Disappointment followed high hopes -- especially among the Arabs -- after the promise of change of the new US president foundered in 2009, writes Bassem Hassan* Many pundits are probably poised to consider Barack Obama the 2009 person of the year. And who can blame them? Obama, who made history in 2008 by becoming the first black president of the United States, had quite a successful first six months in office. In fact, it seemed that the 44th president of the United States had managed in that short period to repair the damage done to the country's international image by his predecessor's policies, as evinced by the soaring popularity of the United States across the globe at the beginning of the year. World leaders lined up in every international forum to shower praises on Obama and what they perceived as his commitment to multilateralism. People gave him a hero's welcome in almost every city he visited. The apex of Obama's PR success was his speech in Cairo in June. Now, one can dispute the claimed novelty of Obama's approach to relations between the United States and Arabs/Muslims, his alleged even-handed treatment of Israeli claims and the aspirations of the Palestinians, and/ or the sincerity of the American president's intentions, but there is no doubt that Obama charmed his audience that afternoon. The expectations of his Arab fans went through the roof when Obama appeared to be pressuring the Israelis to freeze the building of new settlements in the West Bank in order to jump-start the negotiations with Mahmoud Abbas. One can only wonder why those fans felt vindicated by such a gesture, especially that the current administration went to great lengths to explain to Netanyahu that his predecessors had committed themselves to such a policy in Annapolis and via Bush's roadmap. In other words, Obama was only reiterating demands made by his predecessor. Furthermore, this gesture fades into insignificance when compared to George H W Bush's decision in the early 1990s to withhold loan guarantees to Israel, an act that compelled Yitzhak Shamir to participate in the Madrid Conference. Was the euphoria of his fans a reflection of hope or a sign of despair? I put my money on the latter. It was probably also the gloomy international scene that made the Norwegian Nobel Committee award Obama the Nobel Peace Prize merely for giving "people hope for a better future". Joining the likes of Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu might have appeared initially to eclipse the PR setback that he suffered when the International Olympic Committee picked Rio de Janeiro to host the 2016 Games over Chicago (which was eliminated in the first round) despite a well-written and well-delivered speech on behalf of his adopted hometown. However, the critique directed at the Nobel Committee for its decision illuminated Obama's Achilles heel. While he might be one of the most media savvy politicians alive, the gulf between his promises and rhetoric on the one hand and his administration's policies on the other hand is increasing by the day, a fact that no media hype or speechwriter can hide. The public outcry against this decision suggests that those who placed their hopes on Obama are running out of patience and that the latter actually needs to start delivering before he squanders all his political capital. Nowhere is this more urgent than in the Arab and Muslim worlds where one could argue that the situation on the ground in many places has actually deteriorated during Obama's first year in office. Pakistan, now engulfed in a full- blown civil war, is the clearest example. While it would be unfair to place the blame for this war that has been in the making for years solely on Obama's policies, it is also quite clear that his administration has contributed significantly to fuelling it. This war that aims, among other things, to secure supply lines for NATO's troops in neighbouring Afghanistan and to deny Taliban and Al-Qaeda fighters an opportunity to regroup in the tribal areas along the Pakistani-Afghani border seems to be an integral part of the Obama administration's strategy for its war in Afghanistan. Like his predecessor, Obama sanctioned the assassination of anti- American tribal leaders, even at the cost of the lives of innocent Pakistanis, and on the other side of the border the numbers of Afghani civilians killed in American raids just kept piling. Like Bush's "surge" in Iraq, Obama's recently declared strategy for the war in Afghanistan is nothing but a recipe for more bloodshed and for prolonging the war. On Palestine -- the acid test for the credibility of any American president in the eyes of Arabs and Muslims -- the new administration did not fare better than previous ones. The hopes raised by Obama's Cairo speech quickly evaporated once it became clear that Obama was not willing to act on his promises. Rather than pressuring Netanyahu to stop building settlements, Obama's secretary of state considered the Israeli government's decision to limit its settlement activities to building units that had already been approved by previous governments (a decision that was not upheld) as unprecedented and worthy of praise. Her staff probably had forgotten to mention to her that this selfsame government had been busy cleansing Jerusalem of Arabs since taking office, and that its provocative acts in Al-Aqsa had brought the situation to the verge of a new Intifada. Even diehard Palestinian "peaceniks" like Abbas and Saeb Ereikat, who have tied their political careers to the success of negotiations with the Israelis, seem to have lost faith not only in Obama's ability to make a difference but also in the effectuality of the entire Oslo process. All the above notwithstanding, Obama could have still become person of the year if for no other reason but the absence of a serious competitor; or so it seemed at least until last September. The release of the Goldstone Report that month deepened the cracks in Obama's public image, especially in the Arab and Muslim worlds. For the South African judge proved that current international law, despite all its limitations, could still serve as a means to bring Israeli political and military leaders to justice. His unequivocal condemnation of the Israeli violations of international law both in Gaza and the West Bank (including in Jerusalem) further exposed the elusiveness of Obama's language and promises. His administration's position on the report, especially its attempts to block its discussion in the Security Council, established beyond any doubt Obama's willingness to follow in the footsteps of other American presidents in covering up Israeli crimes. Hence, one can suggest that the Goldstone Report, rather than Obama's sweet talk, was in fact this year's real source of "hope for a better future" where might does not make right. It opened as a question the possibility of a world where leaders of powerful states could be prosecuted too. Actualising this potential, however, will depend primarily on the efforts of grassroots movements across the world. In many ways, the report of the South African judge was just the first bullet in what promises to be a long confrontation between these movements and powerful states, with Obama's administration at the helm of the latter. 2010 will witness the opening round of this confrontation, but certainly not the end of it. * The writer is lecturer in political science at the British University in Egypt.
