Whatever one may think of Barack Hussain Obama's speech in Cairo last week, there was no doubt it was historic and unprecedented for an American president. By any measure he was eloquent and charismatic and sounded genuinely eager for a new beginning with the Arab and Muslim world.
His hour-long remarks, beamed across the world, were cheered more than 30 times by a mixed audience at Cairo University, a co-sponsor with the more-than-1,000-year-old Al Azhar University of this rare event. A member of the large audience stood up at one point and yelled out loudly, "We love you, Barrack Obama!" This was a far cry from the treatment that his predecessor, George W. Bush, received in Baghdad, when an Iraqi journalist threw his shoes at the visiting American leader.
The US State Department seemed very elated with the unexpectedly warm reaction, carrying on its much-visited website several laudatory press commentaries from various capitals of Arab and Islamic countries. These were in sharp contrast to the reaction to past US policies, especially during the Bush administration, which had been severely criticised, especially those with regard to Iraq. Even Obama joined the chorus in describing the US-led invasion there as "a war of choice that provoked strong differences in my country and around the world".
Obama was right to acknowledge that "no single speech can eradicate years of mistrust" and that he could not answer that afternoon in Cairo "all the complex questions that brought us to this point". For example, he ought to have recalled some of the abominable Israeli actions, as when 42 years ago this week 34 US sailors were killed and 174 others wounded aboard the USS Liberty, a spy ship, when it was attacked off the coast of Egypt during the 1967 Middle East war.
Another dastardly Israeli action was recalled with the recent announcement of the death of Yehoshua Zettler, the Israeli officer who planned and supervised the assassination in Occupied Jerusalem of the UN mediator Count Folke Bernadotte on September 17, 1948. Zettler also had a role in the massacre at the Arab village of Deir Yassin, just outside Occupied Jerusalem, in which more than 100 unarmed Palestinians were murdered by Zettler's Stern Gang and the Irgun Gang led by Menachem Begin, who much later became prime minister of Israel.
Nevertheless, the Middle East ball started rolling this week as evidenced by the immediate visit of US special envoy George Mitchell to Israel in an obvious attempt to pressure the right-wing government of Benjamin Netanyahu to abide by Obama's demand that he curtail any expansion of Israeli colonies, including "natural growth."
The word is out that the Obama administration wants immediate talks between the Palestinians and Israelis, but obviously none of this is likely to happen until Israel reveals its intentions - which remain unclear. Israeli leaders have yet to declare their borders; something they have not done since the founding of Israel in 1948, probably because they had hoped to expand their territory - as is now the case. More striking has been the failure of Israel to draft a Constitution that guarantees all citizens, whether they be Jewish or not, equal rights. Palestinians in Israel are to this day still denied the right to live in all-Jewish towns or villages.
Netanyahu has now promised to reveal in a major address next Sunday his government's "principles for achieving peace and security". Whether he will re-commit Israel to the two-state solution as outlined in the road map for peace, signed in 2003, remains to be seen.
A key point in Obama's statements that has confounded the Netanyahu govenment and which has been repeatedly stressed by his top aides, is that a two-state solution is in the interests of all, including the US. "I intend to personally pursue this outcome," he told his Cairo audience, "with all the patience and dedication that the task requires".
In other words, the Israelis, whoever is in office, no longer have a monopoly on US Middle East policies. Obama's two top aides - David Axelrod and Rahm Emanuel - are Jewish. But both they and several Jewish congressmen support his stance, much to Netanyahu's bewilderment when he visited Washington recently.
This does not mean that it will be all smooth sailing, especially since the Arab side is getting impatient with Israel's foot-dragging. But there is hope that a solution can be reached within two years. What must be troublesome for all is the continued division among the Palestinians. Here Obama, who showed remarkable sympathy for the plight of the Palestinians in his Cairo remarks, may be the only one capable of finding a way to drag Hamas into the equation.
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