Obama’s Foreign Policy in Review – The Middle East: Israel and Iran

President Obama began his tenure as President of the United States with a tour around the world. One of the places where he made a considerable political statement was in the Middle East. During the election, Obama declared that he would take a more pragmatic approach to the region and “talk with our enemies,” an apparently stark contrast to the Bush Administration’s cutting of communication with Iran.

What is now called Obama’s Cairo Speech, President Obama offered rapprochement between the Western and Islamic world. This serves as a good basis of analyzing exactly what Obama proposed to accomplish and what has happened in his first year in office.

In the second point of his speech, Obama addresses the elephant in the room: the Israeli-Palestinean conflict. Here, Obama focuses on the persecution of both parties throughout history and calls on each to renounce violence and work together to achieve peace and security for all. Both parties must recognize the other’s right to exist and address work together to achieve them. This was heralded as a good change in rhetoric that committed the United States to building peace in the region.

Since that time, international news has focused on Israeli settlements in occupied Palestine as a true measurement of the progress made towards peace. Recently, while Vice President Biden was in Israel, Prime Minister Netanyahu gave the green light to constructing Israeli settlements in East Jerusalem. Secretary of State Clinton ha since said that this was “insulting” yet it is apparent that something has failed. Ultimately, the United States and Israel will continue to differ on this matter because while Israel sees its neighbors as existential threats, the United States is not threatened in the same way by these countries: while Israel sees standing armies and a Syrian attempt to get a nuclear weapon, we see small terrorist havens. Clearly, these threats are different in size and importance (especially when the United States is bogged down in two other ground wars) and it leads to two opposing perspectives: Israel sees this as a security issue while the United States sees it as a diplomatic issue. While the United States may be the only game in town, is it truly suited to lead a peace initiative in the region, or, must it come from and be led by Israel?

Iran was also addressed in the Cairo speech, in a much shorter section about nuclear weapons. Obama addressed international concerns about what is perceived as an Iranian attempt to join the nuclear club. While Iran denies this, few in the international community truly believe they have peaceful ambitions. Since this speech, the most important development in the US-Iranian relationship was the discovery of a secret Iranian nuclear facility that had been hidden from the international community and its nuclear watchdog, the IEAE. It is nearly impossible to read intentions in international politics. The student of international politics will instead use capabilities as the measurement of a threat. However, if a country that is suspected of conducting a nuclear weapon research program is hiding a nuclear facility, it is quite clear what that country’s intentions truly are.

Obama ran on a platform of speaking to your enemies. Communication is always important, but that is where this experiment stops. Many will say that if you treat a country like an enemy, you will make an enemy out of it. And this is where Obama was truly coming from: we should stop antagonizing Iran so we don’t make the situation in the Middle East any worse. The only problem is this: what if the country you are treating like a friend is going to be an enemy no matter what? Then what do you do?

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