A Harris opinion poll just done for the FT reveals that the people of Italy, France, Germany and the United Kingdom see China as the greatest threat to the world. Of the polled countries, only Spain sees the U.S. in that spot. 35% of these five countries give China the laurels in the threat category, with Italy giving it highest honors in the contest. Last year, the U.S. won the dubious victory prize in Europe. This year the U.S. was down to 32%.
Iran stood at 10%. I suppose it depends on where you live. If the poll had been conducted in Israel, Iran would have probably gone to the head of the class.
So how dangerous is Israel? It didn't factor at all.
And in another type of poll -- this one conducted by the University of Maryland and Zogby International in the Arab world -- it turned out that the
Lebanese Shi'a Hizbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, won the beauty contest, with Syrian president Bashar Assad winning second place. Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad came in a close third. All of this reported in today's Jerusalem Post. The Arab world has strange taste.
George Bush "scored the most hated person in the Arab world."