Anti-U.S. Sentiments Reach Simmering Point Throughout the Arab World

If Americans were expecting flag burning or rock throwing after the bombardment of Afghanistan, it hasn’t happened in most of the Arab world--at least not yet.

But across the Middle East, resentment is percolating that Muslims are once again the ones facing attacks by U.S. missiles.

“Iraq, Sudan, Libya and now Afghanistan--the Americans are on a crusade,” said Abdel Bade Fooda, owner of a small religious bookshop in the heart of Cairo’s old city. “The terrorism explanation is just an excuse to punish a very poor Muslim country.”

Asked why he cared about the plight of people 2,000 miles away, the Koran seller folded his hands together and said: “We are brothers. Islam has no frontiers.”

U.S. efforts to present the strikes against Afghanistan’s Taliban government as preventive action against terrorism, not an attack on Islam, appear to have failed in many places.

Increasingly, government officials are bracing for retaliation. From Cairo to Beirut to Sana, Yemen, the level of security Monday was extremely tight. Arab governments deployed soldiers in all major cities, and big guns were wheeled in front of foreign embassies and state banks.

“Vary your routines and avoid large crowds or mosques,” warned a State Department communique to U.S. citizens in the region. “We cannot predict what the popular reaction will be.”

The angry words and spirited but peaceful protests held Monday could turn violent, many people said, if the U.S.-led coalition expands its war against terror to Iraq or Syria, as some American officials have advocated. Although Muslim solidarity is tight, Arab solidarity is even tighter.

“Right now, it’s business as usual,” said writer Vinod Menon, based in the Saudi city of Riyadh. “But if an Arab country is attacked, the situation may change dramatically.”

Even before the strikes, there was one attack in Saudia Arabia. On Saturday, a parcel bomb was tossed into a crowded shopping mall in Khobar, killing two people, including an American. Saudi authorities have released few details on the incident.

Airports have become especially tense. One foreign visitor leaving Sana was shadowed Monday morning by armed guards from the minute he checked out of a hotel to the moment he stepped on his plane.

Many people have been careful to draw a distinction between their feelings toward Americans and their views of the U.S. government.

“We feel horrible about what happened in New York,” Cairo vegetable vendor Mahmoud Issaid said. “But so many people have died in Palestine too, and America has done nothing.”

The ongoing bloodshed between Israel and the Palestinians, especially intense this past year, has turned many Arabs--and Muslims around the world--solidly against the United States, Israel’s top ally. The punishing sanctions against Iraq are another grievance. So is the latest conflict--between the strongest country in the world and one of the poorest.

“This is not fair to the Afghan people,” said Mazen Haddad, a 28-year-old Jordanian living in Qatar. “They live in tents.”

Unlike during the 1991 Persian Gulf War, when several Arab governments sent soldiers to help U.S.-led forces drive Iraq out of Kuwait, this time around most Arab leaders are keeping quiet about military involvement.

Many of the leaders are considered traitors to Islam by Osama bin Laden, the man suspected of organizing the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and the Pentagon. Still, Arab leaders fear publicly supporting the effort to apprehend Bin Laden in Afghanistan because of rising levels of anti-American sentiment.

King Abdullah II of Jordan broke his silence Monday, issuing a statement that his country “supports the international efforts to combat terrorism.” But he also urged the United States to help find “a just solution to the Palestinian problem.”

Cartoons and editorials almost drip with bitterness toward the United States. The Egyptian Gazette featured two large pictures of U.S. bombers on its front page Monday, and charged that “the United States continues to glamorize militarism.”

Confronted by these messages are thousands of university students who gathered Monday in Syria, Oman and Egypt to protest the strikes against Afghanistan.

“Our rulers, why are you silent?” shouted hundreds of students at Zagazig University, north of Cairo. “Have you got orders from America?”

Some people said the protests were expected to be even bigger but that many students didn’t show up, frightened of violating anti-demonstration laws enforced in many Arab countries.

In other parts of the Muslim world, anti-American anger flared, especially after reports emerged that U.S. bombs had killed civilians in Kabul, the Afghan capital.

“I don’t think this is a proper answer,” said Bahto Memovic, a Bosnian Muslim security guard in Sarajevo, the Bosnian capital. “I hoped America would find a way to solve this situation without war and without innocent casualties.”

Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi reportedly plans to urge his counterparts to condemn the military action when Islamic countries gather for an emergency meeting in Qatar on Wednesday.

“Military actions that kill civilians, is that the way to combat terrorism?” Kharrazi asked at a news conference in Tehran, the Iranian capital. “Instead, you have to cut the roots,” he said.

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Times staff writers T. Christian Miller in Qatar, Alissa J. Rubin in Sarejevo and Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson in Tehran contributed to this reportJW