Results from a new poll of British public opinion on foreign nations, commissioned by the UK Telegraph:
The Telegraph comments:
The violence and Israel’s continuing occupation of the West Bank and Gaza appear to have done immense damage to its standing. Israel comes top of the list of countries where people would least like to live and would least like to take a holiday.
It is also the country thought least deserving of international respect. Despite being the only fully democratic state in the Middle East, it is also thought to be among the world’s “least democratic countries”.
Of the 12 criteria set out in YouGov’s check-list, Israel comes out bottom in four cases and among the bottom five in a total of eight. Only Russia has a worse overall score.
We’ll submit that biased British media coverage of the violence is what’s caused the immense damage to Israel’s standing, not the (self-defensive) violence itself.
