OCT 18, 2014
Amid rising conflicts engulfing the Middle East, most of the 44 nations surveyed in a new Pew Research Center study listed the top threat in the world as "religious and ethnic hatred."
Nations were given the option of selecting between five dangers: nuclear weapons, pollution, AIDS and other diseases, inequality, and religious and ethnic hatred.
At 58%, Lebanon had the highest level of concern of any country and identified religious and ethnic hatred as the single greatest danger to the world, correlating to its diverse religious makeup of Shia Muslims, Sunni Muslims, Lebanese Christians, Greek Orthodox, and Jews. Meanwhile, severe battles between Hezbollah and Jabhat al-Nusra have brought war to Lebanon. Egypt, Israel, Palestine, and Tunisia also shared Lebanon's concern.
Meanwhile in the West, "the gap between the rich and the poor is increasingly considered the world's top problem by people living in advanced economies,"the Pew Research Center says. Americans, and generally most European nations listed "inequality" as the world's greatest danger. Spain cited this concern at a rate of 54%, the highest level of concern in this category.
Ukraine and Russia both named "nuclear weapons" as their highest threat, along with Japan, Pakistan, and Turkey. It is estimated that Russia - which leads the world in number of nuclear weapons - along with the US, UK, France, China, India, Pakistan, Israel, and North Korea, possess approximately 17,000 nuclear weapons altogether.
Most African countries claimed "AIDS and other infectious diseases" as their most pressing issue in the world today.
Here is the full list of all 44 surveyed countries:
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