Video and Transcript: Obama and Merkel Remarks at Dresden Press Conference (5 June)

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CHANCELLOR MERKEL: (As translated.) We are delighted to have the American President here this morning with us, after having met the last time at the NATO summit.

We will visit a little bit of Dresden and later on we go on to Buchenwald, to the former concentration camp. I think that this is, indeed, a trip of a highly symbolic nature. Let me just remind all of us of the visit to Buchenwald that we will take later in the day. It is so important that the American President, Barack Obama, makes his first stop here in Dresden. This is a highly symbolic city. It is a city that was almost completely destroyed during the Second World War, was then rebuilt after Germany unification. It has again turned out to be a jewel of German culture and civilization. The people here are so glad that you've come to see them because it shows that you also pay tribute to the tremendous efforts they made in those 20 years after the fall of the wall.

We have made very good use of that time, talking about the political agenda, pressing issues. President Obama yesterday gave a very important speech in Cairo, which I think will be an ideal basis for a lot of action of a positive nature, particularly as regards speeding of the peace process in the Middle East. We also talked about a possible time frame for possible progress to be made. I said on behalf of the Federal Republic of Germany that we would like to try and be helpful in this peace process to the extent that this is possible to us. We need a two-state solution; we need a viable Palestinian state and a viable state of Israel, side by side. And whatever we can do in order to constructively accompany this along the way we will gladly do.

The status of negotiations with Iran on the nuclear program was also at the very top of our agenda. Here, too, we agreed to work closely together. Germany will try its utmost with its contacts, with its expert knowledge to give a positive contribution to this issue.

We also obviously debated the situation on world markets. We exchanged views on the different stimulus programs that we pursue in our countries. And we also talked about what we feel is necessary in order to prepare the next G20 meeting, then also the upcoming G8 meeting. What is important is to implement what we decided on in London. The European states are now doing that; the United States are doing that. You have a very ambitious plan that you outlaid. So we will keep a close eye on developments. And then in the autumn when we meet at G20 we will also state very clearly that strengthening the multilateral system is also one that we consider to be important.

This year negotiations on climate change, on a post-Kyoto regime are also on the agenda. We very much welcome the very, very hard work that the United States has done in order to see to it that the necessary answers are found for this phenomenon of climate change. We know that it's very much an uphill battle; we're very familiar with that from the debate that we have here in our country. And we are keeping a close eye on legislation that is passed. We, I think, are at one in saying we need an ambitious program, we want to have successful negotiations in Copenhagen, and we want to make the best possible use of our time leading up to this.

Once again, a very warm welcome to you, sir, and we are so glad that you and the members of your team have taken the trouble to come here.

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well, thank you very much, everybody. Good morning. It is wonderful to be in the beautiful city of Dresden, which obviously is steeped in history and, as Chancellor Merkel discussed, has overcome great tragedies and is now this beautiful city full of hope. And so I'm very grateful to not only Chancellor Merkel but to the German people for their hospitality.

Germany is a close friend and a critical partner to the United States, and I believe that friendship is going to be essential not only for our two countries but for the world if we are to make progress on some of the critical issues that we face, whether it's national security issues or economic issues or issues that affect the globe like climate change.

Chancellor Merkel, as she mentioned, and I had a very productive discussion. We continue to work closely together to confront the global economic crisis and to restore growth and prosperity for our people. The downturn knows no borders and it will take some time and sustained action by all of us to move forward.

At the G20, we successfully laid out the parameters for collective action. And we've seen, I think on both sides of the Atlantic, some progress in stabilizing the economy, but we're far from done in the work that's required. I mentioned to her that, in the United States, we are working diligently to strengthen financial regulations to ensure that a crisis like this doesn't happen again, and it's going to be very important to coordinate between Europe and the United States as we move to strengthen our financial regulatory systems. We affirmed that we are not going to engage in protectionism. And as all of us do what's required to restart our economy, we have to make sure that we keep our borders open and that companies can move back and forth between the United States and Europe in providing goods and services to our respective countries.

I'm very pleased to see the resolution of the Opel situation here. We are very sympathetic towards each other, that it's not easy to help auto companies restructure, and it's not always popular, but it's also, we are convinced, the right thing to do. And I'm hopeful that not only are we going to see these companies stabilize, but also that they're going to emerge even stronger and more competitive in the international marketplace.

Chancellor Merkel and I discussed a range of security challenges. Germany has been a very strong NATO partner. As all of you know, we have great challenges in Afghanistan and increasingly in Pakistan, but our collective commitment to making sure that we are not seeing the kinds of terrorist bases that could pose harm to all of our people, that we maintain that commitment.

We also discussed the issue of Iran -- and not in isolation, but in a broader context of avoiding a nuclear arms race in the Middle East that could be profoundly dangerous. And I've said publicly that I'm committed to engaging in serious dialogue and negotiations with Iran. That can't be done in isolation, it has to be done in conjunction with the P5-plus-1 or the E3-plus-3 process, and Germany is going to be a critical partner in that process.

Later in the summer I will be traveling to Russia to discuss how we can reduce U.S. nuclear stockpiles and Russian nuclear stockpiles. And so as I said, our concern is not just Iran, but a broader effort to strengthen nonproliferation so that the threat of nuclear weapons is greatly reduced in our lifetime.

And as the Chancellor mentioned, we discussed my recent trip to the Middle East and the need for all of us to redouble our efforts to bring about two states, Israel and a Palestinian state, that are living side by side in peace and security. I think the moment is now for us to act on what we all know to be the truth, which is that each side is going to have to make some difficult compromises; we have to reject violence. The Palestinians have to get serious about creating the security environment that is required for Israel to feel confident. Israelis are going to have to take some difficult steps. I discussed some of those in the speech.

Ultimately, the United States can't force peace upon the parties. But what we've tried to do is to clear away some of the misunderstandings so that we can at least begin to have frank dialogue. And we're not going to be able to do that by ourselves; we're going to require strong partners like Germany in that process. And I know that Chancellor Merkel is very much committed to that.

So, again, it is a great pleasure to be here. It is a great pleasure to be with my friend once again, who I always seek out for intelligent analysis and straight talk. And I'm looking forward to continued partnership between our two countries to deal with the wide range of issues that we confront at this time.

So thank you very much.

CHANCELLOR MERKEL: Well, I believe you have the possibility to ask questions. Maybe we ought to -- do we start with a German question?

Q Christiane Meier, from the First German Television. Mr. President, did you have the opportunity to also address the issue of Guantanamo and do you feel sufficiently supported by Europe and here, in particular, by Germany, in accepting prisoners, former prisoners? And does this perhaps overshadow your relationship with the Chancellor or perhaps not -- there has been certain mild, sometimes even wild speculation over the course that your trip took, that you left certain venues open until the end and that this had something to do with your relationship with the Chancellor.

And Chancellor, did you make an offer or were you actually able as regards Guantanamo to give certain assurances to the President and accommodate him?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: I think your characterization of wild speculations is accurate -- they are very wild and based on no facts. The truth of the matter is, is that the relationship not only between our two countries but our two governments is outstanding. Most of the speculation around my schedule here in Germany doesn't take into account simple logistics: traveling, trying to get from one place to the other, coming off a Middle East trip, having to go to Normandy tomorrow. There are only 24 hours in the day. And so there's nothing to any of that speculation beyond us just trying to fit in what we could do on such a short trip. That's all that there was.

So stop it, all of you. (Laughter.) I know you have to find something to report on, but we have more than enough problems out there without manufacturing problems.

In terms of the issue of Guantanamo, look, this is a very difficult issue. It's difficult in my country; it's difficult internationally. We have a facility that contains some people who are very difficult to deal with. Some of them probably should not have been detained in those facilities in the first place. They should have been processed and tried and convicted. If they weren't convicted, then they should not have been languishing in a facility like that, that became a symbol for many around the world of us not sticking to our ideals and our traditions and rule of law.

But it was done. And that's the past. And now we have to move forward. We have spoken to the European Union about the possibilities of working with us and helping us in managing the closure of Guantanamo. Chancellor Merkel has been very open to discussions with us. We have not asked her for hard commitments, and she has not given us any hard commitments beyond having a serious discussion about are there ways that we can solve this problem. And I don't anticipate that it's going to be resolved anytime in the next two or three months. I think it's going to be a longer process of evaluation.

But I'm very appreciative of the openness, not only of Chancellor Merkel but other European countries to work with us, because I think they recognize that we have a shared interest in battling extremists and terrorists at the same time as we have a shared interest in upholding broader principles of international justice; and that those things are compatible, but it's going to take some time.

We'll be looking at individual cases; seeing are there people who can safely be transferred; if they are safely transferred, where would they be transferred to. And this is a conversation we're not just having with Germany but the broader European Union. And I very much appreciate the constructive manner in which Chancellor Merkel has approached the issue.

CHANCELLOR MERKEL: Allow me, if I may, to, as regards that one part of the question, say that it's fun to work together with the American President because very serious, very thorough analytical discussions very often lead us to draw the same conclusions. And I think we proved that in London, we proved that on previous meetings. I think that's part of our job, isn't it, that you exchange views, different views that you may have also. And wherever it was necessary, we have come to common solutions. So I very much look forward to our future cooperation.

On Guantanamo, Germany has always come out in favor, in particular my government, for closing down this facility. This has been a long-standing issue. We very purposefully at the time accepted Mr. Kurnaz, who has some sort of relation to Germany. And we also said that when there is a solution in the offing we will constructively contribute to it. Now there are talks going on of the Minister of the Interior with the American side, very intensive discussions, which we wish to continue. And at the very end I am absolutely confident that we will find a common solution.

I believe a question from the American side maybe.

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Just pick on somebody or --

Q Mr. President --

PRESIDENT OBAMA: You know, Jennifer has got the mic; sorry, Jake. (Laughter.)

Q He handed it to me, so I'm going to keep it.

PRESIDENT OBAMA: There you go.

Q Thank you, Mr. President. You challenged -- on Mideast peace, you challenged all the parties yesterday and again here in your opening remarks to take actions. The Israelis, the Palestinians, the Arab states, things they've been asked to do for years, actually agreed to do, but still today remain even -- perhaps even more unwilling or unable to do them. What are your specific next steps to try to break this stalemate? And why do you think your approach is realistic?

And then to Chancellor Merkel, if I could, you talked about a timeline that the two of you discussed on Mideast peace. Can you be more specific about that, please?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: As I said at the outset of my speech, yesterday was just one speech and it doesn't replace all the hard work that's going to have to be done -- that was done before the speech and is going to have to be done in the years to come in order to solve what has been a 60-year problem. And I'm under no illusions that whatever statements I've put forward somehow are going to supplant the need to do that work.

I think that what is different now is, number one, you're seeing a U.S. administration and American President engage this issue almost on the day that I took office. We've only been in office five months, and yet we've seen extraordinary activity already on this issue. And that's sent a signal to all the parties in the Middle East that we are serious. I've assigned George Mitchell, my special envoy, who has met repeatedly with all the players in the region and who is going to be going back next week in the wake of my appearance in Cairo to follow up with each of the individual parties on a whole host of negotiation points and potential confidence-building measures that can be taken.

And I've already met with Prime Minister Netanyahu. Our governments are in close contact and communication about how we can move forward on some of the items that might be inhibiting restarting talks. I've had Abbas in the White House to do the same.

And so you've probably seen more sustained activity on this issue in the first five months than you would have seen in most previous administrations. The reason we are doing that is because not only had talks ground to a halt, but there was a sense that all sides were getting so dug in and so cynical that you might reach a point where you could never get the parties back at the table. And I think given what we've done so far, we've at least created the space, the atmosphere, in which talks can restart.

Now, I just have to say one more time, the United States can't solve this problem. The United States can be a partner in solving the problem, but ultimately the parties involved are going to have to make a decision that the prosperity and security of their people is best served by negotiations and compromise, and we can't force them to make those difficult decisions. What we can do is to provide them a framework and a forum and the support for such an outcome to be achieved.

And I'm sure that -- one of the things I very much appreciate was Chancellor Merkel's willingness to put the prestige and the resources of the German government behind that same effort. I think the entire international community is going to have a responsibility to help these parties achieve a hard-won peace that will ultimately be good for everybody's security interests.

CHANCELLOR MERKEL: Well, I believe that with the new American administration, with President Barack Obama, there is actually a unique opportunity now to see to it that this peace process -- or let's perhaps be more careful -- this negotiation process to be revived again.

Yesterday's speech in a way opened up also the door to the Arab world again. And in the way that it was described just now you have sort of made steps along the way. And when steps are made along the way then we feel as Germans we can perhaps be helpful to accompany this. For historical reasons we have a very close and very special relationship with Israel. We have a very great interest in the safety and security of Israel. And on the other hand we also have a very fervent wish a Palestinian state be built.

This agenda needs to be worked on step by step, but it is certainly true the parties, themselves, have to show a readiness, a willingness to do something for the peace and security of the world as a whole. I see this as a core issue, and an essential and crucial issue. And this is why we all have the wish and the willingness to bring this matter forward. The historical opportunity I think is there, even though looking at many, many countries in the Arab world -- even looking at many countries in the Arab world, they have a very great interest in progress there because for the economic development as well they need peace there, they need security. And we should have every interest in seeing this bring about and we will give our contribution to it.

Q You will later on, Mr. President, visit the former concentration camp, Buchenwald. Tell me now already, if possible, what is your personal motivation, what drives you to this? We were told here in Germany that because you know Elie Wiesel, the Nobel Peace Prize Winner so well, because he told you about his periods in the camp where he suffered great hardship that this sort of made you do it.

And another political issue, if I may. Madam Chancellor, climate change. Germany, Europe are putting concrete targets on the agenda, concrete reduction targets. Will America in the post-Kyoto process be willing to commit itself to concrete reduction targets? Or are you pursuing a different kind of approach, Mr. President, similar to you predecessor in office?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well, first of all, one of the main reasons for me being in Europe this week is to commemorate the 65th anniversary of the landing in Normandy. And this is a moment that obviously is of great importance to the United States, so many lives were lost during this period; it marks the beginning of the end of World War II, and many of the veterans of World War II are in the sunset of their years. And so having an opportunity to acknowledge them once again and the sacrifices they made was very important to me.

As part of that trip we thought it was very important for me to visit Buchenwald. First of all, I've never traveled to one of the concentration camps, but this one has a personal connection to me. It's not only that I know Elie Wiesel and have read about his writings, it's also that -- and I've stated this before -- that my grandfather's -- my grandmother's brother was one -- was part of the units that first liberated that camp. And I've talked about this before in the United States, perhaps not in Germany, the shock for this very young man -- he couldn't have been more than 19, 20, 21 at the time, was such that he ended up, when he returned, having a very difficult time readjusting to civilian life, and it was a memory that burned in him for quite some time.

And that, you know, was something that I learned about as a young person, and for me then to be able to come and reflect on this very difficult history and to not only reflect on the dangers of when peoples are in conflict and not acknowledging a common humanity; but also to celebrate how out of that tragedy you now have a unified Europe, a Germany that is a very close ally of Israel, and the possibilities of reconciliation and forgiveness and hope. All those things I think are part of why this visit is very important to me.

In terms of climate change, ultimately the world is going to need targets that it can meet. It can't be general, vague approaches. We're going to have to make some tough decisions and take concrete actions if we are going to deal with a potentially cataclysmic disaster. And we are seeing progress in Congress around energy legislation that would set up for the first time in the United States a cap and trade system. That process is moving forward in ways that I think if you had asked political experts two or three months ago would have seemed impossible.

So I'm actually more optimistic than I was about America being able to take leadership on this issue, joining Europe, which over the last several years has been ahead of us on this issue.

As I told Chancellor Merkel, unless the United States and Europe, with our large carbon footprints, per capita carbon footprints, are willing to take some decisive steps, it's going to be very difficult for us to persuade countries that on a per capita basis at least are still much less wealthy, like China or India, to take the steps that they're going to need to take in controlling carbon emissions.

So we are very committed to working together and hopeful that we can arrive in Copenhagen having displayed that commitment in concrete ways.

CHANCELLOR MERKEL: Allow me, if I may, to say, as to a visit to Buchenwald, that this is for me deeply moving, to see an American President, in this case President Barack Obama, as a visitor in Buchenwald. And he talked about his personal background as regards this question.

Look at Buchenwald. Buchenwald is one example of these horrible concentration camps, liberated by American troops. Later on it was turned during the Soviet period again, and it also, in the time when Germany was divided, it again became somewhat symbolic. People in that part of the country were not able to enjoy freedom and security.

Now, after the end of the Cold War, we go there after Germany has been reunited, after Europe has been reunited, now that we also enjoy freedom and democracy, as the United States does. That is very moving, and it shows you that actually history makes things possible if a sufficient number of people believe in the dream of freedom.

Q Thank you, Mr. President. A couple questions, one just to follow up on Jennifer's. What are some of the gestures of good faith that you'd like to see from the Israelis and Palestinians? But then regarding your visit to Buchenwald, since the Holocaust, a constant refrain in the United States has been "never again," but U.S. President after U.S. President has sat back and let genocides happen over and over, whether Cambodia or Rwanda. What does "never again" mean to you as a U.S. President, especially given the fact that genocide is going on right now in Darfur? There were accusations of genocide in Sri Lanka a few weeks ago. What does it mean to you? And are you doing everything you can to make sure "never again" is not a hollow refrain?

And then for Chancellor Merkel, does Germany not have an extra obligation to take action to prevent genocide from happening in other parts of the world? Thank you.

PRESIDENT OBAMA: With respect to confidence-building measures or next steps, again, I'm going to be sending George Mitchell back into the region next week. He's going to be meeting with all the various parties involved. I think I've said publicly and I repeated in the speech some things that are going to have to be done.

You know, a lot of attention has been given to my statement that the Israelis need to stop settlement construction, and I recognize that it's received a lot of attention in Israel, as well. Keep in mind that all I've done there is reaffirm commitments that the Israelis themselves had already made in the road map. And I recognize the very difficult politics within Israel of getting that done, and I'm very sympathetic to how hard it will be.

But as Israel's friend, the United States I think has an obligation to just be honest with that friend about how important it is to achieve a two-state solution -- for Israel's national security interests, as well as ours, as well as the Palestinians. And that's an area where steps can be taken.

They're not the only steps, by the way, that Israel can take and will need to take in order to advance movement towards peace. And I mentioned some of the other issues that I've discussed with Prime Minister Netanyahu's office, for example, increasing freedom of movement within the West Bank, dealing with the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and allowing reconstruction to proceed more aggressively.

What's been interesting is that less attention has been focused on the insistence on my part that the Palestinians and the Arab states have to take very concrete actions. When it comes to the Palestinians, we know what they're supposed to be doing. They have to continue to make progress on security in the West Bank.

They have to deal with incitement issues. There's still a tendency, even within -- among Palestinians who say they are interested in peace with Israel, to engage in statements that are -- that incite a hatred of Israel or are not constructive to the peace process. Now I think, to his credit, President Abbas has made progress on this issue -- but not enough.

We still have not seen a firm commitment from the Palestinian Authority that they can control some of the border areas that Israel is going to be very concerned about if there were to be a two-state solution. There are still problems of corruption and mismanagement within the Authority that have to be addressed.

So there are going to be a whole set of things having to do with the Palestinians' ability to govern effectively and maintain security. And if they're not solved, Israelis are going to have trouble moving forward.

And the Arab states, what I'd like to see is indicators that they are willing, if Israel makes tough commitments, to also make some hard choices that will allow for an opening of commerce, diplomatic exchanges between Israel and its neighbors.

Now, all these things are going to take time. They're not going to happen immediately. But I'm confident that if we stick with it, having started early, that we can make some serious progress this year.

On the issue of genocide, I think "never again" means that the international community has a obligation, even when it's inconvenient, to act when genocide is occurring. So on the issue of Darfur, for example, I didn't simply mention it in a speech yesterday before a Muslim audience, talking about genocide that's taking place within a majority Muslim country, but I also raised it in discussions with President Mubarak of Egypt, who has strong diplomatic relations with the country of Sudan.

And I've assigned one of my closest national security advisors, General Scott Gration, as a special envoy who has been traveling throughout the region trying to not only solve the immediate humanitarian crisis that exists and that was made worse when President Bashir kicked out many of the international non-governmental organizations that have been providing humanitarian assistance. We've been working diligently to solve that immediate problem and get humanitarian assistance back on the ground. But what we've also been doing is to try to reactivate the possibilities of a peaceful -- a peace settlement between Khartoum and some of the rebels in Darfur that would allow the internally displaced people from Darfur to start returning to their homes.

So we've been very active on this issue. It may not have received the attention in the press that some of the other issues have, but we are spending a lot of time trying to make sure that we make progress and that the people of Darfur are able to return to their homes and live in peace.

CHANCELLOR MERKEL: Well, first, experience -- part and parcel of our history, of our past experience here in Germany is obviously the Shoah. And out of that comes an everlasting responsibility for the safety and security of the state of Israel. If you like, this has been the (inaudible) of every German government, ever since the Federal Republic came into being, and it will always be that case.

As regards genocide all over the world, we have an international responsibility that we need to shoulder here. And here, too, we work very closely together. We, all of us, have made the experience I think along the way that this quite often takes much longer to resolve than one would like it to be and can be satisfied about.

But military intervention alone, without any political framework that we put on these issues, is also not always successful. We've made that experience, as well. This is why the European Union -- actually during the EU-Africa Summit established very close links with the African Union, trying also to win over African countries to shoulder their responsibility or helping them shoulder their responsibility, for example by providing them with the necessary material, the equipment, but also through political discussions.

I think that due to the experience we've made over the years as European Union members that we were able after the Second World War to live together peacefully. We have an obligation not only to create peace within Europe, because we've been able to do that, but to actually share with others the knowledge how we managed to get that to happen. Dignity of man is inviolable. This is what is inscribed in the German constitution. And this goes not only for the Germans, not only for the Europeans, but for every human being all over the world. It means we can solve problems of this kind. We as Germans, after the Second World War, have made an experience that was certainly not a matter of course. The Allies actually extended a helping hand to us, to our neighbor France, the United Kingdom, but also the United States of America. We need to share this experience in order to prevent further cases of tragedy occurring. And we will always be at your side, at the side of the Americans.

Thank you very much.

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Thank you.

Obama in Cairo: A "Challenging, Thoughtful Speech"

Related Post: President Obama’s Speech in Cairo - The “Right Path” Runs Through Israeli Settlements

I'm going to take another 24 hours to sift through the reactions to President Obama's speech in Cairo, but the general perception is that it has been well-received in the US. There were expected levels of idiocy (Joe Pagliarulo on The Glenn Beck Program that Obama should have done what Ronald Reagan would have, telling moderate Muslims to love America or "live in your cave") and political confrontation (Liz Cheney, who is clearly making her move from State Department bureaucrat and Vice President's daughter to rising Republican star, scoffing at Obama's "hand-holding" in a world of "terrorism,...the slaughter of innocents, and Iran’s hegemonic hopes for the Middle East"); however, even former Bush Administration officials like Peter Feaver declared, "For the most part, I think [Obama] did what he had to do," and The Wall Street Journal gave support, albeit through the fatuous and misleading claim, "Barack Hussein Bush".

There was sustained criticism of Obama's presentation from Noam Chomsky, who saw no substance apart from Israel-Palestine, where Obama was continuing "the path of unilateral US rejectionism". Yet other analysts who have been hostile to the President's interventions in Afghanistan and Pakistan were positive about this engagement with the Middle East; Robert Dreyfuss wrote, "Obama hit a home run."

In addition to the shrewd observations of Canuckistan and Chris E on my original analysis, I was particularly struck by the evaluation of Marc Lynch, which had high praise for Obama's "thoughtful, nuanced and challenging reflection on America's relations with the Muslims around the world". At the same time, I think there is a convergence of possible weakness both in this evaluation and the speech of the President. Lynch's question on Israel and Palestine, "How will the U.S. and the international community support...non-violent action and redeem...moral authority?", could be applied to Obama's vagueness on plans beyond an initial challenge to the Israeli expansion of settlements.

My First Take on The Speech

MARC LYNCH

President Obama's speech today in Cairo met the bar he set for himself.  In an address modeled after the Philadelphia speech on race, he forewent soaring oratory in favor of a thoughtful, nuanced and challenging reflection on America's relations with the Muslims around the world (not "the Muslim world", which for some reason became a major issue in American punditry over the last few days).  As he frankly recognized, no one speech can overcome the many problems he addressed.  But this speech is an essential starting point in a genuine conversation, a respectful dialogue on core issues. After the initial rush of instant commentaries and attempts to inflame controversy pass, it should become the foundation for a serious, ongoing conversation which could, as the President put it, "remake this world."

Before I get into the substance of the speech, a few preliminary notes.

First, Obama made an admirable effort to speak a few words in Arabic, even if he mangled the pronunciations (hajib instead of hijab, al-Azhar). As anyone who has traveled abroad knows, a little effort learning local languages signals respect and goes a long way.  He also effectively interspersed quotes from the Quran, without it being too obtrusive -- I would have liked to have seen some bits from the great Islamic philosophers, but oh well.

Second, the rollout of the speech already stands as one of the most successful public diplomacy and strategic communications campaigns I can ever remember -- and hopefully a harbinger of what is to come.  This wasn't a one-off Presidential speech.  The succession of statements (al-Arabiya interview, Turkish Parliament, message to the Iranians) and the engagement on the Israeli-Palestinian policy front set the stage.  Then the White House unleashed the full spectrum of new media engagement for this speech -- SMS and Twitter updates, online video, and online chatroom environment, and more.  This will likely be followed up upon to put substance on the notion of this as a "conversation" rather than an "address" -- which along with concrete policy progress will be the key to its long-term impact, if any.

Third, I am going to refrain from commenting on the Arab response for now.  That will take a few days, at least, to unfold.  The usual suspects will appear on the media, and some will have valuable things to say, but I want to wait to see the talk shows on the major TV stations, op-eds, forums, blogs, and more.  A cautionary note, though --- English-language Egyptian blogs are likely to be a particularly poor initial "focus group" for  judging the response.  But listening to the response and engaging in the debate which emerges will be key, for American officials and for the American public.  Because Obama's address sought to reframe the conversation, we won't know whether it succeeds until we see how the subsequent political debate unfolds.

OK, now to the speech itself.   This was a challenging, thoughtful speech which will be picked at and discussed for a long time.  It wasn't as revolutionary as some might have hoped, but that's not surprising -- the ground is so well-trodden that it would have been astonishing to see something genuinely new.  Instead, it struck me as a thoughtful reflection and invitation to conversation, with some important nuance which might easily be missed.  It was neither "just like Bush" nor a total departure from past American rhetoric.    I will only focus here on some of the most interesting and important aspects from my perspective -- and I have intentionally not read any other commentary or talked to anyone about it, in order to keep my own impressions fresh for now.

Violent Extremism. Obama's lengthy early discussion of violent extremism was politically necessary, if a bit excessive -- the most Bush-like part of the speech in some ways, but not others.   He made clear the reality of the threat posed by al-Qaeda and invoked 9/11 to provide context for American efforts in Afghanistan. But crucially, without drawing attention to it, he pointedly did not refer to a "Global War on Terror."   He took care, as in his Turkey address, to correctly placed the challenge on the marginal fringe of Islam: "The enduring faith of over a billion people is so much bigger than the narrow hatred of a few. Islam is not part of the problem in combating violent extremism - it is an important part of promoting peace."

This deflates rather than exaggerates the threat, while still taking it seriously -- his lengthy discussion of violent extremists should reassure skeptics who feared he would ignore it, but hopefully without dominating and driving out the other messages.  Throughout the speech he took care to present a vision for a convergence between the values, interests and aspirations of those vast majorities.   Such a convergence must not be held hostage to those few violent extremists, he made clear, while also forcefully repeating that those extremists will be combatted.  He did well to insist that the U.S. was changing course on deviations from its ideals -- torture, Guantanamo -- without belaboring the point. All of this was fine, similar to the Turkey speech, and was what needed to be said.

It worries me, though, to hear him say that the U.S. must remain in Afghanistan and Pakistan until "we [can] be confident that there [are] not violent extremists in Afghanistan and Pakistan determined to kill as many Americans as they possibly can."  By that standard, U.S. troops probably can never leave... but that's a topic for another day. But he did very well to point out firmly that the U.S. had no aspirations for bases in either Afghanistan or Iraq, and that "America has a dual responsibility: to help Iraq forge a better future – and to leave Iraq to Iraqis."

Israelis and Palestinians. I'm still struggling to grapple with this truly astonishing portion of his speech.  I don't think I have ever heard any American politician, much less President, so eloquently, empathetically, and directly equate the suffering and aspirations of Israelis and Palestinians. This is the one part which I have to quote:

Around the world, the Jewish people were persecuted for centuries, and anti-Semitism in Europe culminated in an unprecedented Holocaust. Tomorrow, I will visit Buchenwald, which was part of a network of camps where Jews were enslaved, tortured, shot and gassed to death by the Third Reich. Six million Jews were killed - more than the entire Jewish population of Israel today. Denying that fact is baseless, ignorant, and hateful. Threatening Israel with destruction - or repeating vile stereotypes about Jews - is deeply wrong, and only serves to evoke in the minds of Israelis this most painful of memories while preventing the peace that the people of this region deserve.

On the other hand, it is also undeniable that the Palestinian people - Muslims and Christians - have suffered in pursuit of a homeland. For more than sixty years they have endured the pain of dislocation. Many wait in refugee camps in the West Bank, Gaza, and neighboring lands for a life of peace and security that they have never been able to lead. They endure the daily humiliations - large and small - that come with occupation. So let there be no doubt: the situation for the Palestinian people is intolerable. America will not turn our backs on the legitimate Palestinian aspiration for dignity, opportunity, and a state of their own.

For decades, there has been a stalemate: two peoples with legitimate aspirations, each with a painful history that makes compromise elusive. It is easy to point fingers - for Palestinians to point to the displacement brought by Israel's founding, and for Israelis to point to the constant hostility and attacks throughout its history from within its borders as well as beyond. But if we see this conflict only from one side or the other, then we will be blind to the truth: the only resolution is for the aspirations of both sides to be met through two states, where Israelis and Palestinians each live in peace and security.

This is quite possibly the most powerful statement of America's stake in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the urgent need for justice on both sides that I have ever heard.  He posed sharp challenges to Israelis and Palestinians alike, directly addressing the realities of Palestinian life under occupation and the humanitarian crisis in Gaza while also empathizing with Israeli fears.  He positioned the U.S. as the even-handed broker it needs to be:  "America will align our policies with those who pursue peace, and say in public what we say in private to Israelis and Palestinians and Arabs." Left unsaid, but clearly in the background, was the fact that he has been matching those words with deeds by forcefully taking on the issue of Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

He also offered a powerful analogy to the American civil rights campaign and other global experiences to argue that "that violence is a dead end. It is a sign of neither courage nor power to shoot rockets at sleeping children, or to blow up old women on a bus. That is not how moral authority is claimed; that is how it is surrendered."  I really like this analogy, which he extended well beyond America's shores. Some Palestinians will likely complain, though, that their own attempts at non-violent activism too often get crushed beneath Israeli bulldozers.  How will the U.S. and the international community support such non-violent action and redeem such moral authority?

Iran and "Resistance". The section on Iran was artful, though not as exceptional as some other parts of the speech.  He did well to offer to move beyond the past and to offer a way forward, but with few new details about that course. The key may be not in the comments on nuclear weapons or even on the offer of dialogue, but in this line:   "The question, now, is not what Iran is against, but rather what future it wants to build."  This seems to be a nod to the reframing which I have been urging for months now:  challenging the "Resistance" narrative which has increasingly dominated regional discourse.  This reading is reinforced by an essential absence:  the whole notion of a new cold war of "moderate states" confronting "radical states" -- the regional alliance against Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah advocated by the Bush administration, the Israeli government, and certain Arab leaders such as Hosni Mubarak -- was totally absent from the speech. While Obama did not confront the Resistance narrative directly, his entire speech sought to challenge it in practice -- offering partnership, declining to endorse the old lines of division or attempt to rally those forces in a new conflict, and challenging all sides to articulate what they are for rather than what they are against.

Democracy. Many people have worried that Obama would not address issues of human rights and democracy in the speech.  He certainly did not offer a Bush/Rice style grand call for democratic transformation of the region -- but, it again has to be noted, those grand calls for democratic transformation accomplished virtually nothing and had been abandoned within a year.  It's not like Bush left a legacy of active democratization which Obama is supposedly abandoning.  Rather than repeat the old buzzwords to please those invested in the democracy promotion industry, Obama did something more important by addressing head on some of the most vexing issues which have plagued American thinking about democracy in the region. This, to my eye, was the key statement:

America respects the right of all peaceful and law-abiding voices to be heard around the world, even if we disagree with them. And we will welcome all elected, peaceful governments - provided they govern with respect for all their people.

As I noted yesterday, that suggests clearly that the U.S. will accept the democratic participation of peaceful Islamist movements as long as they abstain from violence --and respect their electoral victories provided that they commit to the democratic process.  He made a passionate defense of that latter point, that victors must demonstrate tolerance and respect for minorities and that elections alone are not enough.  But he clearly did not prejudge participants in the electoral game -- the old canard about Islamists wanting "one man, one vote, one time" thankfully, and significantly, did not appear.

Liberalism and Faith. Finally, Obama offered a genuinely challenging reformulation of how to think about religion in public life: "We cannot disguise hostility towards any religion behind the pretence of liberalism."  There's a lot packed into that simple statement, which I think gets to the heart of the hypocrisies and bad faith of much of the Western public discourse about Islam (particularly, but by no means exclusively, on the right).  He defended the right of Muslim women to wear the hijab if they so choose, while passionately defending their right to education and to full participation in public life.  And this links back to his lengthy, forthright discussion with which he began his speech: "Islam is a part of America."  Too often, an idealized, supposedly secular America is juxtaposed against religious Islamic countries -- but the America where I live is one filled with religious people of all faiths who bring that faith into the public realm on a daily basis for better or for worse.   Recognizing that reality, and how the U.S. has and has not successfully managed the tensions between liberalism and religion, strikes me as potentially productive.

President Obama's Speech in Cairo: The "Right Path" Runs Through Israeli Settlements

Latest Post: After the Obama Speech - Israel Re-Positions on Settlements, Two-State Solution
Latest Post: After the Obama Speech - Hamas Asks, “Is He Ready to Walk the Way He Talks?”

Near the end of his hour-long speech in Cairo, President Obama declared, "We must choose the right path, not just the easy path." An Enduring America colleague blurted, "How very Obi-Wan Kenobi".

Of course, Obama's address wasn't just Star Wars. It also drew from the Koran on at least five occasions, concluding, "May God's Peace Be Upon You", the Bible ("Do Unto Others as You Would Have Them Do Unto You", "Blessed are the Peacemakers", and the Talmud. It tried to bring Heaven and Earth together from democracy to religious freedom to women's rights to economic development. It rejected the "clash of civilisations" by calling for mutual respect based on an overlap of common principles.

It was, in short, a speech that will draw acclaim from many in the US for its high vision and lofty rhetoric (even though I have no doubt that the Koran references, the self-citation of his name "Barack Hussein Obama", and the President's identification with his audience through his experience from Kenya to Indonesia to Muslims in Chicago will be duly castigated by the Usual Critics). And that general ambition, I think, will ensure the warm applause of the listeners at Cairo University will echo today for many people overseas, including Obama's primary audience in the Middle East.

But what will be heard tomorrow? The "right path" may be laid out with ideals of distant Nirvanas, but Obama has to get there through more immediate, less-exalted territory. And it is in his self-defined three tests that the President's sweeping call to live together will be confronted by people still dying and suffering in different camps.

1. THE HOPEFUL CLIMB: THE IRAN TEST

Obama actually labelled this "rights and responsibilities on nuclear weapons", but that was a clumsy excuse to raise the Tehran issue.

Indeed, it was initially a very misguided sleight-of-speech since it immediately put the case that Iran is close to nuclear weaponry and, more importantly, that it was the only case worthy of notice. (The Twitter boards immediately lit up with, "Nuclear weapons? Israel?")

Obama, however, rescued himself with a shift to an acknowledgement of shared historical blame --- the US acknowledges trying to knock off the Iran Government in 1953 while the Islamic Republic has its own acts of violence since 1979 --- and then the key declaration. Talks will move forward without preconditions. No mention of deadlines, either.

In short --- are you listening, Tel Aviv? --- "engagement" is on.

2) THE DIVERSION: "VIOLENT EXTREMISM" (AFGHANISTAN-PAKISTAN-IRAQ)

This was Obama's lead item on his seven challenges, and it could have come straight from the George W. Bush playbook (although not delivered so eloquently). The US was "not at war with Islam" but it was "relently confronting extremists who threaten our security". Afghanistan was a war of necessity, as "Al Qa'eda killed nearly 3000 people on that day" of 11 September 2001. Al Qa'eda had continued to kill in many countries, and many of those killed were Muslims.

The President's message? Eight years after 9-11, the US would withdraw its forces from Afghanistan and Pakistan if there were "no violent extremists". Or, turned around, since "violent extremists" are likely to be present in those two countries, the American military --- overtly and covertly, leading operations and pushing for them from Pakistan and Afghanistan allies behind the scenes ---- will be on a long-term mission.

Of course, Obama balanced the military dimension by talking about the economic aid the US is giving to Afghanistan and Pakistan. It's the omissions, however, that were striking. No reference to US bombing, missile strikes, or drone attacks; indeed, the President did not even put a number on the troop escalation.

If this speech had been given closer to the affected areas, I think Obama would be facing some very bad press tomorrow. As it was, a more distant audience in Cairo could greet the call for the Long War against Violent Extremism (former known as Terror) with a shrug, apart from applause for the line that Islam does not condone the killing of innocents.

As for other battlefronts in that LWVE, the President's discourse on Iraq was also received patiently but fairly quietly --- this, in comparison with other issues, appears to be yesterday's conflict. There was a much heartier response to the brief but pointed declarations of an end to torture and a closure of Guantanamo Bay.

3) THE TOUCHSTONE: ISRAEL AND PALESTINE

"Here we go," my colleague and I said. Obama, after 25 minutes, had finally said, "We need to discuss...the situation between Israelis, Palestinians and the Arab world."

It was an almost breath-taking rhetorical dive. The President immediately made clear, "America’s strong bonds with Israel are well known. This bond is unbreakable." He buttressed that with an extended emphasis on the Holocaust: "Denying that fact is baseless, ignorant, and hateful."

Having linked support of Israel with historical memory and the fight against anti-Semitism, Obama could put the other half of the equation just as boldly: "Let there be no doubt: the situation for the Palestinian people is intolerable. America will not turn our backs on the legitimate Palestinian aspiration for dignity, opportunity, and a state of their own."

Yes, George W. Bush had also mouthed "Palestinian state", but not with this force. And there was more. While Obama went to great lengths to say, "Violence is a dead end," he offered a political opening. His call was not just on the Palestinian Authority to prove its "capacity to govern". He also held out recognition of Hamas, provided that organisation "put an end to violence, recognize past agreements, and recognize Israel’s right to exist".

As one listener wrote, "[It was] refreshing to hear a US President go further than any previous in relation to the [Israeli] occupation." However, that listener also added, "Now we need action."

And it is here that Obama's words and post-speech reality meet. The test case for his policy is now the a defining test:

Israelis must acknowledge that just as Israel’s right to exist cannot be denied, neither can Palestine’s. The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop.

The President added equally important demands: "Israel must also live up to its obligations to ensure that Palestinians can live, and work, and develop their society....Progress in the daily lives of the Palestinian people must be part of a road to peace, and Israel must take concrete steps to enable such progress." For now, however, the line is drawn: Tel Aviv concedes on settlement or Obama's Middle Eastern plan falls at the first hurdle.

Indeed, that line is so stark that the President did not even refer to other significant issues. He referring to the general responsibilities of Arab States, but there was no mention of Syria (and thus an Israeli-Syrian peace agreement), no reference to Lebanon, let alone Hezbollah, no place for Saudi Arabia apart from an allusion to "King Abdullah’s Interfaith dialogue".

And so the paradox of Cairo: at the end of Obama's hour, his exaltation of values across faiths comes to Earth in those buildings in East Jerusalem and across the West Bank. It is their spread, rather than the spread of goodwill or religious blessings, that will determine the fate of this President's "right path".

Obama's Strategy in the Middle East: Resetting with Rhetoric One More Time

One useful way of considering tomorrow's grand Middle Eastern speech by President Obama is to recall that it was supposed to be delivered three or four months ago. Soon after the election, Obama's advisors briefed the press that the new President, within weeks of the Inauguration, would be addressing the world from Cairo. His high hopes for a new region, with the vision that long-term enemies could live and progress together, would be followed by talks fostered by US representatives.

Israel's invasion of Gaza ruined that plan, so the Obama White House went to Plan B. Obama's special envoy, George Mitchell, and then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made high-profile trips to the region; there were specific missions by diplomats, such as Jeffrey Feltman's and Daniel Shapiro's trip to Damascus. Middle Eastern leaders --- Abdullah of Jordan, Netanyahu of Israel, Abbas of the Palestinian Authority --- came to Washington.

The only hitch is that, after all the travel and photo opportunities, there has been no notable advance. Israel, now led by the Government of Benjamin Netanyahu, has not only balked at any prospect of talks that would lead to a Palestinian state or a headline measure such as a freeze on settlement expansion in Jerusalem and the West Bank. And, with Tel Aviv making no movement, Arab governments have pulled away from the symbolic advance of "recognition", for example, by allowing overflights of their countries by Israeli commercial planes.

So Obama takes the podium in Cairo, after talks in Saudi Arabia today, empty-handed. Speaking to the Israeli Parliament on Monday, Prime Minister Netanyahu publicly slapped down the American demand on settlements --- his Defense Minister, Ehud Barak, is in the US offering the "compromise" of "dismantling unauthorized settlement outposts", which does nothing to address the American concern about legally-authorized construction. Obama, rather weakly, told the BBC that he would look to Arab States to offer some measures for a regional peace process, knowing (I suspect) that there is no prospect of that. Saudi Arabia wants some signal from Tel Aviv that the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative, launched by Riyadh, is a starting platform. Damascus, with Israel not even creeping towards a resumption of indirect talks, plays a waiting game.

What, oh what, can this President do? Well, he will do what he has done best so far. He will by-pass the specific difficulties with the clarion call to engagement based on mutual respect and interests. It worked in his Inaugural Speech, it worked in the Al-Arabiya television interview in January, and it worked in his address in Ankara (which is now our #1 story in the last eight months and continues to be in the Top 5 on most days). Obama's rhetoric may be derided by some domestic critics for its refusal to situate Islam as subservient to "American values" and for his "apologies" for past actions in US foreign policy, but it has succeeded with many overseas listeners precisely because it recognises those listeners, rather than demanding adherence first to an American position.

That is why, in recent days, Obama and his advisors have shifted from discussion of particular elements in a "peace process" to the general statement, repeated on two occasions by the President in his interview with National Public Radio on Monday, that it is "early in the process". The President will undoubtedly mention (according to McClatchy Newspapers, "forcefully endorse") a Palestinian state, but he will set out no timetable or specific steps towards that state. He will cite "areas of mutual interest" with Arab and Islamic countries but will be more concrete in his suggestions on defeating "violent extremism" than on negotiations toward political and economic agreements.

One could argue, of course, that is still quite an achievement after 4+ months in office, especially as every US President since Dwight Eisenhower in 1953 has pursued an Arab-Israeli settlement and none --- with the notable exception of Jimmy Carter --- has had a lasting success. And it looks like Obama will wow his observers in the American media (with the exception, of course, of ardently pro-Israeli outlets and of Bush Administration supporters who cling to the fiction that "democracy promotion" was the primary aim of that President's eight years in office). The working consensus is "a brave and possibly historic effort" with "an evenhanded approach", and Obama's rhetorical power is likely to sustain that praise.

(Beyond well-meaning support for the President, there are the more troubling hurrahs of self-serving sycophancy. New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, after preening that he told Obama a joke during their 20 minutes of phone time, offers without further awareness or reflection: "The president has no illusions that one speech will make lambs lie down with lions. Rather, he sees it as part of his broader diplomatic approach that says: If you go right into peoples’ living rooms, don’t be afraid to hold up a mirror to everything they are doing, but also engage them in a way that says ‘I know and respect who you are.’ You end up — if nothing else — creating a little more space for U.S. diplomacy. And you never know when that can help.")

The issue, however, is whether Obama's audience in the Middle East and beyond will settle for feel-good but abstract advances. US supporters of the President are exalting his forthright stance on Israeli settlements, but the fact remains that Tel Aviv has been equally forthright so far in rebuffing Obama. If that intransigence continues, Washington's Plan B is vague, limited so far to talk of not guaranteeing an American veto in defence of Israel in the United Nations Security Council (and not even mentioning, as the George H.W. Bush Administration did, withholding of US economic and military aid).

And, of course, the settlements are only Tel Aviv's first line of defence against an attack for a two-state Israel-Palestine resolution. If Washington gets its way, there will then be the issue of the Israeli wall cutting across the West Bank, and then the issue of the status of Jerusalem, and then the Palestinian civilian "right of return" to the lands they lost in 1948, and then the Israeli military's "right of return" to the West Bank if it perceives a security threat, and then the small matter of a place called Gaza.

One might respond that Israel-Palestine is only one issue in the complexities of the region. True, but it is a touchstone issue (rather than, for example, Israel's preferred option of Iran). Symbolically, the failure to get a resolution that accords not respect but a meaningful economic and political status for Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza will be held up by others, whether for the benevolent reason that they see it as an essential case of justice and rights or for the less-than-benevolent reason that they want to divert attention from issues in their own communities and countries or the very malevolent reason that they want to justify hostile and often violent action against perceived enemies.

But, for those who want a context beyond Israel and Palestine (or, rather, Israel and the West Bank of the Palestinian Authority), Obama has set himself even bigger problems. There are the questions of how Obama can walk the tight-rope between support for political freedom and US alliances, powerfully demonstrated by the location of the President's speech, with far-from-democratic regimes. A less noted but just as significant difficulty with "local" politics emerged in a question from National Public Radio:

You’ve mentioned the — many times, the importance of reaching out to Iran with an open hand; trying to engage that country. Are you also willing to try to engage with Hezbollah or Hamas?

Obama responded with a pretty firm "they can just shove off":

Iran is a huge, significant nation-state that has — you know, has, I think, across the international community been recognized as such. Hezbollah and Hamas are not. And I don’t think that we have to approach those entities in the same way.

The President might as well have said "illegitimate". When the NPR questioner persisted, "Does that change with [Hezbollah's] electoral gains?", Obama refused to grant the political party --- which is likely to be a significant, if not dominant, entity in Lebanon's ruling coalition after this month's elections --- any status:

If — at some point — Lebanon is a member of the United Nations. If at some point they are elected as a head of state, or a head of state is elected in Lebanon, that is a member of that organization, then that would raise these issues. That hasn’t happened yet.

There was a bit more flexibility --- but only a bit --- with Hamas, as Obama said "the discussions...could potentially proceed" if Hamas accepted the conditions of the US-UK-EU-Russia Quartet.

The danger for the President is that, for all his talk of respect and equality, many will see him continuing rather than renouncing the US priority of getting the "right" governments. Vice President Joe Biden's trip to Beirut in the midst of the electoral campaign did not go unnoticed by Lebanese observers. There are suspicions, after a West Bank firefight that killed two leading commanders of Hamas' military wing, that the US is supporting (and possibly prompting) the Palestinian Authority's crackdown on its rival for power. Maybe, in the context of a grand speech, these are just troubling and tangential details. In the absence of an American strategy that offers concrete measures as well as rhetoric, however, the details can take on significance.

I'm not sure that I want to share Robert Fisk's dark vision of tomorrow's events: "I haven't met an Arab in Egypt – or an Arab in Lebanon, for that matter – who really thinks that Obama's 'outreach' lecture in Cairo on Thursday is going to make much difference." On the other hand, I am just as unsettled by talk from the White House that they are "re-setting" the Middle East.

Because, as any gamer knows, you don't hit the Reset button when you are doing well. And while that might bring a change in fortunes, if you keep hitting Reset (the Inaugural Speech, the Al-Arabiya talk, Ankara, now Cairo), an observer may begin to think that no one ever wins.

Video: Obama Interview with BBC (1 June)

Related Post: Audio of Obama Interview with National Public Radio (1 June)

Before setting off for the Middle East and Europe, President Obama gave the British Broadcasting Corporation's Justin Webb 15 minutes on Monday. Webb's questions were surprisingly challenging, but Obama was able to speak in general platitudes about the need for a US explanation about its "hunt for extremists" to the Muslim world, for a two-state Israel-Palestine solution, and "for Iran to set aside ambitions for a nuclear weapon". Still, there was one significant passage --- which we'll analyse in a separate post --- where Obama called on Arab States to make concessions so Israel would engage in negotiations with the Palestinian Authority and other countries.