The Word on the Street - What do Arabs think?
By Richard Nadler

May 22, 2006

The reaction of the Arab street to the war in Iraq is well documented. But what the street says depends on which side of it is polled. The post-war optimism of most Iraqis contrasts with the deep skepticism that most non-Iraqi Arabs voice toward Operation Iraqi Freedom and its aftermath -- a contrast that reflects the changing political reality of the Middle East. Iraqis, with their newfound freedom of expression and wide array of media, are getting a broader and more accurate view of the world than their politically oppressed neighbors, who hear a steady barrage of anti-American vitriol.

Surveys conducted by Zogby International between 2002 and late 2005 record opinion in six Arab countries: Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, Morocco, and the United Arab Emirates. The post-war opinions of Iraqis have been measured by the International Republican Institute, the Gallup Organization, and Oxford Research International.

The differences are stark. According to Shibley Telhami, a senior fellow of the Brookings Institution's Saban Center for Middle East Policy, non-Iraqi Arabs "essentially see Iraq through the prism of domestic anarchy and violence, through the prism of the U.S. presence which they don't like, and through the prism of the Sunnis, who are obviously worse off." In the six-nation sample, respondents consider Iraqis "worse off after the war" by a margin of 77 percent to 6 percent.

But Iraqis disagree. Most applaud the destruction of the Baathist regime. By 52 percent to 29 percent they rate their lives as better post-Saddam, and by 48 percent to 18 percent they expect their lives to improve over the next year. Asked, "Thinking about any hardships you might have suffered since the US-Britain invasion, do you personally think that ousting Saddam Hussein was worth it or not?" 77 percent answer "worth it." This includes 91 percent of the Kurds surveyed and 98 percent of Iraqi Shiites.

The Oxford Research International pollsters have explored the bases of Iraqi optimism. They found that a plurality of Iraqis consider their situation to have improved from Baathist days in terms of overall security, safety from crime, and freedom of speech. Pluralities also cite improvement in the availability of education, medical care, and basic household necessities.

The Arab street outside of Iraq considers the post-Saddam government illegitimate and undemocratic. In 2004, Zogby and Telhami asked non-Iraqis to characterize the handover of full sovereignty from the Coalition Provisional Authority to the interim government headed by Ayad Allawi. Sixty-five percent said the transfer was "cosmetic"; only 4 percent regarded it as "positive change." In a 2005 Zogby-Telhami poll, Arab respondents characterized the war as bringing less democracy rather than more by 58 percent to 9 percent.

These results are understandable when viewed in conjunction with another finding: Arabs outside of Iraq don't consider the U.S. particularly democratic. Asked to name countries that provide the "most freedom and democracy for their own peoples," Germany and France were both named more frequently than America, the latter by a margin of three to one.

By contrast, most Iraqis consider the new regime both legitimate and democratic. The idea of democratic government wins the assent of 74 percent of Iraqis polled. Sixty-six percent of Iraqis, including 89 percent of the majority Shiites, characterize the December parliamentary elections as "free and fair." Sixty-eight percent of Iraqis, including 81 percent of Kurds and 90 percent of Shiites, consider their parliament "the legitimate representative of the Iraqi people."

The surveys show that Iraqis want Coalition forces to leave -- but no time soon. In a January 2006 poll, Iraqis preferred a withdrawal framework lasting two years or more to one of six months or less by 64 percent to 35 percent. Seventy-eight percent of Shiites and 85 percent of Kurds preferred the slower timetable.

Now an Arab in Rabat has no more personal experience of post-Baathist Iraq than a Hoosier in Terre Haute. The Arab street outside of Iraq is getting its information from somewhere, and it obviously isn't from Iraqis. What has caused this dichotomy between Iraqi optimism and wider Arab pessimism?

According to Zogby International, the primary font of information in the region is "Arab commentaries in Arab media." Among these, al-Jazeera, the Arabic TV-news station broadcast from Dubai, dominates the market. It is, says Telhami, "the first choice for news" of 45 percent of Arabs -- and the second choice for most of the rest. It is the trusted source. There is no broadcast institution of similar reach in the English-speaking world.

Here's how al-Jazeera's news webpage described Operation Iraqi Freedom:

U.S. and British occupation of Iraq is regarded as the re-emergence of the old colonialist practices of the western empires....Will Iraq turn into a new Vietnam, eventually bringing the US to its senses...or perhaps to its knees?...In the past, enemies attacked from East and West before they were swallowed by the moving sands of the region, or forced to retreat, leaving behind a phoenix-like people who adore life and still accept to die for their freedom....The escalating Iraqi resistance seems to be setting the stage for another act which might usher in a new Arab World or set the clock ticking for the end of yet another empire. The Coalition forces are colonialists. The Baathist and al-Qaeda terrorists are freedom fighters. The "resistance" is escalating. A new Arab World beckons. Given that this is what most Arabs are hearing, should we be surprised that they answer poll questions the way they do?

In post-war Iraq, on the other hand, al-Jazeera's worldview has some competition. Iraqis are able to see the progress their country is making firsthand, even as it goes largely unreported in the pan-Arab media. In addition, Iraqi media are much more diverse than those of other states in the region. They have swelled from three TV stations, three radio stations, and ten newspapers -- all state-owned -- to 44 commercial TV stations, 72 commercial radio stations, and over 100 independent newspapers. Opinion ranges from apocalyptic Shiism to classical liberalism to Marxism-Leninism. Some of these papers are friendly to the Coalition forces; others publish screeds blaming the U.S. for any and every problem. In short, the Iraqi press is free.

In this atmosphere, al-Jazeera has earned the anger and contempt of Iraqi democrats of every persuasion. Ayad Allawi, a secular Shiite, accused al-Jazeera of inciting hatred. Falah al-Naqib, the Sunni interior minister in the interim government, temporarily closed the station's Baghdad bureau (although its broadcasts from Dubai continued). He said that al-Jazeera had "agreed to become the voice of terrorist groups" and accused it of strengthening the position of kidnappers and hostage-takers.

Speaking before a meeting of the Council on Foreign Relations on June 23, 2005, Allawi's successor and political opponent, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, said, "The problem that Jazeera has is not with the government; it is with the Iraqi people....We on the inside in Iraq, we see Jazeera as an instrument of distortion....Has Jazeera given credit or credibility or significance to the areas of mass graves? Why are only the negative aspects of Iraq aired on Jazeera TV?"

But al-Jazeera is simply a prominent manifestation of a much deeper problem in the Arab press. In a Washington Post op-ed entitled "How to Lose Your Job at a Saudi Newspaper," Fawaz Turki, longtime columnist for Arab News, described the three cardinal sins in Arab journalism: criticizing the government, criticizing Arab leadership, and criticizing Islam.

"The Arab world today," Turki wrote, "sadly remains a collection of disparate entities ruled for the most part by authoritarian regimes that rely on coercion, violence and terror to rule, and that demand from their citizens submission, obedience and conformity. And that includes those citizens who call themselves 'journalists,' to whom, by now, responsibility to truth and logic has become irrelevant."

Thus the most feared Arab governments combine with the most trusted Arab media to create a wall of silence between the Arab masses and the revolution occurring next door in Iraq. The nature of this revolution is to change power relations, forcing rulers to accommodate their priorities to those of the governed in order to gain or retain power. And that is something no tyranny can afford.

Mr. Nadler is president of Americas Majority, a nonprofit think tank, and co-editor of Daily Dispatch, a military blog reporting on events in Iraq.