For too long, he said, US congressmen have heard only one voice — “the voice of the very committed supporters of the Israeli right.”

While the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the pro-Israeli Washington Institute and the Israeli embassy are bombarding Capitol Hill with reports, press releases and fact sheets, objective information on the Middle East conflict and Arab and Muslim issues remain scarce.

“I do not object to the Washington Institute and AIPAC; they are part of our system,” said Walker, who served as assistant secretary of state for near east affairs under former US President Bill Clinton.

“But you, the Arabs, can no longer afford to just ignore Washington. Arab governments and institutions should start considering how to affect public opinion in the US.”

Walker, who arrived here on Sunday as part of a high-profile tour of the region that has already taken him to Egypt, Syria and Lebanon, was speaking at a roundtable organised by the Centre for Strategic Studies (CSS) at the University of Jordan.

He was expected today in Saudi Arabia, from where he was to continue to Israel and the Palestinian self-rule areas.

He said his tour was aimed at discussing with regional leaders and opinion-makers the US-led campaign against terrorism and other repercussions of the Sept. 11 attacks.

On Monday, he was received at the Royal Court separately by His Majesty King Abdullah, with whom he discussed the international and regional political situation, and Her Majesty Queen Rania, with whom he tackled the problem of rectifying misconceptions on Islam in American public opinion.

Walker, who was also an ambassador to Israel and Egypt, met on Sunday with local business leaders, in a bid to raise funds for the MEI.

The institute is generally viewed on the American think-tank scene as a counterbalance to the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), which disseminates largely pro-Israeli, rightwing views.

But the task is not easy, Walker pointed out yesterday. WINEP, with a $15 million budget, can invite speakers from the region, organise visits, sponsor publications, and influence big media corporations. The MEI's $1.2 million budget allows for much less.

Exerting immediate efforts to influence American public opinion and Capitol Hill becomes more crucial should one agree with Walker and believe that the next few months will be decisive to forge the US' Middle East foreign policy over the next decades.

“The next six months will be crucial for American foreign policy in the next 20 years,” he told an audience of former ambassadors, foreign ministry officials and scholars at the CSS.

In Washington, politicians affiliated with the Jewish lobby are working fast and furious in the wake of the terror attacks to discredit Secretary of State Colin Powell and his policies based on multilateralism and coalition-building.

“These people believe that we should not only be attacking Osama Ben Laden in Afghanistan, but also Saddam Hussein in Baghdad,” Walker warned.

“They have tried to attack the secretary of state personally, but found it was not very practical, because he is very popular.”

So, Walker continued, the Jewish lobby and its politicians started attacking Powell's policies, especially by disseminating “baseless and untrue” reports suggesting that Arab countries, such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia, were not supporting the US-led war against terror.

The Sept. 11 attacks triggered a major change in the US, whereby average Americans “are starting to realise that there is a whole world out there,” and have started asking questions about Islam and the Middle East.

The attacks came at a time when the administration of US President George W. Bush had already started appreciating that “not being engaged in the [Mideast] peace process was a mistake,” Walker argued, adding that the new president has by now realised he “pulled back too far.”

“It took the administration some time to understand that this [disengagement] was damaging US interests in the region,” he noted.

Now that Bush appears finally determined to play as active a role as his predecessor in Mideast peace-making, a “crescendo” of charges and counter-charges between the administration and Israeli premier Ariel Sharon has dominated bilateral exchanges lately.

“This is because the US has a concept of negotiations and Sharon has a completely different one,” Walker said.

“At some point, I believe, they will clash,” he contended.

Meanwhile, as Washington is back in the middle of Mideast negotiations and American public opinion is willing to hear about the region, Arab governments and institutions cannot miss this chance of being heard.