Great Expectations in the Islamic World Posted by Ilan Goldenberg

I spent last weekend in Doha, Qatar at Brookings’ World Islamic Forum, a fascinating conference on which I’ll be doing a series of posts over the next few days.  Perhaps the most striking theme throughout the conference was the incredible optimism surrounding Barack Obama.  This was especially true of representatives from the Muslim world.  Only a year or two ago, the tone at these types of events was one of anger and frustration with an arrogant America.   But instead of anger, the most commonly heard phrase during the three days was “mutual respect” – the term used by President Obama during his interview with Al Arabiya.  A term, which based on the reaction of the crowd at the conference, was pitch perfect.

The problem was that this feeling of hope and optimism contrasted powerfully with the overwhelming challenges facing the United States and the Islamic World.  These conferences always include some broad framing panels about the way forward and of course during those discussions the outlook seemed to be positive.  But when you got into the details and attended panels on specific issues, the story was entirely different.  The panels on Pakistan, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the global financial crisis were far from uplifting.  And in contrast to the overall optimistic mood, there was recognition in each of these sessions that the issue was reaching a potentially dangerous tipping point.  Even more disturbing was the fact that you had very impressive experts presenting on these issues and usually their policy recommendations only skirted the edges or acknowledged that the situation was so screwed up that they weren’t certain that there was a way out and that any way out would likely take years. 

The danger for the Obama administration is trying to balance these incredibly high expectations with the very difficult realities on the ground.  If they aren’t able to do this effectively, this unique moment of optimism and potential cooperation will be lost.  Powerful and dramatic early actions will buy Obama time and extend the honeymoon.  Shutting Guantanamo was an important first step as was his interview with Al Arabiya.  Obama’s speech to the Muslim World will undoubtedly buy him much good will.  Publicly laying out a clear end game for Iraq that makes clear that America is in fact leaving will also get an overwhelmingly positive response across the Muslim World.  But eventually he’ll have to deliver progress on tougher issues such as the Arab-Israeli conflict and Afghanistan, if he wants to maintain the goodwill towards the United States that currently permeates the region.   

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