Mideast allies express fears over U.S. policies

One thing about incompetence, it will always make matters worse. To whit:

President Bush and his top advisers fanned out across the troubled Middle East over the past week to showcase their diplomatic initiatives to restore strained relationships with traditional allies and forge new ones with leaders in Iraq.

But instead of flaunting stronger ties and steadfast American influence, the president's journey found friends both old and new near a state of panic. Mideast leaders expressed soaring concern over upheavals across the region that the United States helped ignite through its invasion of Iraq and push for democracy — and fear that the Bush administration may make things worse.

President Bush's summit in Jordan with the Iraqi prime minister proved an awkward encounter that deepened doubts about the relationship. Vice President Dick Cheney's stop in Riyadh yielded a blunt warning from Saudi leaders. And Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's trip to the West Bank and Israel, intended to build Arab support by showing a new U.S. push for peace, found little to work with.

Visits designed to show the U.S. team was in charge ended, instead, in diplomatic embarrassment and disappointment, with U.S. leaders rebuked and lectured by Arab counterparts. The trips demonstrated that U.S. allies in the region are struggling to understand what to make of the difficult relationship — and to figure whether, with the new Democratic control of Congress, Bush even has control over his nation's Mideast policy.

(read more)