Well sports fans…the Pres will make another “major” Middle East speech….but will it make a difference or will it be just another speech?
Remember back some 17 months ago….Pres. Obama was in Cairo making an unforgettable speech….one of his best according to some sources….he talked about AQ and extreme Islam, Palestinians and a array of subjects…,.basically, saying that the US was going to do better in the Middle East over the last administration……after such a moving address…..how has he done in keeping his promises….an opinion piece in the Post of Pakistan touches on this subject……
President Barack Obama’s pledge on Wednesday to strive for better relations with the Muslim world drew skepticism in Cairo, where last year he called for a new beginning in the Middle East after years of mistrust. In a visit to Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country, Obama acknowledged morSeventeen months after Obama’s Cairo University speech, al Qaeda is still threatening the West, peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians remain stalled over the issue of West Bank settlements and US troops remain in Iraq and Afghanistan. Many in the Middle East believe that Washington’s tight alliance with Israel makes it impossible to end the suffering of the Palestinians, breeding cynicism among Arab Muslims toward US intentions in the region. “It’s all speeches — in the end the same American politics, and Jewish politics, continues,” said Cairo retiree Mohamed Abdel.e needed to be done to repair ties with the Muslim world.
There you have it….seems that moving and inspirational speech made 17 months ago has done little to solve the problems of the US in the Middle East….like they say….it was nothing but a speech and no one in the area really consider for a moment that anything would change….SURPRISE! Nothing has changed!
And yet Obama will try again….and once again NOTHING will change….he will make a good speech and that is about it…there will be NO change in Yemen or Syria or Bahrain or the Israeli/Palestinian conflict…..so I say again…NOTHING will change!
Lobo,
I hardly think one Pakistani editorial qualifies as the true measure of what has and hasn’t been achieved. Besides, it seems hypocritical of someone in Pakistan to try and lay the problems they have there squarely at the feet of U.S. policy.
I would question too whether or not speeches by Obama are not useful. I suggested his Cairo speech 17 months ago may have ironically been the catalyst to initiate reformation in that country where military posturing by Bush failed.
I wish I could agree but the situation of so many years of political abuse had more to do with than a speech……and the oped just echoed so many other analyst in the region……I too wanna belief but I fear it just the way……
Hmm… I agree with both you and lbwoodgate. I think you are being a bit unkind to Obama (although you’re probably right in the main at least), but then the truth (as seen through ANY eyes that are not American) does tend to bear out what the Pakistani report said.
Moslems do NOT in the main support AQ, or anything of that ilk – so why then does the US (in particular, but much of the rest of the West is also guilty) still support the Israeli stance? Israel (or at least its VERY large extreme right wing faction) is the direct enemy of everything moslem and in fact most things non-jewish. It’s the same old same old – extremists rule – and Israel is as guilty of that as anyone, if not more than most.
Moslems are never going to like or trust us much because of that past. So, I don’t see what’s wrong with taking a TRULY neutral position for once – kill each other all you like, we’re not gonna take sides, or interfere; point a gun at us, on the other hand, or support someone who does, and we’re gonna bomb the f*ck out of you. End of argument!
My point basically was that with the speech a year ago the ME was hoping for more from the US…they did not get it…….yes, his words could be a motivator but it was mjore the life they have had to live than anything an American president had to say…….they see that words and actions are not that related and there is the main problem…..
In case you would like to see what he had to say…text of the ME speech….
http://www.thehotjoints.com/2011/05/19/full-text-of-obamas-middle-east-policy-speech/
Well, yes… I’ve seen and heard most of it, but isn’t the REAL fact from a diplomatic point of view that he’s for the first time stated openly that Israel needs to get it’s act together and start facing reality – not least by beginning REAL peace talks and he’s suggested the old borders as the tarting point, which actually horifies the Israelis?
I think that her spoke but he was just playing politics…..Envoy Mitchell just resigned….I would say that he sees NO way for a peace agreement from either side…..
No, neither do I, but that’s the point, isn’t it? Obama and therefore America is (AT LAST) actually suggesting that the Israelis have some responsibility in this – that’s new, isn’t it?
It may, as you rightly say, be all talk – in fact I’m sure it’s all talk – but America has done much in the past to keep the media and a whole lot of world opinion “on side” with the Israelis, whereas, in fact, guilt in the ME problem seems to me to be pretty much a case of six to one and half a dozen to the other!
Yes he is implying that…but so has every president since Reagan…..if they would stick to the rhetoric then there is a possibility things could work out over time…..but Israel knows this is not a serious thing…..and when Obama goes to AIPAC and speaks there should be a softing of this stance…