World View: Opinion polls are snapshots in time. They are influenced by current events. Attitudes can change as events are perceived in different ways or change course.
All concerned with polling know such elementary facts must be borne in mind when interpreting findings, but they do report real attitudes which have to be taken seriously.
This week a flash Eurobarometer poll published by the European Commission (a telephone poll of about 500 people in each of the 15 EU member-states) found that first Israel at 59 per cent and secondly the United States (along with Iran and North Korea) at 53 per cent, came out on top of a list of countries regarded as presenting a threat to peace in the world.
They were followed by Iraq (52), Afghanistan (50), Pakistan (48), Syria (37), Saudi Arabia (36) and China (30). Fifteen states in all were presented to respondents who were asked: "For each of the following countries, tell me whether or not in your opinion it presents a threat to peace in the world."
In Ireland the full list was as follows: North Korea (66), Israel (62), US (60), Afghanistan (55), Iraq and Iran (54), Pakistan (50), Libya (40), Saudi Arabia (38), China (37), Russia (31), India (27), Somalia (17) and the EU (6).
There was a flurry of dissociating statements following publication of the findings. The Italian Foreign Minister, Franco Frattini, currently the EU president, spoke of the question's "ambiguity" and said it did not express EU policy. Romano Prodi said what mattered was the answers given.
An Israeli foreign ministry source noted the poll was conducted in the middle of last month, just after Israel attacked Palestinian targets in Syria and raided targets on the West Bank, and when there was renewed discussion about attacking Iran's nuclear facilities.
He contrasted these findings with recent diplomatic progress made in convincing the EU to tackle anti- Israeli terrorism. Other Israeli voices were reinforced in their belief that Europe must be kept out of any renewed peace process, that the poll results reflect a resurgence of anti- Semitism here and that only the US can be trusted as an ally.
Despite all the qualifications, these are surely arresting and intriguing results. To classify Israel and the US as the greatest threats to world peace flies in the face of settled western European international policy, public perception - and alliance commitments - for the last 50 years.
It tells a story of fundamental change in attitudes towards the transatlantic relationship after the Iraq war. It reveals that Europeans are increasingly aware that conflict in the Middle East can be an existential threat for them, which should be tackled directly by European leaders, rather than by relying on the US. It underpins a much greater public conviction that an effective EU foreign and defence policy is needed for this task.
American analysts and commentators are waking up belatedly to these new realities.
Thomas Friedman, a New York Times columnist, wrote last Sunday about the "end of the West" as we have known it since the second World War. Shared dates tell a story of shared values and interests. Thus 1945 symbolised a transatlantic commitment to democratic govern- ment, free markets and deterring the Soviet Union for two generations. However the former Swedish prime minister, Carl Bildt, told him in Brussels last week that "our defining date is now 1989 and yours is 2001".
While EU prime ministers wake up wondering how to share sovereignty, the US president worries about how to stop terrorist attacks. Friedman concludes it is necessary to chart a new Atlantic alliance.
Talking to an influential group of politically involved Californians this week, I was struck by the accuracy of Friedman's account. Several asked about the significance of 1989, while complaining that Europeans don't understand how vulnerable US citizens feel after 2001. They were shocked by the poll and surprised to hear such strong criticism of Israeli policy. I was surprised once again by how effectively the Israeli lobby in the US has captured the public and media agenda there. As a result, transatlantic discussions can easily speak past one another, but that is to underestimate the extent of the US debate.
Last week Prof Bob Pastor, a senior foreign policy adviser to successive Democratic presidents and candidates, told an audience in UCD that the US debate was polarised between unilateralist policies, originating with Theodore Roosevelt in the late 1890s and continued through the Reagan and current Bush administrations, and the allied multilateralism more characteristic of most post-1945 presidencies, including Clinton's.
Its outcome will be determined by events and by voices from abroad, which can have genuine influence.
Pastor appealed to countries like Ireland to be active in that respect, including during the EU presidency next year. He believes a more powerful EU, with a stronger foreign and defence policy, is in the US's interest, but the political significance of the developing EU is very much underestimated there.
Much will depend on how the policy of democratic transformation in the Middle East spelled out by President Bush on Thursday is pursued.
Pastor's view is echoed in remarks made by another Democratic adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski, last week. He too supports a new transatlantic pact based on a more equal relationship with a stronger EU. He went on to say: "Palestinian terrorism has to be rejected and condemned, yes, but it should not be translated de facto into a policy of support for a really increasingly brutal repression, colonial settlements and a new wall."