[Peace-discuss] The point that was made at the AWARE meeting last night

[C. G. Estabrook]

"The Brookings Institute just a few months ago released extensive polls of what 
Arabs think about Iran ... They show that Arab opinion ... holds that the major 
threat in the region is Israel, that’s 80 percent; the second major threat is 
the United States, that’s 77 percent. Iran is listed as a threat by 10 percent. 
With regard to nuclear weapons, rather remarkably, a majority, in fact, 57 
percent, say that … it would have a positive effect in the region if Iran had 
nuclear weapons…

"When they talk about Arabs, they mean the Arab dictators, not the population, 
which is overwhelmingly opposed to the conclusions that the analysts here, [Sec. 
of State] Clinton and the media, have drawn. There’s also a minor problem. 
That’s the major problem. The minor problem is that we don’t know from the 
cables what the Arab leaders think and say. We know what was selected from the 
range of what they say. So there’s a filtering process. We don’t know how much 
it distorts the information. But there’s no question that what is a radical 
distortion is - or not even a distortion, a reflection of the concern that the 
dictators are what matter. The population doesn’t matter, even if it’s 
overwhelmingly opposed to U.S. policy. This shows up elsewhere…." [Noam Chomsky 
on Democracy Now!]