Breaking the Image

On Wednesday, President Obama started his tour of the Middle East. The head of the White House is hoping to use the framework of this trip to improve the U.S. relationship with the Muslim world. “America is one of the largest Muslim countries,” he stated, recently.

What awaits Obama in the Near East: diplomatic success or disappointment? With this question, Rossiyskaya Gazeta turned to the assistant director of the Institute for Oriental Studies, Russian Academy of Science, Vladimir Isaev:

Of course, Obama has a chance to better the image of the United States, which was ruined by his predecessor, George Bush. The two wars against Muslim countries, started by the ex-head of the White House, had a very negative effect on the American image in the Muslim world and among Arabs, in general.

It is not a surprise that the Middle East is more sympathetic to Obama, the first black president, who in addition has Muslim roots. His recent initiative to unblock the Near Middle Eastern situation has also attracted attention. Obama’s proposals to the Middle East are highly anticipated; not the least because of the well developed relationship between the Arabs and the United States. This is much closer than their relationship with Russia or any other country. To become convinced, we only need to consider the volume of capital and trade flows.

It is very hard to make a prognosis on what initiatives Obama will propose during his tour today. No country will ever announce such things in advance. We can only guess what kind of proposals Obama will offer to the Arabs. Lets say, advancement on the Near East settlement or steadier economic ties, which have weakened significantly since the U.S. intrusions into Afghanistan and Iraq. Some Arab countries even started to freeze American capital. However, now these governments might be attracted to financing the American economy. This is because the United States, and the rest of the world, thinks that America’s recovery from the economic crisis will also help others get out of it with fewer losses.

Most likely, Obama will exploit the traditional Arab-Iran misperceptions of each other to strengthen the pressure of the Muslim world on Iran, with a goal to stop nuclear weapon development. When it comes to the prospects of a preemptive strike on Iran, the United States is unlikely to do it alone if this scenario occurs. It is more likely that they would use someone else, possibly Israel, which is watching Tehran’s nuclear program a lot more closely. And that’s not a surprise: Tehran has not yet threatened to erase the United States off the face of the Earth. On the other hand, such statements are made towards Israel on a regular basis.

At the same time, U.S.-Israeli relations are undergoing a difficult period. It’s clear that the United States will remain the guarantor of Israeli security in the Near East. Besides that, the Israeli population, after two unsuccessful wars - one in Lebanon and one in Gaza - has reconstructed in a stricter sense and elected a right-wing government. In the United States, the opposite is true; the Democrats, who adhere to leftist views, are in charge. Naturally, the specific differences between the governments of these countries became noticeable. It’s hard to say how long this “rubbing” will go on for.

Meanwhile…

The current head of the White House, Barack Obama, is becoming more popular in the Arab world. According to the survey of general opinion, the new administration is already trusted by a quarter of the population in most of the countries in the region. This is in contrast to six percent of the Arab population who supported the politics of the ex-President.