PRESIDENT Barack Obama will offer his personal commitment to “change the
conversation” with the Muslim world in a long-awaited speech in Cairo this
week.
White House advisers vowed that Obama would “take on the tough issues”,
including the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and offer to bridge differences
with Muslims based on “mutual interests and mutual respect” - the same words
used in his address to the Turkish parliament last month.
Administration officials say privately that Obama has given himself two years
for a diplomatic breakthough on a two-state solution for Israel and the
Palestinians, despite the opposition of Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli
prime minister, to America’s minimum demand for a freeze on all settlement
building in disputed territory.
Expectations are high for Obama’s Middle East visit, which begins with a
meeting with King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia in Riyadh on Wednesday to discuss
the Arab peace initiative and relations with Iran before he arrives in Egypt
the next day.
The goal of two states living side by side, with the holy sites in Jerusalem
under international jurisdiction, is to receive a new push by Obama.
“Some of the things that you will hear in the speech are returning to proven
and effective policies and initiatives that have . . . served the national
interest well in the past,” said Denis McDonough, Obama’s foreign policy
adviser.
Israel was beginning war rehearsals today by launching its largest emergency
drill involving 7m people. The cabinet will head to a nuclear shelter to
test its performance under hypothetical missile and rocket attacks by Iran,
Syria, Hezbollah and Hamas.
On Tuesday morning sirens will sound all over Israel and citizens will be told
to find shelter within 30 seconds in Gallilee and within two minutes in Tel
Aviv.
Obama has put President George W Bush’s democracy agenda on the back burner in
an attempt to strengthen the alliance between America and moderate Arab
states against Iran and radical Islamic groups and to revive the Middle East
peace process.
A “range of political actors” have been invited to Cairo University for
Obama’s speech, but White House officials emphasised the strategic
importance of America’s alliance with Egypt’s President Hosni Mubarak.
The Obama administration believes Bush’s democracy drive was
counter-productive and came at the expense of economic programmes which
might have done more to foster moderation.
