In the Middle East, overwhelming opposition to Islamic State

Many Muslim-majority countries hold decisively negative views of the terror group; attitudes in some European countries have been less critical

Close to a dozen Muslim majority countries hold overwhelmingly negative views of the Islamic State group, according to a poll released Wednesday by the Pew Research Center’s Global Attitudes Project. The poll was conducted before a recent spate of IS terror attacks including Friday’s onslaught in Paris.

With the exception of Pakistan, where most respondents said they had no definite opinion of the Islamic State, in none of the 11 countries surveyed did more than 15% of the population express favorable attitudes towards the terror group.

The Pew survey, which broke down respondents based on ethnicity, religion and region, noted that disdain for IS “cut across lines.”

Leading the list with a 99% national disapproval rating, the Lebanese expressed the most negative views of the Islamic State, which controls large areas of territory in Iraq and Syria.

In Israel, the survey found that 98% of Jewish Israelis and 91% of Arab Israelis strongly opposed IS, while in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, the group’s disapproval ratings stood at 92% and 79% respectively.

Unfavorable views towards IS ranged from 62-80% in Turkey, Nigeria, Burkina Faso, Malaysia and Senegal.

In Pakistan, only 28% of respondents expressed negative views towards IS, with the majority — 62% — offering no definite opinion on the group.

The results starkly contrast to a poll conducted last year in Europe which indicated Western support for IS was far stronger than previously thought. Conducted by ICM Research on behalf of Russian state news agency Rossiya Segodnya, the poll revealed that 64% of French people, 64% of Germans and 82% of Britons reported “somewhat unfavorable” or “very unfavorable” views of the group.

The Pew survey comes on the heels of a series of recent bloody attacks claimed by IS terrorists or local affiliate groups.

Police believe that Belgian-born Abdelhamid Abaaoud was behind a series of shooting and suicide bombing attacks that killed 129 people and wounded over 350 in Paris last Friday.

Other recent IS attacks include twin suicide bombings that killed 44 people in Beirut last Thursday, the downing of a Russian airliner over Egypt with 224 people aboard on October 31, and the suicide attack that left 102 dead and over 500 injured in Ankara on October 10.

The Pew survey noted that in light of the recent spate of attacks, IS was likely even less popular in the countries surveyed.

Titled “Views of ISIS by Religion, Ethnicity and Region,” the survey was conducted in April and May this year as part of the Pew Research Center’s annual global poll, and has a margin of error between 3-4% percentage points depending on the country.