President Obama Heads to Cairo

World Cititzen: Obama's Cairo Speech and the 57-State Solution
Frida Ghitis | Bio | 14 May 2009
World Politics Review



When President Barack Obama finally announced the location of his much-heralded speech to the Muslim world, the news came as a surprise. As a candidate, Obama had promised to give such an address during his first 100 days in office, as part of an urgent campaign to repair relations between the United States and Muslims.

Observers wondered where Obama would go for the potentially historic occasion. Many believed the U.S. president would choose a democratic, Muslim-majority country for the event. Favorites included Jakarta, where Obama lived as a child. Turkey, a U.S. ally, also seemed like a good choice. Even Morocco, one of the more open Arab countries, was considered a longshot.

The choice of Cairo proved controversial, as the White House surely knew it would. When it comes to democratic values, Egypt -- America's autocratic ally -- is something of an embarrassment. Critics pounced, highlighting Egypt's dismal human rights record. Why would the Obama administration choose for its speech a country where the president has ruled for 28 years, human rights are routinely violated, and democratic ideals are regularly trampled?

The White House is giving faint hints about the reasons and the strategy behind the choice.

Egypt, declared White House spokesman Robert Gibbs, is "the heart of the Arab world." Although it remains an eminently non-democratic country, Washington would like it to become an example to emulate for all Arab countries.

This signals that the speech to Muslims is gradually morphing into a speech to Arabs. Improving relations with Muslims is important. But when it comes to U.S. strategic interests, the more urgent item on the agenda is creating a strong coalition with Arab countries. The Obama administration has chosen Egypt because Cairo has taken a strong position on the two major crises brewing in the region: the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, and the conflict with Iran.

Obama will seek to boost Egypt's standing by placing it at the center of a coalition to isolate Iran and bring peace, not just between Israelis and Palestinians, but between Israel and the entire Arab world.

Egypt not only has relatively good relations with Israel. It has also confronted Iran openly and forcefully, especially after uncovering a plot by Iran-backed Hezbollah to attack targets inside Egypt. Egyptian officials have publicly accused Iran of trying to "conquer the Arab world."

In the coming months, the Obama administration will speak frequently and loudly about the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. In reality, however, it will push behind the scenes for a much wider agreement: something harkening back to the old Madrid Process, which sought to bring a comprehensive peace deal for the region. That subsequently went off the rails, pushed aside by the much narrower Oslo Accords between Israelis and Palestinians.

Jordan's King Abdullah, the first Arab leader to visit the Obama White House, is a strong advocate of the plan. He claims that Obama is reaching for a "57-state solution," one that would bring peace between Israel and all 57 member countries -- Arab and Muslim -- of the Organization of the Islamic Conference.

Obama cannot be accused of holding modest aspirations. The plan may be extremely ambitious, but it is also very clever. If it works, it could break the knot that has tied up the prospects for peace between Israelis and Palestinians, as well as play a key role in breaking the impasse with Iran.

Ever since Benjamin Netanyahu became Israel's prime minister, much ink has been spilled noting that he has so far refused to accept the two-state solution. But that is not the main obstacle to peace today. Eventually, Netanyahu will accept two states. When he does, Israel will have seemed to have made a major concession, even though several Israeli governments have already signed on to the plan, and Netanyahu himself has agreed to accept previous agreements.

The biggest obstacle to peace between Israelis and Palestinians lies in the strength of Iran-backed Hamas, relative to Fatah. Israelis and Palestinians know that if Israel withdraws all its forces from the West Bank, Hamas will take over with the same ease with which it took over Gaza in 2006. A Hamas-ruled West Bank is an existential red line for Israel. Obama knows, understands, and accepts this.

Rather than waste energy on a goal that is unachievable in the immediate future, Obama's plan to bring peace between Israelis and Arabs would help isolate Iran, along with Hamas and Hezbollah, two armed groups that vow to fight Israel's existence until the bitter end. By building such an alliance and imbuing it with popular support -- hence the high-profile speech -- Obama would tell Arabs that he is offering them a new path: a path to the future.

Pressure is already being brought to bear on Syria to jump on the peace bandwagon and leave Iran behind. Simultaneous with overt efforts to reach out to Damascus, the U.S. has also just renewed sanctions, charging that Syria's actions "supporting terrorism, pursuing weapons of mass destruction [pose a] threat to the national security" of the U.S. This was the stick. The carrot may have come delivered by the hand of King Abdullah, who visited Syrian President Bashar al-Assad after meeting Obama.

Pressure on Hamas is also mounting. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, who will meet Obama later this month -- as will Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak -- has reportedly decided to form a new government without Hamas.

Obama will try to build a front for the future, one based on two pillars: peace between Israelis and Arabs, and rejection of Iran's regional goals. If he succeeds in building the foundation for that new edifice, he will have a strategically placed megaphone to speak to the region -- not about platitudes, but about concrete steps for peace. Arab and Muslim countries will hear the presumably persuasive message that they can stand with the U.S.-backed alliance, or remain on the wrong side of history.

Frida Ghitis is an independent commentator on world affairs and a World Politics Review contributing editor. Her weekly column, World Citizen, appears every Thursday.

Photo: President Barack Obama during a press conference following the G20 Summit, London, April 2, 2009 (White House Photo by Pete Souza).