JERUSALEM - After years of supporting the Bush administration's policy in the Middle East, a growing number of Israelis are openly criticizing the United States for creating more, not less, danger for Israel.

Israeli experts contend that American policies have destabilized Iraq, emboldened anti-Western forces from Iran to Lebanon and paved the way for militant Islamists to gain control of the Palestinian Authority.

"The threats to Middle East security and stability worsened in 2006," experts at Tel Aviv University's Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies recently warned. "The American failure in Iraq has hurt the standing of the U.S. in the Middle East."

Perhaps most strikingly, in their annual evaluation of the situation, the Israeli analysts concluded that it was better for the United States to get out of Iraq than to add troops, as President Bush is proposing.

"There's no Israeli interest being served by continued American presence in Iraq," said Mark A. Heller, a Jaffee Center researcher who helped produce the group's annual "Middle East Strategic Balance" report.

"There's a basic overall interest in not having the United States perceived as a weak or failing power," Heller said. "But any initial goals that might have been served by getting rid of Saddam Hussein have long since been banked."

The Bush administration is "simply discredited in the region as a player," Yossi Alpher said. Alpher, a former head of the Jaffee Center, now serves as co-director of www.bitterlemons.org, a joint Palestinian-Israeli Web site financed by private donations and a grant from the European Union.

Iran's status rises

Securing Israel, America's closest ally in the region, was one of the Bush administration's justifications for toppling Saddam and for promoting democracy throughout the region. Israel has been unwavering in its support of U.S. initiatives since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, from ousting the Taliban in Afghanistan to toppling Saddam and threatening Iran and Syria. The former Bush administration officials and advisers who pushed those initiatives are among Israel's staunchest American supporters.

But a growing number of Israeli experts now think that U.S. policy has backfired. The threat from Saddam's army has been replaced by the dangers of a volatile civil war that threatens to spill over Iraq's borders. By ousting both Saddam and the Taliban, the United States eliminated two major counterbalances to Iran, which now enjoys growing power and influence.

"When the United States removed Saddam Hussein from power, people were happy here because he represented a major threat," said Eytan Gilboa, a political science professor at Bar-Ilan University. "But that elevated the Iranian threat, and Iran is the most dangerous country in the world."

Israeli leaders now consider Iran to be their biggest and most pressing danger. Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, regularly antagonizes Israel by questioning whether the Holocaust happened and suggesting the Jewish nation will one day be wiped off the map.

Israel is expected to push the U.S. to ensure that Iran faces tough international sanctions for pressing ahead with its nuclear program, which Israel fears could provide one of its most vocal adversaries with a nuclear bomb.

Some argue that without the threat from Saddam, the international community is better positioned to deal with Iran.

"In the long run, I think this will help peace and security in the Middle East," said Daniel Ayalon, who served as Israel's ambassador to the United States during the Iraq invasion. "The fact that we do not have Saddam Hussein there allows the world to focus on the ayatollahs and Ahmadinejad."

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