Israel. The Holocaust is ancient history.

The schema shows up glaringly in references to Hamass crimes as a form of resistance or decolonisation, and in the statement by some Harvard students that held Israel entirely responsible for the slaughter of its own citizens. Many Jews, in Israel and the diaspora, perceive a wider disregard for Israels sufferingnot just less sympathy than it received during, say, the Entebbe hostage crisis of 1976, but a void. If the issue is morally simple, meanwhile, for many Western activists the remedy is blunt and drastic: not the two-state solution of yore, but a Palestine that stretches from the river to the sea.

In the left-leaning political elite, the picture is starkly different. Both Mr Biden and Sir Keir Starmer, leader of Britains opposition Labour Party, have offered Israel staunch support. All the same, the escalation in some rank-and-file attitudes to the war may have a lasting falloutboth in the Middle East and in the West.

Mr Biden, Sir Keir and other leaders have been lambasted by some in their parties for declining to call for a ceasefire. This disapprovaloften motivated by natural compassion for Palestinian civilians rather than ideologymay cost them votes, Muslim and otherwise, in what may be tight elections next year. (Mr Biden may have weighed that risk against the potentially higher cost of supporting a ceasefire.)

That may not be the only form of political blowback. Plenty of liberal voters are dismayed by the responses of people with whom, in the past, they felt broadly aligned. Their coalition with more radical voters was already under pressure; for some liberals, the bedrock of common values that they thought underpinned it seems to have crumbled. If the debate over Gaza has been a symptom of polarisation in the West, it may yet prove to be a cause of realignment, too.

The consequences for Israel and the Middle East are unpredictable. At least in the short term, revulsion for Hamas seems to outweigh any qualms Americans might have had before the war over Israels rightward lurch under Binyamin Netanyahu. Most Americans, including most Democrats, tell pollsters that supporting Israel is in American interests. How far and how long that remains the case depends on a series of unknownsstarting with the conduct and outcome of a ground invasion of Gaza, and the new dispensation that may follow. Developments in domestic politics will matter, including the fervour of the Republican embrace of isolationism.

From an Israeli point of view, though, the long-term trajectory of opinion in America is worrying. And in Europe, as the second world war recedes from living memory and the clout of Muslim voters grows, support for Israel may continue to soften, especially on the left.

Even as the disaster in Israel and Gaza unfolds, one of its morals is already clear. Amid the unchecked flow of images and ideas, Western public opinion and geopolitical conflicts are entangled in new and explosive ways. Culture wars and real wars are no longer separate struggles.

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The culture war over the Gaza war - The Economist