Muslims Will Judge Obama by Actions More Than Words
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Helene Cooper - (Analysis) June 4, 2009 - 12:00am

It is too soon to tell whether President Obama’s 55-minute speech to the Muslim world from Cairo will be the balm to America’s broken relationship with Islam that White House officials hope. Some early signs are promising — and not just that several times someone in Mr. Obama’s audience in the domed hall yelled out, “I love you!”

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Americans Remain Skeptical About Middle East Peace
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Gallup
by Lydia Saad - June 4, 2009 - 12:00am

With President Barack Obama seeking to engage the Arab world with his speech in Cairo, Americans' confidence that there will ever be peace in the Middle East is at near-record lows. Only 32% of U.S. adults surveyed by USA Today and Gallup in late May believe "there will come a time when Israel and the Arab nations will be able to settle their differences and live in peace"; 66% disagree.

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Obama Calls for Alliances With Muslims
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Alan Cowell, Jeff Zeleny - June 4, 2009 - 12:00am

President Obama pledged on Thursday to “seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world,” imploring America and the Islamic world to drop their suspicions of one another and forge new alliances to confront violent extremism and heal religious divides.

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Muslims Will Judge Obama by Actions More Than Words
Media Mention of Ziad Asali In The New York Times - June 4, 2009 - 12:00am

It is too soon to tell whether President Obama’s 55-minute speech to the Muslim world from Cairo will be the balm to America’s broken relationship with Islam that White House officials hope. Some early signs are promising — and not just that several times someone in Mr. Obama’s audience in the domed hall yelled out, “I love you!”

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Rival Messages as Obama Lands in the Mideast
Media Mention of Ghaith al-Omari In The New York Times - June 4, 2009 - 12:00am

Aiming to repair the American relationship with the Muslim world, President Obama was greeted on Wednesday with reminders of the vast gulfs his Cairo speech must bridge, as voices as disparate as Al Qaeda’s and the Israeli government’s competed to shape how Mr. Obama’s message would be heard.

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Obama should recall Chicago on his tour
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Star
by Rami Khouri - (Opinion) June 3, 2009 - 12:00am

President Barack Obama has an opportunity on his visits to several Arab countries this week to clarify American strategic aims and core policies in the Middle East. However, to do so he will have to make a few key decisions that his government has avoided to date. The most important on the conceptual level is to break free from the psychological chokehold of religion that continues to constrain American thinking vis-a-vis the Arab world and other Muslim-majority societies.

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Obama and the Arabs
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Asharq Alawsat
by Abdul Rahman Al-Rashed - (Opinion) June 3, 2009 - 12:00am

Either Barack Obama is the most intelligent president that has ever entered the White House, or he is trying his luck in his first presidential months by walking into the dangerous minefield, the Middle East. So far, it seems that everything he has done has been successful in a region in which hatred of everything American has become deep rooted since the era of Lyndon Johnson until today.

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Obama on Obama
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Thomas L. Friedman - (Editorial) June 3, 2009 - 12:00am

During a telephone interview Tuesday with President Obama about his speech to Arabs and Muslims in Cairo on Thursday, I got to tell the president my favorite Middle East joke. It gave him a good laugh. It goes like this:

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Much Awaited Visit
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jordan Times
(Opinion) June 3, 2009 - 12:00am

US President Barack Obama’s Middle East visit is certain to stir interest in many quarters, and definitely much more of it in this conflict-ridden part of the world. His much-anticipated speech in Cairo has been prefigured by laymen and pundits alike. The president, they say, will announce his administration’s idea on how the Arab-Israeli conflict can be managed to finally bring about peace in the region and put an end to the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian problem.

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Arab States Cool to Obama Pleas for Peace Gesture
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Michael Slackman - June 3, 2009 - 12:00am

President Obama starts his much anticipated Middle East tour on Wednesday in Saudi Arabia, where he is expected to press the Arab nations to offer a gesture to the Israelis to entice them to accelerate the peace process.

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