At the Brookings Institution this morning, Shibley Telhami and Steven Kull each presented their findings on public opinion regarding the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Shibley Telhami focused on Arab public perceptions. The main part of his study, was centered on the question “How important is the issue of Palestine in your priorities?” He surveyed Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, KSA, and the UAE, over a period of 5 years. The results, somewhat unsurprisingly, indicated that non-Palestinian Arabs on average found the issue most important in 2004, least important in 2005, and are quickly approaching the 2004 levels once again. Even in 2005, however, 69% of non-Palestinian Arabs still found the issue to be one of the 3 most important to them.

According to Telhami, the results indicate that the perceived importance of the issue is directly correlated to the level of violence and disagreement in the region. All in all, it was not exactly the most astonishing finding.

Telhami did have some very interesting results on questions regarding conflict resolution, however. He noted that the Arab world as a whole tends to favor the idea of a two-state solution in principle, but that they were pessimistic about the possibility of making such a solution happen in reality. As a result, opinion polls have begun to favor militant groups over those that seek peaceful resolutions, because the militants are seen as taking more practical measures.

Steven Kull’s presentation was focused on world opinion. His study, conducted by World Public Opinion.org, was intended to find what various publics around the world thought their governments, as well as the UN, should be doing/saying about the Palestinian-Israeli situation. Overwhelmingly, people across the globe tended to want their governments to remain neutral and favor neither side.

At the same time, however, the Palestinians, Israelis, U.S., and the Arab States, were all rated very poorly on average for not having done enough to resolve the conflict. Moreover, in response to a series of questions about possible UNSC actions, there was a high level of public support for greater UN involvement. According to Kull, the results mean quite simply that people around the world find the issue to be important, and want the conflict resolved quickly and fairly, without favoring either side.

One thing is overwhelmingly clear, and that is that in a region tending towards radicalism, our next president is going to have to act quickly to try and get a workable resolution. Both experts agreed; time is not on the side of peace.

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