Western relations have become slightly more positive in the United States, Britain, France, Germany and Russia compared with five years ago, although negative views between Muslim countries and the West persist on both sides, a Pew Research Center survey found. The survey, by Pew's Global Attitudes Project, found majorities of Muslims surveyed in five of six Muslim-dominant countries and the Palestinian territories described non-Muslim Westerners as selfish and greedy. In all six Western countries surveyed, fewer than 30 percent of non-Muslims said they consider Muslims respectful of women. Ten years after the Sept. 11 attacks, Muslims in the Middle East and Asia and non-Muslims, all have worries about Muslim extremism. Majorities of Muslims interviewed in most of the predominantly Muslim nations surveyed were inclined to say relations with people in Western countries are bad. There has been no overall improvement in those views in the predominantly Muslim nations during the past five years. Westerners are less likely to believe relations are poor today than they were five years ago. Among Western nations, France, Germany and Spain were the most likely to hold negative views of relations between Western nations and Muslims, with about six in 10 holding that view. About half in the US and Britain held this view. In Russia, fewer than four in 10 said relations were bad. Both sides tend to blame the other for bad relations, but more than a quarter of those in the US, Britain and France who say relations are bad blame the West. Pew's survey shows significant mistrust remains between the average person on the “Muslim street” and the general public in Western nations, said Arsalan Iftikhar, a human rights attorney who is writing a book about Muslims in the aftermath of Osama Bin Laden's death. “Both Westerners and Muslims alike tend to point the proverbial finger at the ‘other' in order to not fully accept responsibility for their own societal shortcomings,” Iftikhar said. Negative views among Muslims reflect a “nosedive” of their expectations after President Barack Obama pledged to improve US-Muslim relations during a speech in Cairo last year, said John Esposito, founder of the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at Georgetown University in Washington. “People don't see a difference on a number of critical points between the Obama and Bush administrations,” Esposito said.
