More Europeans fear Israel
Iraq? North Korea? United States? Nope. According to a recent poll, most Europeans think Israel is a threat to world peace. Dawood Traboulsi reports from paris
A recent European Union poll found that 59 per cent -- almost two-thirds -- of Europeans consider Israel a threat to world peace.
The poll, commissioned by the EU's Eurobarometre service and carried out over the telephone by the Gallup public- opinion group between 8 and 16 October, asked approximately 7,500 people throughout the EU's 15 member countries to respond to the following question: "for each of the following countries, say, in your opinion, whether or not that country represents a threat to world peace."
According to the results, released on 3 November, 59 per cent of those surveyed responded that Israel was a threat to world peace, placing it at the top of the list followed by the United States, North Korea and Iran all tied for second at 53 per cent, Iraq at 52 per cent, Afghanistan at 50 per cent and Pakistan at 48 per cent.
Bottom of the list came the EU itself, with only eight per cent of those surveyed saying that they considered Europe a threat to world peace.
Israel immediately responded harshly to the announcement of the poll results. "The European Union should stop the brainwashing that seeks to demonise Israel," said Natan Sharansky, the Israeli minister of diaspora affairs.
The Israeli ambassador to the EU also protested to the European Commission.
A spokesman for Chris Patten, the EU commissioner for external affairs, said that the EU Commission had not explicitly authorised the poll.
Later, both Romano Prodi, the Italian president of the European Commission and Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, whose country currently holds the rotating presidency of the European Union, distanced themselves from the poll and its results.
Prodi said that the poll "reflected neither the ideas nor the policies of the commission," and discounted public opinion as a factor in the formation of European policy. Berlusconi assured the Israeli prime minister of his "indignation" at the results of the poll.
Eurobarometre, a division of the commission's press and communications directorate, commissions around 60 polls a year designed to gauge European opinion on a variety of issues. These are carried out on the commission's behalf by Gallup following consultation between the private company and European civil servants on the questions to be asked.
The poll's results were released amidst continuing European protest against Israeli actions in the occupied territories.
At the European Summit on 16 and 17 October, the union clearly condemned Israel's building of a "security wall" inside the West Bank and denounced "extra-judicial executions" carried out by Israel against Palestinians.
European diplomats last week expressed concerns that Israel will try to use the results of the recent poll to prove that anti- Semitism is on the rise in Europe, making it more difficult for the union to curb Israel's actions in the occupied territories and elsewhere. They fear that the poll will be used by Israel to gain leverage in the United States, and as pretext to ignore European concerns.
