Published July 23rd, 2006 by Future Atlas
Iraqis on Israel
Future Atlas noted in March that “a democratic or at least popularly supported Iraqi government could emerge as a harsh and more effective critic of Israel,” making prospects poor for an Israel-friendly Iraq that some invasion advocates imagined before the war.
That was illustrated this week when Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki strongly condemned Israel’s actions in Lebanon, and called them “aggression.”
The NYT noted that:
The resentment of the Iraqi government toward Israel calls into question one of the rationales among some conservatives for the American invasion of Iraq — that an American-backed democratic state here would inevitably become an ally of Israel and, by doing so, catalyze a change of attitude across the rest of the Arab world.
Israel’s advocates seem to attribute Arab and Muslim views of Israel to propaganda and misinformation; though both influence these views, at the heart of enmity for the Jewish state is how it actually treats the Arabs under its rule and beyond.
Views of Israel could also undo another American goal for the invasion: faced with Israeli military dominance, future Iraqi leaders — even democratically elected ones — may renew their interest in nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons.