Fawaz Gerges: "Obama and The Middle East: The End of America's Moment"
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2012-05-21/fawaz-gerges-obama-and-middle-east-end-americas-moment
President Barack Obama, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak, and Jordan's King Abdullah II walk the Cross Hall towards the East Room of the White House in Washington, Wednesday, Sept. 1, 2010, before making statements on the resumption of negotiations for Middle East Peace.
(AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)
NATO heads of state are meeting on Sunday and Monday in Chicago against a somber backdrop: American-led efforts to cajole Syria’s Bashar al-Assad to step down have failed. The prospect of a nuclear Iran looms large, and concerns are rising over the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan amid the ongoing insurgency there. When Barack Obama was elected president, he promised not only to transform America’s domestic policies, but also its foreign policy. Yet the Middle East, in particular, remains as troubled as ever. Middle East expert Fawaz Gerges joins Diane to explain why he believes President Obama has lost a historic opportunity to redefine America’s role in the region.
Guests
Fawaz Gerges
chair of the Middle Eastern Center at the London School of Economics.
Related Items
Read An Excerpt
From Obama and the Middle East by Fawaz A. Gergez. Copyright © 2012 by the author and reprinted by permission of Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Ltd.
Comments
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Why is this surprising, he hasn't suceeded in doing anything positive at home either. Lets just hand him his walking papers in Novemeber and start making progress for this great nation. We have weathered other bad presidents, this too shall pass.
By the by, not a Romney fan either but Obama moving on as a "Change We can Believe In."
I think the real question is this: Why is there so much emphasis on American presidents doing so much in the middle east? The middle east, as a region, has been broken and fractured for a very long time; frought with violence, oppression, and corruption of the highest order. The issues are cultural, political, and personal to the various peoples of the region. How can any one, but those middle eastern countries, and their respective citizenries, do anything to resolve the issues they have?
Why is it that the people in the Arab world expects the U. S. to come in and make changes that they don't seem to care too much about. We have been poking our noses in that area of the world for far too long and each time we get a stick poked in our eyes.
My thoughts are we should protect our shores and leave them to their own devices. We are cursed if we make an attempt to help them and cursed if we leave them alone. It seems like a bunch of unappreciative peoples depending on others to make them whole. It's crazy.
It's agreed, the United States would have done just as well and certainly better domestically with the presidency left vacant for the past 3.5 years.
At a time when a *great* presidency is what the nation and the world desperately needs, what we elected in 2008 was *just another* ambitious politician. Since he can't run on his promise of hope and change, as he now has a record of dithering, waffling and capitulation, he is forced to run as a Democrat.
What impact is the uprising in Syria having on the political and social stability in Lebanon?
While we think we are talking about the issues, the fact is that the monetary policies and the sponsors therein rule our economy and our political leaders, we all know it, but I understand it's a bitter pill... Our hopes rest not in elected officials, but in the people, and the way we deal with one another on a moment to moment.
I hear in the interview that the character assissination of Obama is in full swing now.
Clearly Gerges is connecting US Middle East Policy for the past 60 years (!) and Obama's inability to deliver on his vision. His argument is that there is a embedded system that pre-dates Obama, and yet this is completely lost on Diane and her listeners. We Americans are simply unable to get the concept of HISTORY. Very embarrassing.
After the election of George W.Bush,and his gross disrespect of all other foreign governments,countries elected their own right wing extremists. In Israel Benjamin Netanyahu,in Iran Mahmoud Ahmadinejad,to Merkil of Germany,to every nation on Earth,nobody wanted to be bullied by Bush.
Now we`re stuck with all these right wing knucklehead crack pots,and Obama is gonna fix this overnight?
Fawaz A. Gergez is writing and talking fiction. American's have been involved in the Middle East (ME) for about 100 years. All these ME folks have been fighting/killing/enslaving each other for THOUSANDS of years, while being ruled by ruthless tribal leaders/dictators/Muslim clerics. Libya, Iraq, Afganistan,Tunisia, Egypt, Morocco, Gaza strip, West Bank, Lebanon, African countries, Indonesia and Phillipines, will soon be controlled by the Muslim Brotherhood or other Islamic conservative, liberal, terrorist, fundamentalist spinoffs. If you held a vote today, you would find the majority of people in these countries (poor,illiterate) WANT to be governed by a Muslim Cleric, under Sharia law, NOT Democracy. The Arab spring was not a movement for God given freedoms ,rights and Democracy. It was an Islamic mission to overthrow Authoritarian Dictators and replace them with Totalitarian Muslim clerics. They will implement an Islamic, Fascist form of government/public laws (not religion), under the COVER of the Islamic religion. Fawaz never mentioned "Muslims, Islam" once, during the radio interview. How can that be? Hmmm,Hmmm,Hmmm Barrack Hussein Obama
Almost every non-Jewish critic or advocate on the issue of Israeli settlements, Israeli national security & the Palestinian issue keep the conversation limited to the people of Israel and Palestine & the PAC influence of US foreign policy. To be sure, they are the players however, there is a very key aspect of what drives US foreign policy for this particular area of the Middle East. In reality, the end-time view of the Dispensational doctrine is the single main driver behind the US position on Israel. Since the formation of the state in 1948, considered (by their doctrine) as the pivotal & fulfilled prophecy in what they teach as their biblical end-time view that must include a Jewish nation. The doctrine developed prior to 1948. The formation of the nation of Israel is considered fulfilled prophetic (in their doctrine) legitimizing their particular doctrinal position. Now, this end-time view is certainly not embraced by all professing Christians, but a large majority have embraced the doctrine. For them, the nation of Israel must survive as described in the Torah and is to be considered as a sacred piece of their end-time doctrinal position. To act in any manner that would jeopardize the nation would be to act against the known will of God or resist the known will of God, or moving against the hand of God The conversation almost never includes this vital component of the politics behind US policy concerning Israel.
A number of great empires have bloodied their noses in the Middle East. The Roman Empire and the British Empires among others. And basically nothing ever improves. Dr. J. Rufus Fears of the University of Oklahoma best described the Middle East when he called it "The Graveyard of Empires". So far, he's right. Now the USA is becoming part of the Graveyard.
What a breathtakingly inane comment, mnemecek
Mr. Fawaz is way off base to say the only reason why 70% of the US Congress supports the president of Israel is because they have been coerced and bribed [by Jews]. Coercion of this sort may be the status quo in Lebanon, Egypt, and Syria, but not quite on the same scale here in the USA. He also blamed the failure of the peace plan on Israel alone, and failed to mention that no Palestinian leader has ever accepted Israel's right to exist on "Muslim" land. Ms. Rehm's listeners deserve better than to listen to such a transparent and racist agenda. There are no Jews living in Lebanon any more, nor in Syria, Iraq, or Egypt. How did that happen, Mr. Fawaz? I would have liked to ask Mr. Fawaz, why doesn't his homeland of Lebanon allow its own Palestinians, who have been living in camps for sixty years, become free and equal citizens? Stop blaming Jews for every injustice. Next time you are on this show, I hope you will speak out for the rights of the "stateless" Palestinians in your own country.
In the interest of fairness and evenhandedness, I think a representative of AIPAC should be invited to counter Mr. Gerges's propoganda. He is correct that the Jewish vote is not monolithic. However, AIPAC does, in fact, represent the majority of American Jewry's positions. Moreover, contrary to what Mr. Gerges said so positively, AIPAC is supportive of a two-state solution with the necessary security guarantees.
He also stated that the support for the peace process in Israel has waned. What a surprise. The Israelies pulled out of Gaza and they have been on the receiving end of daily rocket attacks almost every day since. How can the Israelies continue to support land for peace when Gaza is the result?
America is not going to pull the Arab irons out of the fire. Only the Arabs can do that. And I was always taught that if you want something, you give something. So far, the Arabs have given absolutely nothing.
DME
AMEN to Coffeetree's comments.
I think people don't realize that half the population of Israel are descendants of Iraqi, Syrian, Egyptian, Iranian, Yemenite, Lebanese indigenous Jews who predate the Arab and Muslim arrival in these lands by a thousand years.
The Jewish refugees were not combatants. They were forcibly evicted from their ancestral homes as a response to the partitioning of the Palestinian mandate. Lost Jewish lands and assets from these middle eastern countries are at least twenty times greater than lands lost by Palestinians in the war they themselves waged in order to continue the eradication of the native Hebrews from their areas of origin.
I don't know why Israelis are so terrible at explaining all this. Palestinians are keeping the world hostage with their intransigence, wasting everyone's time, good intentions, and money. Their goal has never changed, to diminish the Jewish presence in the middle east. Mr. Fawaz participates in this deception. Shame.
The main problem is the dark side of the Arab culture, which has no respect for human rights/dignity and is pathologically opposed to freedom and democracy and the separation of mosque and state.