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America Is Losing the Arab World And China Is Reaping the Benefits By Michael Robbins, Amaney A. Jamal, and Mark Tessler

In the wake of Hamas’s October 7 assault and Israel’s subsequent devastating war in Gaza, Arab public opinion is turning against not only Israel but also the United States. Michael Robbins, Amaney Jamal, and Mark Tessler—all investigators at Arab Barometer, a leading public opinion polling project in the Arab world—conducted surveys in five countries in late 2023 and early 2024. They show, in an essay from the forthcoming issue of Foreign Affairs, that “the United States’ standing among Arab citizens has declined dramatically” since the war began—and that “Arab citizens’ views of China have warmed.” To achieve any of its goals in the Middle East, not least a permanent settlement to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Washington must win the trust of Arab citizens in the region—or risk losing more ground to Beijing. To start with, Robbins, Jamal, and Tessler write, “the United States must show the same care for the suffering of the Palestinians that it does for that of the Israelis.”

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