Saturday, June 3, 2006
Very interesting report in the JPost: European support for Palestinians 'crashes' [h/t: David Boxenhorn]
...Greenberg told The Jerusalem Post that the shifts in attitudes reflected in the surveys were so dramatic that he "redid" some of the polls to ensure there had been no error.
He singled out France as the country where attitudes had changed most dramatically. Three years ago, 60 percent of French respondents said they took a side in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and of that 60%, four out of five backed the Palestinians. Today, by contrast, 60% of French respondents did not take a side in the conflict, and support for the Palestinians had dropped by half among those who did express a preference...
...At the root of the change, said Greenberg, was a fundamental remaking in Europe of the "framework" through which the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is viewed.
Three years ago, he said, the conflict was perceived "in a post-colonial framework."
There was a sense "that Europe could cancel out its own colonial history by taking the 'right' side" - the Palestinian side. Yasser Arafat was viewed as "an anti-colonial, liberation leader." The US was seen as a global imperial power, added Greenberg, and the fact that it was backing Israel only added to the "instinctive" sense of the Palestinians as victims.
France, with the largest Muslim population - moreover an entirely Arab Muslim population - with the direct experience of Algeria and the most anti-US positions, was most prey to this mindset.
Today, by contrast, the Europeans "are focused on fundamentalist Islam and its impact on them," he said. The Europeans were now asking themselves "who is the moderate in this conflict, and who is the extremist? And suddenly it is the Palestinians who may be the extremists, or who are allied with extremists who threaten Europe's own society."
An increasing proportion of Europeans are concluding that "maybe the Palestinians are not the colonialist victims" after all.
Furthermore, the pollster said, the question of which side held "absolute," uncompromising positions had also shifted - to Israel's benefit. The sea-change in attitudes, he said, had been accelerated by the fact that former prime minister Ariel Sharon, who had been widely regarded as an ideological "absolutist," had surprised Europe with his disengagement initiative. And at about the same time, the Palestinians had chosen the "absolutists" of Hamas as their leadership...
European elites wriggling out from under the "post-colonialist" rock they've been under -- or at least redefining the roles? Credit for the Gaza pullout? Actually noticing the choices, even the "painful choices" being made by the various parties? Remarkable if it pans out.
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It's GREAT news if the survey was properly done. I'd be interested to know how much the Muslim population has changed since the first survey. Almost certainly it has increased, making the decrease in support even more remarkable.
Until I see some corroboration in the real world, I remain skeptical. And as IMRA points out, look who's behind the poll.
Yeah, I don't have any illusions on this. It's "interesting," but that word covers a broad terrain.
On the one hand, as Europe is far more class-oriented than we are in the US, the "opinion elites" have even more of a strangle-hold on information and the way it's conveyed than they do here.
On the other hand, all polling, even the ones that have results we like the sound of, is somewhat akin to magazine top 100 lists -- good jumping off points for discussion, but of limited use in and of themselves.
More detail here is warranted, but it's "interesting" (and hopeful) nonetheless.