Six Months After Cairo, Obama Must Deliver Yasser M. El-Shimy

WORLD POLITICS REVIEW

12/4/09

Six Months After Cairo, Obama Must Deliver

Yasser M. El-Shimy


When the White House first announced President Barack Obama's decision
to give a speech in Cairo in order to "reset" U.S.-Muslim relations
last June, American pundits from the left and right criticized the
speech's location, its timing and its presumed content.
Skepticism dominated Middle Eastern commentary as well. In a region
battered by conflict and profoundly suspicious of Western intentions,
the history of the 20th century, as taught in schools, was dominated
by the narrative of colonialism and national liberation, war and
resistance. From this perspective, Britain and France simply passed
the imperial torch to the United States. So the new president could
hardly be expected to erase the haunting memories of Iraq, Gaza,
Lebanon, Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo from the Muslim collective
consciousness with a simple speech.
Nonetheless, much like his politically inconvenient Philadelphia race
speech, Obama was somehow able to convert skeptics into believers.
Hard as it may have seemed at the height of the Abu Ghraib scandal in
2006, just three years later, an American president received several
standing ovations from a predominantly Muslim audience in the most
populous capital of the Arab world.
The genius of the Cairo speech was its simplicity and truthfulness.
Obama acknowledged some of the United States' misguided historical
interventions in the region, among them the overthrow of the
democratically elected Mossadegh government in Iran in 1953 and the
launching of a "war of choice" in Iraq. But as much as Obama was
willing to confront the legacy of his country, he forced his audience
to confront their own shortcomings and illusions as well. Time and
time again, Obama spoke about religious tolerance, women's rights,
human rights, democracy and the rule of law, and the future of peace
in the region. Although these issues are seldom the topic of public
discourse in the Middle East, his words were fervently applauded.
Today, Dec. 4, marks six months since Barack Obama gave his milestone
Cairo speech. America's standing across the Muslim world, however, is
starting to dwindle back to its status quo ante, for a simple reason:
The president committed the strategic blunder of not following up his
words with actions.
For instance, even after Israel rebuffed Obama's demand for an
immediate halt to settlement expansion on Palestinian lands in East
Jerusalem and the West Bank, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
praised Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu for "unprecedented"
concessions. To Muslims, it appeared that the new sheriff in town was
not that different from the old one, at least not when it comes to the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
To be sure, Muslims resented President George W. Bush, but it was
above all his policies they could not fathom. Indeed, more broadly,
Muslims' discontent with Washington has mostly been political in
nature. Polls almost uniformly demonstrate that Muslims are
disappointed with America's policies towards the Middle East, and that
those policies drive anti-American sentiment. The long list of
grievances includes U.S. bias towards Israel, its abiding military
presence (in Iraq and Afghanistan, along with massive military bases
in the Persian Gulf), as well as its support for autocratic regimes in
Egypt, Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in the region.
There are many understandable limitations on the president's ability
to steer U.S. Middle East foreign policy in a new direction. These
include a decidedly pro-Israel Congress, a national security
establishment that is set in its ways, and the need to maintain
support for his domestic political agenda. Obama might have done his
strategy a lot of good, for instance, by giving the Cairo speech after
he had finished his healthcare policy battle.
Nevertheless, the president's grace period with the Muslim world may
still extend for a few months, during which Muslims are likely to
judge him on how he handles five issues in particular --
Israel/Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iran and Iraq.
First, Washington should continue to exhibit a unified, robust stance
on the issues of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East
Jerusalem as well as the flow of vital goods into the Gaza Strip. This
should send the unambiguous message that America is ready and able to
lay the groundwork for a peaceful resolution to the Arab-Israeli
conflict, and that, in addition to Israel's security concerns,
Palestinian suffering does, in fact, matter.
Second, the formation of a Lebanese national unity government headed
by Saad Hariri presents a tremendous opportunity for peace. The
arrangement terms should include Israeli withdrawal from the Shib'a
Farms and other occupied Lebanese territories, in exchange for the
disarmament of Hizbollah.
Third, Washington should be responsive to Damascus' peace overtures.
The government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has been subtly
signaling its willingness to improve relations with the U.S. and
resume peace talks with Israel through Turkish mediation. Syria should
not be left out in the cold.
Fourth, the U.S. should use its leverage to ensure that the Iranian
nuclear issue is tackled through diplomacy. In particular, it ought to
persuade Israel not to launch an unprovoked attack on Iran's nuclear
installations, the repercussions of which may also draw Iraq, Lebanon,
Syria and Gaza in varying capacities into any subsequent
Israeli-Iranian conflict. Muslims may also perceive such a strike as
yet more evidence of America's bias towards Israel, which itself
possesses an unacknowledged but widely recognized nuclear weapons
program outside of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty regime.
Finally, American forces should not stay in Iraq, at least not in
significant numbers, beyond 2012. Adherence to the Status of Forces
Agreement (SOFA) is vital to dispel misgivings about the U.S. military
presence in the region.
Although a longer list could be easily devised, the foregoing steps
would go a long way towards "resetting U.S. relationships with the
Muslim world." All is not lost yet, but at the six-month anniversary
of the Cairo speech, the prospects for better U.S.-Muslim relations
are looking increasingly bleak.
Yasser M. El-Shimy is a former Egyptian diplomat, currently pursuing a
doctoral degree in Political Science at Boston University. He blogs at
Underreported.