POLL: Majority of Muslims View U.S. Unfavorably

Princeton, New Jersey (CNN) - A majority of people interviewed in nine Muslim countries had unfavorable opinions of the United States and President Bush, according to a new Gallup Poll.

Most respondents also said they think the U.S. military action in Afghanistan is morally unjustified.

Researchers conducted face-to-face interviews with 9,924 residents of Pakistan, Iran, Indonesia, Turkey, Lebanon, Morocco, Kuwait, Jordan and Saudi Arabia to gauge public opinion in those countries following the September 11 attacks on the United States. About half of the world's Muslim population lives in those nine countries.

In the survey, 53 percent of the people questioned had unfavorable opinions of the United States, while 22 percent had favorable opinions.

A favorable opinion of the United States was highest in Lebanon, at 41 percent, and Turkey, at 40 percent, and lowest in Pakistan, at 5 percent. Twenty-eight percent of Kuwaitis, 27 percent of Indonesians, 22 percent of Jordanians, 22 percent of Moroccans, 16 percent of Saudi Arabians and 14 percent of Iranians surveyed had a favorable view of the United States.

On Bush, 58 percent of those surveyed had unfavorable opinions, compared with 11 percent who had favorable views.

Of those surveyed, 67 percent saw the September 11 attacks as morally unjustified, while 15 percent of the respondents said they were morally justified.

But an even greater number -- 77 percent -- said the U.S. military action in Afghanistan was morally unjustified compared with 9 percent who said it was morally justified.

The survey also found that 61 percent said they did not believe Arab groups carried out the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington. Of those surveyed, 18 percent said they did believe Arab organizations were responsible.

The interviews were conducted between December and January. The respondents were randomly selected and did not know a U.S. firm was sponsoring the poll.

Gallup said the sampling error was plus or minus 1 percentage point for questions asked in all nine countries and plus or minus 4 percentage points for questions broken down by individual nations.