Obama Landmark speech: reactions pics

[General Duke]

Obama speech reaction, from Gaza to Pakistan and AfghanistanPalestini ans give guarded welcome to promise of a fresh start, but others want action, not 'sweet words'

 

 

 

In the Delice coffee shop in the heart of Gaza City customers watched the speech in silence, some paying more attention than others. But there was not a hint of applause, even when Obama talked about the "intolerable" situation facing the Palestinians.

 

Many said they welcomed his words, but wanted to see action on the ground.

 

"He touched our emotions, especially when he quoted from the Qur'an," said Ehab Qishawi, a diplomat in the foreign ministry in Gaza. "His words were good, but up to now we haven't seen any policies on the ground. That's what we're waiting for.

 

"We've had a lot of experience with the Americans and we know that there are always red lines, especially when it comes to the relationship with Israel."

 

Eyad Galaja, 28, felt the speech was balanced and gave "a direct message to Israel to lift the siege on the Palestinians". The Israeli blockade, which for two years has prevented all exports and most imports to the overcrowded strip, is the dominating feature of life in Gaza, ruining the economy and putting many out of work.

 

Galaja, who works in the health ministry helping refer patients for treatment abroad, said: "It is easy to say the words, many presidents have given good speeches, but the most important thing is the actions. The first step should be to put pressure on Israel to lift the siege on Gaza, open the commercial crossings and let goods come in."

 

Others have been more outspoken in their criticism of Obama and the US administration. Asad Abu Shark, a professor of linguistics at al-Azhar University, said he was wary of hearing "sugar-coated language".

 

"Any American gesture in the right direction is welcome," he said. "If the Americans want an even-handed policy we welcome that, but actions speak louder than words. We don't want to live in hope until we die in despair."

 

He wants Washington to press Israel to end its blockade of Gaza, end the occupation of the Palestinian territories and allow Palestinian refugees to return to their homes in what is now Israel.

 

Abu Shark, whose family are refugees from what is now the Israel city of Ashqelon, believes in a one-state solution to the Middle East conflict, with Israelis and Palestinians living together as citizens of a single, binational state. It is an idea that is gaining ground among Palestinians but is strongly opposed by Israelis.

 

He was concerned about America's close relationships to the leaders of the Arab world. "If America says they want democracy and then he meets with dictators it means there is a double standard," he said. "They should stop listening to Arab rulers and start listening to the Arab public."

 

 

'Osama, Obama, a big drama'

There was interest if not excitement at the New Raja restaurant, a modest lunchtime joint in Islamabad. Mopping up his curry with a chunk of flat bread as he waited for the speech to start, Nisar Ahmed Faizee, a burly trader with a scraggly beard, was sceptical it would change much.

 

"Osama, Obama – what's the difference?" he said, reaching for his cigarettes. "It's all a big drama."

 

His languid cynicism was reflected on the streets outside, where men lounged in the shade sipping fruit juice and sheltering from the head-drilling heat of a Pakistani summer. Not many came inside to watch.

 

"We're not interested," said Anwar Khan, perched behind a counter filled with cheap watches. The cricket friendly between Ireland and the Netherlands played on his tiny television. "For us, Bush and Obama are the same. They are droning us to death."

 

He was referring to the CIA-led drone strikes against al-Qaida targets in the tribal belt, a common source of anti-American anger in Pakistan.

 

The traders knew plenty about Islamist violence: down the street lay the Red Mosque, the extremist stronghold where 100 people died during a nine-day siege two years ago.

 

But back inside the restaurant, under the television, the speech was having a gentle impact. Customers were coming and going, and those watching wore impenetrable expressions, even as the Cairo crowd thundered with applause.

 

A hard core of about 10 customers watched closely, following the Urdu subtitles. At the front, craning his neck up, was an office clerk named Rafiullah.

 

"US policy is changing now, inshallah," he said afterwards, singling out the mentions of Israeli policy for praise. "Obama says he is going to try to change it, and I believe him."

 

Some seemed drawn simply by the image of Obama. "I don't know much," said Muhammad Irshad, a young cobbler. "But at least he's better than Bush."

 

Afterwards the television channel reverted to the usual diet of Taliban news. Dozens of schoolboys, kidnapped at the weekend, had been freed, it reported.

 

As the customers turned back to their cups of tea, the consensus view was that the words were welcome, but not enough.

 

"Good speech. It has created a lot of hope," conceded Nisar Ahmed Faizee, the sceptic. "But saying is one thing, doing is another. Now he has to deliver."

 

 

'Muslims want action not beautiful words'

For Abdul Salam Zaeef, a former senior Taliban official who could play an important role in negotiating a peace deal to end violence in Afghanistan, Obama's speech consisted of "sweet and beautiful words".

 

But they were not enough.

 

"It is part of the American policy just to give us words and not actions," he said. "Muslims around the world want to see actions, not beautiful words."

 

Zaeef, a former Taliban ambassador to Pakistan who left the movement, now acts as an intermediary in the embryonic peace process between the Taliban and the Afghan government.

 

But even he has a hard time believing the US has fundamentally changed its posture, and stressed the huge damage done to American credibility by the death of innocent civilians as a result of US airstrikes.

 

"They are bombing madrassas," he said "When al-Qaida kills one person, America kills 1,000. America says one thing but does another."

 

Wadir Safi, a professor of law and political science at Kabul University, said the change in tone from the leader of the US was hugely welcome, hailing it as the "best speech ever given by an American president".

 

"He wants to eliminate the hatred in the Islamic world that existed under President Bush. I saw a respect in Obama's speech towards Islam and the Islamic world that we had not seen before."

 

Safi added that Obama's strong rejection of the idea that the US wants a permanent military presence in Afghanistan would reassure Russia, Islamabad, Tehran and other regional players suspicious about American intentions.

 

But Ghulam Nadir, a literary student at the same university, said there was nothing the speech could do to change the perception among many Afghans that the US was hellbent on long-term occupation.

 

"They are not here to help us, they are here for their own interests and will leave us whenever they want. If Obama was serious about a peace process he would not have sent more troops."

 

He said the only way to "solve the problem of extremism" was for the US to withdraw support from Israel.

 

"If America continues to support Israel against Palestine, then the issue of relations between the west and the Islamic world will not be solved."

[General Duke]

 

[wacdaraha_aduunka]

It was a welcome speack lets see if he means real business, and inshalaah it will

[General Duke]

[General Duke]

President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton tour the Sultan Hassan Mosque in Cairo. Obama took a tour of the medieval mosque in the heart of old Cairo on a trip aimed at repairing rifts with the Muslim world. (Getty)

[General Duke]

Robert Fisk: Could it be al-Qa'ida is missing Bush?

 

President Barack Obama was received in the Middle East with the usual grovelling Saudi plea for help in taming the Israelis and an incendiary threat from Osama bin Laden that America will pay the price for his role in displacing a million Muslim refugees in Pakistan. It wasn't difficult to see why Obama warned the world not to expect too much from his attempt to "create a better dialogue" with Muslims.

 

Bin Laden was probably 1,300 miles to the north of Obama when the US President landed in Riyadh yesterday for his meeting with King Abdullah but, as usual, Bin Laden's words were a good deal more direct than those of the fawning Saudis. By his support for the Pakistani army's assault on the Taliban in Waziristan, Obama had "sown new seeds of hatred against America" and was "laying the foundation for long wars ahead". With his normal flourish, Bin Laden added that he "warned the American people... that they will suffer the consequences of his actions".

 

Could it be, perhaps, that Bin Laden is beginning to miss old George Bush and his "war on terror", that the ever smiling Barack Obama is beginning to stick in Bin Laden's craw, that the fractional improvement in US-Arab relations is beginning to be a little irksome – or that, by some awful mischance – Obama actually might tame the colonial ambitions of Israel? Ironically it was Madeleine Albright – writing with the usual pomposity but with almost bin Laden-like directness in the New York Times – who also spotted that no Obama speech, "however eloquent, can disentangle US-Muslim relations from the treacherous terrain of current events such as Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan..."

 

The Saudis, of course, wanted to talk about the Iranian – i.e. Shiite – threat to the Sunni world as well as the refusal of Bibi Netanyahu to bow to Obama's demand for an end to the Israeli colonisation of Arab land. Indeed, there are times when the Saudis speak of Iran with almost the same hatred as Bibi. They really should meet some time, although success for the 2002 Saudi peace plan – total Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 border in return for full Arab recognition of Israel – would probably guarantee that just such a meeting took place.

 

Obama's speech writers will have tightened up the US President's Egyptian address for today once they discover whether King Abdullah is still as keen on the Saudis' own 2002 plan. It will no doubt be neatly slotted into the "better understanding" speech which we are going to have to listen to in Cairo today when Obama addresses that famous entity, the "Muslim world". The trouble is that the Shiite-Sunni void – to be played out again this weekend in the theatricals of the Lebanese elections – is almost as important for the Arabs as resolving the tragedy of the Palestinians.

 

And, of course, everyone wants to be seen hugging the new American President. Grinning over his cardamom tea with the king in Riyadh yesterday, poor Obama is going to have to endure the embrace of Hosni Mubarak in Cairo today where the government press – almost as fawning as the Saudis – have been proclaiming that Obama's reference to the Egyptian president as a "stalwart ally" of peace proves that Egypt has yet again won its place at the centre of the Arab world.

 

Yes, Obama did actually call the old dictator a "stalwart ally", much to the disgust of the opposition in Egypt, but that is what you have to do in this part of the world if you want to get invited back. Waiting for the President's speech is almost exquisitely painful because, like the Arabs, Washington's policies still appear hopelessly divided. While infuriating the Israelis – much to the Arabs' delight – Obama continues to send his men into the graveyard of empires to beat the Taliban, shrugging off any responsibility for those one million Pakistani Muslim refugees whom Bin Laden so shrewdly spotted on the horizon. The only real question, perhaps, is whether Obama has asked himself the most important question: does the "Muslim world" actually exist?