By Taylor Luck

AMMAN - Less than one-third of Jordanians have positive feelings towards Al Qaeda’s Osama Ben Laden, a study released on Wednesday revealed.

According to the WorldPublicOpinion.org poll on Islamic world opinion of terrorism and US policy, 27 per cent of Jordanians have positive views of Al Qaeda leader, compared to 20 per cent who have negative views and 27 per cent reported to have “mixed” feelings towards Osama Ben Laden.

The only respondents where a majority had a positive view of Ben Laden were Palestinians residing in the West Bank and Gaza, 56 per cent of whom reported to have positive feelings, compared to 22 per cent negative and 22 per cent “mixed”.

In Egypt, 44 per cent of citizens have a positive view of Ben Laden compared to 17 per cent negative, while 25 per cent of Pakistanis have positive views versus 20 per cent negative.

The only predominately Muslim countries polled where a majority had negative views of Al Qaeda leader were Azerbaijan (82 per cent) and Turkey (68 per cent).

An overwhelming majority of Jordanians, 64 per cent, oppose attacks on US civilians working in Muslim countries, compared to 15 per cent in favour of such attacks, according to the study.

Approximately 80 per cent of Jordanians believe the US is actively working to “divide and weaken” Islam, the report asserts, compared to 87 per cent of Egyptians, 87 per cent of Palestinians and 82 per cent of Turks. Approximately 12 per cent of Jordanians said they believe America is not working to divide Islam.

Around 60 per cent of Jordanians support continued US military aid and support to the Kingdom and Saudi Arabia, the only country polled where a majority ascribed to that view. Some 22 per cent of Jordanians opposed continued US supply of military equipment, the study noted.

The poll of nine nations, which was conducted between July 28 and September 6, 2008 in cooperation with the University of Jordan’s Centre for Strategic Studies, was based on a sample size of 583 Jordanians with a margin of error of +/- 2-4 per cent, according to WorldPublicOpinion.org.