Poll: Muslims call U.S. 'ruthless, arrogant'
PRINCETON, New Jersey (CNN) --Residents of nine Muslim countries called the United States "ruthless and arrogant" in a new poll, with most describing themselves as "resentful" of the superpower.
The Gallup poll found that by a 2-to-1 margin, residents in these nations express an unfavorable opinion of the United States, and a majority also indicated their displeasure with President Bush.
Most Muslims surveyed expressed the view that the September 11 terrorist attacks on the United States were not justified morally, but larger majorities labeled U.S. military action in Afghanistan "morally unjustifiable."
Sixty-one percent said they did not believe Arab groups carried out the September 11 terrorist attacks.
Researchers conducted face-to-face interviews with 9,924 residents of Pakistan, Iran, Indonesia, Turkey, Lebanon, Morocco, Kuwait, Jordan and Saudi Arabia to gauge public opinion in those countries following the September 11 attacks. About half of the world's Muslim population lives in those nine countries. Not every question was asked in every nation.
The overall view was not a positive one for the United States: 53 percent of the people questioned had unfavorable opinions of the United States, while 22 percent had favorable opinions.
Most respondents said they thought the United States was aggressive and biased against Islamic values. Specifically, they cited a bias against Palestinians.
They also view American values as deeply materialist and secular and American culture as a corrupting influence on their societies, the poll found.
Residents of Lebanon had the highest favorable opinion of the United States, at 41 percent, followed by NATO ally Turkey with 40 percent. The lowest numbers came from Pakistan, at 5 percent.
Twenty-eight percent of Kuwaitis, 27 percent of Indonesians, 22 percent of Jordanians, 22 percent of Moroccans, 16 percent of Saudi Arabians and 14 percent of Iranians surveyed had a favorable view of the United States.
On Bush, 58 percent of those surveyed had unfavorable opinions, compared with 11 percent who had favorable views.
Of those surveyed, 67 percent saw the September 11 attacks as morally unjustified, while 15 percent of the respondents said they were morally justified. But 77 percent said the U.S. military action in Afghanistan was morally unjustified, compared with 9 percent who said it was morally justified.
The interviews were conducted between December and January. The respondents were randomly selected and did not know a U.S. firm was sponsoring the poll.
Gallup said the sampling error was plus or minus 1 percentage point for questions asked in all nine countries and plus or minus 4 percentage points for questions broken down by individual nations.