Obama's Cairo speech a hit and miss for some.

Prior to President Barak Hussein Obama’s Cairo speech to the greater Muslim world about building better relations between Islam and the U.S., a lot was made of what would he say or convey that will be effective and productive that hasn’t already been said or tried already. It is ironic that Obama had chosen Egypt as the site of choice for his speech. I guess when he looked around the Muslim world there were no better choices. And while Obama wanted to address the world of Islam proper, Muslims exist not as one monolith community and the issues that concern them are as diverse as the races, ethnicities, and languages that composite its 1.5 billion population. However, during President Obama’s speech he conveyed a brief narrative of his own life experience and a vision of how he sees the world in a much different way than any previous U.S. President has ever done when speaking about U.S.-Muslim relations. Obama’s tactic was to show why it is important to that the two entities (Islam and the U.S.) have more in common than differences and should be much more inclusive within the religious, political, social, and cultural dialogue if there is going to be progress of unity. Progress of a cultural dialogue between the Muslim world and the West is greatly needed in order to remove the layers of mistrust, misunderstanding, and lack of respect that each side has of the other. In the past few years, America has largely been seen as an emperor of mistrust by the greater Muslim world with invasions into Iraq and Afghanistan, and failing to produce the equitable diplomatic steps needed for the creation of a legitimate Palestinian state.

For most Americans, despite the fact we are in a post 9/11 world, many still hold a negative view of Islam. In a recent Pew Research poll, roughly 37 percent of the respondents said that held a negative view of Islam and Muslims, while an astonishing 11 percent think Obama is a Muslim and another 35 percent don’t know what religion he belongs to. What this says is that while President Obama is making goodwill and holds an astute learning of Islam and is easily engaged with Muslims by making Islamic references, the fact remains that most Americans still don’t hold a positive or similar view as to what the message of the U.S. President is sending to the Muslim world. In essence there is still a cultural disconnect between Islam and the U.S. and this will continue to pose a political as well as social problem in both cases. Either President Obama is thinking too highly of the relations that non Muslim-Americans have with Muslims or Americans are sending a direct message that they have no intention of wanting better relations with Muslims around the world. If the latter is the case, then one can expect that this will resonate well with hardcore Muslim factions such as Al-Qaida affiliated ideological groups towards the perceived West’s war on Islam. Obama reiterated the message that the world namely the U.S is not at war with Islam.

While President Obama made plenty of fruitful points about improving relations with the Muslim world by touching on issues such as preserving the rights of women, building better institutions and economies in Muslim majority nations, and asking that Muslims be willing to look within their own faith to root out extremists that kill innocent women, children, and others there were still some specific points that are left to be determined. Those specifics have to go beyond just showing his niceties to his Egyptian hosts and kind words about Muslims, Obama will be looked upon to bring a just resolution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, address the stability of Iraq and Afghanistan without the prescription that America is running the show and will remain a occupier, and balance what is the suspected Iranian nuclear activities among top priorities. These are among the first responses that Muslims are looking for. Obama’s engagement with the Palestinians and Israelis must show patience and toughness to both sides, while displaying that America will not show favor to Israel over the Palestinians if there is to be any traction of winning the hearts and minds of Muslims. Even though it is called the holy land it will take a holy miracle to ever solve this hotbed territorial and religious conflict that many politicians don’t want to touch.

Critics of Obama felt his message was too soft on Islamic antagonists of the U.S. by not saying any of the classical descriptions we have come to know of i.e. Islamic terrorists, Islamo-facists, Muslim extremists, etc. Obama simply stuck to his non-confrontational verbal cache to carefully use the term “extremists” without saying either Islamic or Muslim in front. This did nothing to comfort the fears of how Obama would address the issue in the future. Those same critics likely will interpret this couched definition as a deliberate and calculated move to make it appear as though all extremists who use violence are looked upon as one in the same.

Now that the message has come and gone, the real question remains what real actions will come out of this to foster better relations.