A YEAR ago in Cairo Barack Obama made an impassioned appeal for Arab goodwill and trust. Recognise I am a new type of American, he said in essence, who understands your pain and anger, and respects your culture and religion. “Islam is a part of America,” he declared.
“Let there be no doubt the situation for the Palestinian people is intolerable ... They endure the daily humiliations, large and small, that come with occupation,” he said later in the speech. Then, in a powerful sentence he was to repeat to the UN General Assembly, he said “America doesn't accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements.”
No wonder Arabs were delighted. True, Obama made no promises of US sanctions, aid cuts or other action to reverse Israeli settlement activity, but they were willing to give him time to show he meant what he said.
A year later the disappointment is massive. A poll taken in six Arab countries in June and July shows the air has gone from the Obama bubble. The percentage of Arabs with a positive view of the US has sunk since last summer from 45 per cent to 20 per cent, while the negative percentage has risen from 23 per cent to 67 per cent. Only 16 per cent call themselves 'hopeful' about US policy.
The survey is conducted annually by Zogby International and Shibley Telhami at the University of Maryland. The countries covered are among the region's least radical — Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Saudi Arabia and the UAE — and represent the more modern and affluent parts of the so-called Arab street, with 40 per cent of respondents using the Internet every day.
Since his Cairo speech Obama's Middle Eastern failures have been glaring. US pressure on Mahmoud Abbas to ignore the Goldstone report on suspected war crimes during the Gaza conflict was followed by Obama's refusal to condemn Israeli piracy against the blockade-busting flotilla.
A moment of anger with Netanyahu for the announcement of more illegal house-building in Arab East Jerusalem was forgotten a few months later when the Israeli premier was welcomed to the US — a frown followed by fence-mending instead of a sustained campaign against Israel's violations of international law and significant cuts in the annual aid programme submitted to Congress.
— The Guardian, London
