[Originally published in the Randolph Herald.]
It is absolutely amazing and to his infinite credit that President Obama, faced with critical economic and political problems at home, can, at the same time keep multiple foreign policy balls juggled happily in the air. Yet, he has done so and for someone denigrated as a foreign policy neophyte, he hasn’t made a real substantive mistake.
Obama broke precedent when he decided to visit a Muslim country rather than Israel on his first trip to the Middle East. That was risky enough, but in the course of the visit, he got into an exceedingly delicate area where few Americans have ventured before him. He entered the fray on the issue of the Armenian genocide.
This issue centers on the deaths of over 500,000 Turkish Armenians at the hands of the Turkish government between 1915-1918. The deaths have never been acknowledged as genocide by succeeding Turkish governments and that denial has become an issue for the European countries which hold sway over the entry of Turkey into the European Union.
It is, to say the very least, an extraordinarily delicate subject for the Turks. Yet Obama did broach the topic and did so in a way that was helpful and, quite remarkably, relatively inoffensive to both Turks and Armenians. His words are thought to have had a positive effect and we absolutely need to keep Turkey as a friend.
In addition, it has been most gratifying to hear the President finally put some perspective in the issue of our struggle with fundamentalist Muslim terrorism and al Qaida. He has recognized it as an irritant and as an ancillary problem, particularly in Afghanistan, not as the existential problem it was portrayed to be under President Bush where the greater the problem he painted terrorism, the greater problem it became.
In further comments, the President appears to have somehow put a dying two-state solution for Palestine back in play. In an environment which has just seen a new Israeli government in the person of its Prime Minister Netanyahu and it’s Foreign Minister Liebermann totally reject consideration of such a two state solution, that solution, the old nemesis of right wing Israelis and left wing Palestinians, is at least once again open for discussion.
From Israel’s point of view, this solution would mean that they would have to give up any hope of retaining the vast majority of their settlements on Palestinian soil, while the Palestinians and their most radical supporters would have to recognize the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish state at peace with its neighbors.
More to the point, before Obama’s support of this solution, it was felt by many that it was finally dead in the water, having been killed by both Palestinian and Israeli radicals. It would now appear to have some life and since that particular solution is the only one that will satisfy any of the needs of both sides, its resuscitation has to be considered a good thing.
In addition to these good things, the President has made two very important additional breaks with the old Bush Administration Middle East policies. He has said he will treat Muslims with respect and that America is not at war with Islam. That may not seem like much, but when you consider that the Bush Administration’s policies were the exact opposite and that Muslims around the world believed Bush, the change really is important.
Due respect in Islam is extremely important. It provides the basis for all human relations. When it is not employed, it is viewed as a hostile act. Thus, the Bush Administration really was at war with Islam for they showed that hostility every day with their jingoistic language and macho, good vs. evil rhetoric – “Axis of Evil”, “rogue states”, “outposts of tyranny”, “enemies of freedom”, dead or alive”, “bring ‘em on” to name but a few. And all of this to create and support, through fomenting fear at home and hatred abroad, the Neoconservative goal of the ”long war”.
A return to due respect and civility will be absolutely critical if we are to rediscover purposeful and successful negotiations around our Middle East issues with states like Israel, Syria, Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan. The President has taken the first step in that process, a step without which any such approach would never get off the ground, for It is an unfortunate fact that many Muslims have, for the last seven years, viewed America and its troops as the new Crusaders. That furthers none of our goals in the region.
Haviland Smith is a retired CIA Station Chief who served in East and West Europe, the Middle East and as Chief of the Counterterrorism Staff. A longtime resident of Brookfield, he now lives in Williston.
