Public opinion surveys challenge the image Arab leaders like to project
By James M.
Dorsey
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Several recent public opinion surveys send a mixed message to autocratic reformers in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar, which hosts this year's World Cup in less than two months.
The surveys
reveal contradictory attitudes among Arab youth towards religion as well as
widespread rejection of notions of a moderate Islam and formal diplomatic ties
with Israel.
One survey, published
this week by Dubai-based public relations agency ASDA’A BCW, revealed that 41
per cent of 3,400 young Arabs in 17 Arab countries aged 18 to 24 said religion was the
most important element of their identity, with nationality, family and/or
tribe, Arab heritage, and gender lagging far behind. That is 7 per cent more
than those surveyed in the agency's 2021 poll.
More than
half of those surveyed, 56 per cent, said their country’s legal system should
be based on the Shariah or Islamic law.
Seventy per
cent expressed concern about the loss of traditional values and
culture. Sixty-five
per cent argued that preserving their religious and
cultural identity
was more important than creating a globalized society.
Yet,
paradoxically, 73 per cent felt that religion plays too big a role in the Middle East, while 77 per
cent believed that Arab religious institutions should be
reformed.
Autocratic
Arab reformers will take heart from the discomfort with the role of religion
and skepticism towards religious authority that stroked with earlier surveys by ASDA'A BCW, which has conducted
the poll annually for the past 14 years.
Even so, the
greater emphasis on religion as the core pillar of identity, concern about traditional
values and culture, and the call for Islamic law cast a shadow over social reforms
introduced by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Saudi Arabia and President
Mohammed bin Zayed in the UAE.
Moreover,
the poll results were published as Qatar debates how to deal with potential conduct by
World Cup fans that violates Qatari law and mores, such as public intoxication and
expressions of affection, pre-marital sex, and sexual diversity.
Qatar has
suggested that World Cup fans caught committing minor offences such as public
drunkenness would escape prosecution under plans under development by
authorities.
While Saudi
Arabia's rupture with religious ultra-conservatism that long was the kingdom's
hallmark was stunning, reforms in the UAE were the most radical in their break
with Islamic law that constitutionally constitutes the principal source of the
country’s legislation.
Mr. Bin Salman’s
reforms severely restricted the authority of the religious police, lifted the
kingdom’s ban on women’s driving, enhanced women’s rights and opportunities,
loosened gender segregation, and introduced western-style entertainment – all measures
that are essentially not controversial in much of the Muslim world but went
against the grain of the kingdom’s ultra-conservative segment of the population
and clergy.
That could
not be said for Mr. Bin Zayed’s equally far-reaching changes that decriminalized
sexual relations out of marriage and alcohol consumption for UAE nationals and foreigners
and lifted the prohibition on living together for unmarried couples.
Mr. Bin
Zayed’s reforms are expected to persuade some fans to base themselves
in the UAE during
the World Cup and travel for matches to Qatar, which is socially more
restrictive.
Even so, the
ASDA’A BCW survey suggests that the reforms in the kingdom and the Emirates may
not have been embraced as enthusiastically by a significant segment of the
youth as the two countries would like public opinion to believe.
Separate
surveys by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy showed that 59 per cent of those polled in the
UAE, 58 percent in Saudi Arabia, and 74 per cent in Egypt, disagreed with the notion that “we
should listen to those among us who are trying to interpret Islam in a more
moderate, tolerant, and modern way.”
The youth's
quest for religion and traditionalism strokes with youth attitudes toward
democracy and diplomatic relations with Israel.
Autocratic
leaders will likely be encouraged by the fact that a whopping 82 per cent of
those surveyed by ASDA’s BCW said stability was more important than
democracy. At the
same time, two-thirds believed democracy would never work in the Middle East.
Three quarters saw China, followed by
Turkey and Russia as their allies, as opposed to only 63 per cent pointing to the United
States and 12 per cent to Israel. Even so, they viewed the US as having the most influence in
the Middle East, but
a majority favoured US disengagement.
Yet, the United States and Europe continued to
constitute preferred destinations among 45 per cent of those polled seeking to emigrate.
However,
despite widespread skepticism towards democracy, leaders will also have noted
that 60 per cent expressed concern about the increased role of government in
their lives.
The
establishment two years ago of diplomatic relations with Israel by four
countries included in the ASDA’A BCW survey -- the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, and
Sudan, -- and the fact that Saudi Arabia has become more public about its
relations with the Jewish state and its desire to establish diplomatic ties
once a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is found is likely to
have shaped responses in the surveys.
Aware of
public hesitancy, Saudi Arabia, together with the Arab League and the European
Union, this week convened a meeting in New York on the sidelines of the United
Nations General Assembly to explore ways of dusting off the 1982
Saudi-inspired Arab peace plan.
The plan
offered Israel recognition and diplomatic relations in exchange for creating a
Palestinian state in territories occupied by Israel during the 1967 Middle East
war.
For his
part, Yair Lapid expressed support for a two-state solution in his address to the assembly. It
was the first time Mr. Lapid backed two states since he became prime minister
and the first time since 2017 that an Israeli prime minister spoke in favour of
Palestinian statehood.
Nevertheless,
only 14% of the Egyptians polled in the Washington Institute surveys viewed their country’s 43-year-old
peace treaty with Israel and the more recent establishment of diplomatic
relations with the Jewish state by the UAE and others as positive.
In contrast
to the UAE, Bahrain, and Morocco, where Israeli business people, tourists, and
residents have been welcomed, only 11 per cent of Egyptians surveyed favoured
the normalisation of people-to-people relations.
Similarly,
57 per cent of Saudis surveyed by the institute opposed the normalization of the
kingdom's relations with Israel. Still, a higher percentage in the kingdom and
the UAE than in Egypt, 42 per cent, agreed that “people who
want to have business or sports contacts with Israelis should be allowed to do
so.”
To sum it
all up, the message is that autocratic reformers appear to be far ahead of
significant segments of their populations even if public attitudes may be contradictory.
For now, keeping
the lid on freedom of expression and dissent helps them maintain their grip but
casts a shadow and a doubt over the image they work so hard to project.
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