A hot melt adhesive composed of an ethylene vinyl acetate copolymer, a hydrogenated styrenic block copolymer, a tackifying resin, and a liquid plasticizer. The preferred ethylene vinyl acetate copolymer has a vinyl acetate content between 8 and 28 percent by weight, and the preferred hydrogenated styrenic block copolymer is a styrene-ethylene-butylene-styrene having about 30% styrene content and essentially no diblock. The hot melt gives excellent peel strength when used as a construction adhesive for disposable nonwoven articles. It can also be formulated to exhibit very low bleed through and blocking characteristics when used on low basis weight nonwoven fabrics.