GAZA CITY: Muslims said President Barack Obama’s speech yesterday in Cairo showed a positive shift in US attitude toward the community, but hoped he would follow it through with action.
Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip, said Obama’s speech reflected a change in diplomatic approach different from that of his predecessor George W. Bush. “It is full of courtesies and depends on soft diplomacy,” said Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum.
Hamas said it had sent a letter to the president welcoming his visit to the region and calling on him to help find a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and begin a serious relationship between America and the Arab and Islamic world.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, a Hamas rival, welcomed Obama’s words. “The part of Obama’s speech regarding the Palestinian issue is an important step under new beginnings,” his spokesman Nabil Abu Rudainah said. “It shows there is a new and different American policy toward the Palestinian issue.”
Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa said Obama can end “years of tension and confrontation” between the West and Islam. Obama could also be an “honest broker” in the Middle East peace process, Moussa told BBC radio.
Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement did not comment, but a lawmaker of the group, Hassan Fadlallah, said: “The Islamic world does not need moral or political sermons. It needs a fundamental change in American policy beginning with a halt to complete support for Israeli aggression against the region, especially against Lebanese and Palestinians, an American withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan and a stop to its interference in the affairs of Islamic countries.”
In Tehran, Mohammad Marandi, head of North American Studies at Tehran University, acknowledged that Obama’s tone on Iran was “significantly more positive” than under Bush, but said talking was not enough.
An Israeli lawmaker from a far-right ultranationalist party sharply criticized the US president’s speech.
“His hatred for the people of Israel led him to deliver a most dangerous speech that exposed his pro-Islamic trends, designed to undermine the vision of the people of Israel returning to their homeland,” Michael Ben-Ari said.
A government official said the speech could have been worse for Israel, while a settler spokeswoman called Obama naive and out of touch with reality. A dovish lawmaker said the speech created an important opportunity for peace.
In Somalia, an Islamic group applauded Obama’s words. “Obama’s speech is good and Islam means peace. Obama, let’s follow the verses you quoted from the Qur’an,” Sheikh Abdulahi Sheikh Abu Yusuf, spokesman of Ahlu Sunna, said.
Jordanian opposition and pro-government parliamentarians said Obama was not sincere in efforts to find a solution to the Palestinian problem.
“He merely called for the freeze of the settlement activity and did not urge the dismantling of all settlements that were built on Palestinian territories in violation of the relevant UN resolutions,” Ishaq Farhan, secretary-general of the Islamic Action Front, said.
— With input from Abdul Jalil Mustafa and agencies
