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
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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".

Video: Former President Carter on Detainee Abuse

Speaking on CNN, Jimmy Carter, the US President from 1977 to 1981 and Nobel Peace Prize laureate, made a gentle but challenging contribution to the debate over the release of photographs of detainee abuse (""I don't agree with [President Obama], but I certainly don't criticize him for making that decision") and an investigation of the Bush Administration's torture programme: "What I would like to see is a complete examination of what did happen, the identification of any perpetrators of crimes against our own laws or against international law. And then after all that's done, decide whether or not there should be any prosecutions."

UPDATED Hidden US Torture Photos: The Story (and the Images) Continue

The Salon Gallery of Torture Photos and Video

Related Post: Torture - The Hidden Photos Emerge

UPDATE: Jake Tapper, the White House correspondent for ABC News in the US, has just posted a blog which graphically illustrates the complicity of many in the US media --- wittingly or unwittingly --- in either missing or setting aside the main story. Instead of identifying and focusing on the main story, the content and context of the 2000 photographs and videotapes of detainee abuse, Tapper goes for the sideshow of the White House trashing of the Daily Telegraph's interview with General Taguba.

Last month Enduring America paid a good deal of attention to the Obama White House's decision to defy a court order and hold back 44 photographs, amongst hundreds and possibly thousands, of the abuse of detainees in US facilities in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other countries. We linked to Italian newspapers with a dozen of the images, posting the two most moderate --- the story become our fifth-biggest in our eight months on the Web.

Last week, there was another series of developments --- some illuminating, some confusing, all disturbing. It began on Thursday when The Daily Telegraph of London ran an article based on an interview with General Antonio Taguba, who led the 2004 internal investigation of the abuses at Abu Ghraib. According to the newspaper, Taguba said the photos showed ""torture, abuse, rape and every indecency". The Daily Telegraph highlighted "a soldier apparently raping a female prisoner, a translator apparently raping a male prisoner, and instances of sexual abuse involving objects".

None of this is new. As Taguba carried out his initial investigation five years ago, there were leaks pointing to the content, in thousands of photographs and some video recordings, outlined by The Daily Telegraph. Indeed, the electronic magazine Salon published many of the images in 279 pictures and 19 videos. However, as the Iraq conflict escalated, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld survived calls for his firing, and a few low-ranking soldiers were handed prison sentences for Abu Ghraib, the unreleased photos receded from memory, let alone vision.

What made this story notable, five years later, was the reaction of the Obama Administration. White House spokesman Robert Gibbs was quick to say that The Daily Telegraph "mischaracterised" the 44 photos involved in the court action. Salon, the same magazine that had published "The Abu Ghraib Files", then got in on the act. It interviewed Taguba, who said, "The photographs in that lawsuit, I have not seen." Instead, "he was referring to the hundreds of images he reviewed as an investigator of the abuse at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq". Gibbs then eagerly e-mailed reporters, "Both the Department of Defense and the White House have said the [Daily Telegraph] article was wrong, and now the individual who was purported to be the source of the article has said it’s inaccurate.

Thus, partly because Salon wanted to protect its 2006 exclusive and primarily because the White House wants to keep the story far, far away, the spin was put in motion: nothing new to see here, move along.

Actually, the story should be easy to see, amidst the manoeuvres of politicians and journalists. The 44 photos are important, not necessarily because of their specific images --- a Pentagon official maintains, "These photographs, while disturbing enough, are relatively inconsequential compared to those which were already released in 2004 and 2006" --- but because of the precedent that would be set by their release. For once they are out, the thousands of  photos and tapes will inevitably follow, since the US Government has no legal or political standing to withhold them. As Taguba, who opposes the release of the material, says, "The mere description of these pictures is horrendous enough, take my word for it.”

And, even beyond the visual shocks that lies in the full archive, this will be a big, very new deal. Salon's 2006 gallery is limited to images from Abu Ghraib, so the pictorial illusion can be maintained that it was just one prison (and, beyond that, the political illusion of the Obama White House, following its predecessor, that it was just a few rogue troops who have been disciplined for their crimes). The unvarnished, complete gallery would establish how many places where this abuse occurred, from Iraq to Afghanistan to "undisclosed locations" and possibly to Guantanamo Bay. It would establish, once and for all, that these were not isolated incidents but part of a systematic process put in motion not in Baghdad but in Washington.

There may, however, be a twist in the tale. Scott Horton of The Daily Beast, who is carrying out a personal battle with Salon over the investigation, claims --- via "a senior Pentagon official" --- that there is an intra-Administration contest over the photos. While General Raymond Odierno, the US commander in Iraq, was able to block the release of the 44 images in the court action by arguing that US troops would be endangered, General David Petraeus, the overall US commander in the Persian Gulf and Central Asia, favours disclosure to "lance this boil". So, according to this official, Obama's announcement on 14 May that he would defy the court order is "a stall tactic: he intends to release them eventually, even if he prevails in court, once the situation on the ground improves."

Hmmm....I'm sceptical, as this feels like another delaying tactic rather than an eventual acceptance that the photos will have to be acknowledged, in public view as well in a court case. "Once the situation on the ground improves", given conditions in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, becomes a Never-Never Land of transparency.

So instead there will be the drip-drip-drip of more stories which are not necessarily new, not necessarily exclusive, but still important. There will be more White House denials and misinformation. The Bush Administration men and women behind the photos will escape a public reckoning, and the suspicion --- abroad if not within the US --- will build that President Obama's promise of "the right balance between transparency and national security" is very, very tilted indeed.

Torture Flashback: Putting Away (and Laughing at) the Pelosi "Scandal"

Torture: The Pelosi “Controversy” in One Sentence

You may recall our aversion to any mention of the Bushmen/Republican-whipped-up pseudo-controversy over the complicity of the Democratic Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, in the Bush Administration's torture programme, apart from this question, "If Nancy Pelosi is an accomplice to a felony…..who are the felons?"

It appears the GOP attack dogs, the sailors on the Dick Cheney alternative ship of state, and even Karl Rove feel they have gotten as much as they can out of their diversion, so we thought we'd give it a farewell, with the proper perspective, from the superb Sam Seder:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jzR3A3DcJg4[/youtube]