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June 9, 2009
I referred to Obama's Cairo speech in this earlier post which I'd only quickly scanned. I've read it more slowly since then, and parts of it---- eg, on Israelis and Palestinians--- are very powerful within the context of US policy in the Middle East. Obama says:
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.
Remember, this is a president of the USA talking. Obama deals openly and directly with the suffering and aspirations of both Israelis and Palestinians. He then goes on to point to a way that could address the suffering and aspiration:
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.
He goes on to say 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."
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Obama's speech must make many of the pro-Israeli group in the ALP somewhat uneasy. They are all trotting off to Israel, on an Israeli government funded trip, built around the old Bush assumption of Israeli's good, Palestinians bad.
I wonder what the ALP pollies will say about Israeli settlement expansion when they return from their trip to Israel? Or will they avoid the issue, and talk about the existential threat posed by Iran to Israel? Will they come out and say that Obama got it wrong in his speech?