Questions on Iran as Bush heads to Mideast

In Israel, which he is visiting for the first time as president, Bush is likely to be greeted as one of the country's greatest friends. But in the Arab world, his presidency has been perceived as damaging to the region and to U.S. prestige.
The overthrow of Saddam Hussein's Sunni Arab regime in Iraq, which long served as a counterweight to Shiite Muslim Iran, has allowed Iran's influence to grow. At the same time, Arab leaders blame the breakdown, until recently, of Israeli-Palestinian talks on Bush's refusal to assume the U.S. president's traditional hands-on role in Middle East peace negotiations.
Arab dissidents were elated and then devastated when Bush called for democracy in the region in 2005, only to appear to back away after election victories in Iraq and the Palestinian territories by religious blocs -- the only groups that had built popular support under autocratic governments. Bush plans to offer something of a report card on his Middle East "freedom agenda" when he stops in the United Arab Emirates' capital, Abu Dhabi, next week.
In Arab streets, many blame Washington for the plight of Iraqis and Palestinians. Bush's presidency has been "disastrous," said Hisham Kassem, an Egyptian journalist who received a National Endowment for Democracy award from him last fall. "America's neither feared nor loved. It's neither feared by the regimes anymore, and it's hated by the people of the Middle East. . . . That's the Bush legacy." more...
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