One reason why US policy in the Middle East has been so problematic is because policymakers refuse to consider its impact on the needs of Arab people. With Israel, it’s a different story. Overattentiveness to Israeli concerns coupled with the lack of sensitivity to what Arabs think about our actions has led to deep fractures between Arabs and the US and within the Arab World.

Since 2000, we’ve conducted over 50 multination opinion polls on a variety of topics. We explored Arab attitudes toward other Arabs, the US, China, Russia, Iran, and Israel. We also examined attitudes toward conflicts in the region.

It’s been over two years since we’ve polled across the Arab World, but based on what we saw developing during our two and a half decades of work, it’s clear that US policies are headed toward disaster—not only for the US and its stated goals, but also, and more importantly, for the Arab people.

What follows are some observations based on the trend lines we have culled from our surveys:

After 9/11, President George W. Bush famously claimed, “They hate us because they hate our values.” Our 2002 polling found the opposite: Arabs liked American people, products, education, and values, but strongly disliked US policies toward the Arab world—especially regarding Palestinians. As I said during a congressional hearing on my polling: “Arabs like us and our values—what they resent is that we don’t apply those values to them.”

Bush’s Iraq war and neglect of Palestinians further lowered US ratings. They rose with President Barack Obama’s promise of change but fell when he didn’t deliver on them. Attitudes further plummeted with President Donald Trump’s pro-Israel, anti-Muslim policies.

By late 2023, our last multination poll showed President Joe Biden’s support for Israel’s war on Gaza generating even stronger negatives. To make matters worse, the complications created by President Trump’s US-Israel attacks on Iran, coupled with his assault on the very aspects of America that were respected worldwide—our universities, press freedom, and immigration policy—make it likely that Arabs are now finding it difficult to even like American values.

Over the years, we have often polled on favorable and unfavorable attitudes toward China and the US. During this time, while opinions toward the US ebbed and flowed, attitudes toward China remained steady. By the end of 2023, for the first time, China’s ratings were competitive with those of the US in areas that had previously been the US’s strong suits—education and doing business. And in several Arab countries, China was seen as a more reliable partner than the US.

Arab attitudes toward Iran have followed a consistent pattern. When Iran was perceived to be under attack for resisting the US and the West, it found a strong base of support among many Arabs. But when Iran directly meddled in Arab countries, opinion turned against it. And when its ally Hezbollah turned its weapons against its domestic Lebanese opponents and joined Iran in direct involvement in Syria’s civil war, majorities in most Arab countries turned against Iran.

Following this trajectory, one can reasonably assume that the US-Israel attacks on Iran coupled with Israel’s attacks on Lebanon and Syria, and Israel’s boasts of becoming the regional power that was “defending Western civilization against barbarism,” won Iran some sympathy in Arab public opinion. The same might be true for the recent US-Israel attacks on Iran, except that instead of seeking Arab support, Iran deliberately attacked its Arab Gulf neighbors—the very countries that had been trying to restore relationships with the meddlesome Islamic Republic. This, no doubt, turned opinion among many in the Gulf against Iran. It is........

© Common Dreams