US opinion towards Egypt dips

A poll conducted by the Arab American Institute revealed on Thursday that US opinion toward Egypt was in sharp decline with an overall favourability of only 33 per cent. In July 2011, AAI polling showed 5 per cent of Egyptians held a favorable view of the US. The poll was conducted by jzanalytics for NYU Abu Dhabi in January 2012, and surveyed 997 Americans nationwide. The poll also found out that Americans were wary of the Muslim Brotherhood’s role in government and were sharply divided along partisan lines when it came to future US-Egyptian relations. Sixty per cent of Americans said they needed to know more about Egypt while 55 per cent say their knowledge about Egypt comes from the media. AAI President Jim Zogby stated: "The American and Egyptian people are further apart than ever before. As Egyptians move closer to representative democracy, our differences could have serious implications for bilateral policy." Zogby added: "While it is easy to play politics with this relationship as is happening with attacks on the President by some Republican presidential candidates, the growing gap between us must be taken seriously. Egypt remains the largest and most important Arab country and the US-Egyptian relationship is a strategic one. What happens there will impact our role in the entire region.” Since the 1990's Egypt's favorable ratings have been between 55 per cent to 65 per cent, while the country's unfavorable ratings were around 20 per cent. In the last year of President Mubarak's rule, positive US opinions toward Egypt declined, slipping into the high 40 per cent range. But with positive US media coverage of the demonstrations in Tahrir Square, favorable ratings shot up, increasing 20 points. One year later, some Americans are uneasy with political developments in Egypt. When asked specifically how they felt about the Muslim Brotherhood winning control of the parliament, only 4 per cent said this was a "positive development for Egypt". Just 19 per cent agreed "this was the outcome of a democratic election and we must accept the results," while 26 per cent said that this represented a "set back for Egypt" (a view held by 42 per cent of Republicans). A substantial 39 per cent were "not sure."