Yep and those opinions are amplified by right wing warmongering and the under belly short term anti-solutions that the loudest shouters on tv, facebook and youtube etc have.
I support the acceptance on principle, but I'm certainly not sure of the consequences, good or bad.
Edit: yes I am aware of the meme dislike here but this one hits home imho
When political correctness appears, logic and reason disappears out the window.
For example, regarding the "intolerant, sexist culture" you allude to. It's easy to paint the middle east in broad strokes, but that misses crucial differences between countries and peoples, particularly as those countries were often Western inventions made by grouping disparate regions and populations.
For example, did you know that in 2010 (before even the first conflict against Bashar al-Assad), there were over 150 thousand Syrians in the US alone?