www.reconciliationtalk.com

A simple bow by the most powerful man in the world

Its not just what he said at the G20 and in Europe; its about 3 seconds of what he did that has really stirred the hornets nest for the US conservatives.

It was overlooked at the time, unlike the words he said, but apparently some of his critics have been were searching YouTube for something more to pick on. And they found it!

He bowed to the Saudi King.

You can see the bow here with comment on the Time Middle East Blog.   Why Obama's Saudi Bow was Not a Kow-Tow.  Of course the White House is denying it,but its clearly a bow.  And while it may breach US protocol, its got to have been the best thing he has done yet.   

The Washington Times was disgusted at what it calls his  "servile gesture":  Barack takes a bow

In a shocking display of fealty to a foreign potentate, President Obama bowed to Saudi King Abdullah at the Group of 20 summit in London last week.

Mr. Obama later said in Strasbourg, France, "We have to change our behavior in showing the Muslim world greater respect." Symbolism is important in world affairs. By bending over to show greater respect to Islam, the U.S. president belittled the power and independence of the United States.

The comment in France was not directly related to the bow, but I would suggest gives clear indication he knew what he was up to. As they said, symbolism is important in world affairs. The bow was symbolic, but of what?  Fealty as the article suggests?  That is the popular understanding of any form of obeisance. Mere respect?  Not necessary according to the article:

No Americans of any station are required to bow to royalty. It is one of the pillars of American exceptionalism that our country rejected traditional caste divisions. Article I Section 9 of the Constitution forbids titles of nobility and stipulates that no officeholder or government employee may "accept of any present, emolument, office, or title, of any kind whatever, from any king, prince, or foreign state" without the consent of Congress. Judith Martin wrote in her Miss Manners column in 2001 that bowing "is not an ordinary bit of foreign etiquette one might adopt out of courtesy when traveling. ... Americans do not properly bow to any royalty. We show respect for other countries' leaders the same way we do to our own."

Maybe that is what the problem is about. The attitude that we are going to do it our way. And as a Brit I recognise the same in my own nations manner around the world. We expect greetings, everything in fact, to be done our way. But greetings protocol is important. A greeting is the gateway into a relationship. You can indicate in those few seconds how you are going to treat that relationship. Trust can be built or lost in simple gesture.  I would suggest that President Obama was very simply saying, I am going to treat you with honour, just as I exprect you will treat me with honour. And I bet they heard what he said all the more attentively for that gesture.

Of course what he said is a problem as well:

Mr. Obama is proving that one can be elected president without knowing how to behave presidentially. His servile gesture was fully fitting with the tone of his humility tour of Europe. In his eagerness to be loved personally, the president has lost sight of the fact that the leader of the free world also must be respected.

Whatever came of the respect that is afforded to integrity, to humility?

Obama: Peacemaking with Iran and gaffs on Special Olympics. The net result ...?

Barack Obama led out with words of hope and a great big gaffe today. 

On Iran his words could not have been more apt.  Obama offers Iran 'the promise of a new beginning'  on CNN calls the message "a dramatic shift in tone from that of the Bush administration, which included Iran, along with North Korea and Iraq, in an "axis of evil."

The text of Barack Obama's address to Iran is here.

He is honouring of their history and culture, conciliatory, and yet not a pushover. Central is the "precious humanity that we all share."

So, is it Genocide? Listen to the pain, not the words

Continuing a series of posts on the Gaza situation, and making peace in the Holy Land.

As with a lot of people's blogging, this is a work in progress and marks my own internal discussion in the context of my life and work. For me, as a church based community builder and peacemaker in multicultural Luton, that context is a whole lot of people who don't like what is going on in Gaza.
Protesters join big demonstration against Gaza attacks.  In line with many around the world, the local Council of Mosques have called what is going on in Gaza a living genocide. Not everyone likes that, and so I am trying to think it through.

So, is it a genocide?

My focus here is not to be academic so I am not going to spend a long time on definitions and legalities. But its an interesting subject.  Genocide according to Wikipedia is "the organized attempt to deliberately and systematically destroy, in whole or in part, an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group."

Sticking my neck out - a two state solution is not the answer.

Its never going to work. A two state solution as a future for the Holy Land, that is. I hate to be a prophet of doom but I am persuaded that all the wishful thinking in the world will not solve this one.  

Everywhere it seems there is a renewed momentum to moving Israel and the Palestinian National Authority to talks that will bring about two states. It is seen to be the only answer.

However lets look at the realities.  Hamas is committed ideologically  to the destruction of Israel (though many analysts recognise there might be scope for other outcomes for the pragmatists in the movement). And to be quite frank it seems that Israel is committed to the destruction of Hamas.

While that may not be the same as the destruction of the Palestinians, in practice it can never work without the destruction of the Palestinians, for two reasons.

The Diary of Anne Frank. Rightly remembering the pain of the Holocaust.

I am tempted to write about the almost unanimous condemnation of Israel's action in Gaza by religious leaders. The pope spoke out today, joining a host of Christian and other faith leaders.  I am tempted to write about the damage being done to Israel's cause by this action. I want to join the outcry in response to the wounded and orphaned left unattended.

Yet I am compelled to reflect on another story. Maybe we could call it The Story. For whatever is said is said, we so often find ourselves back there. I am speaking of the Holocaust. A couple of days ago I wrote about Avrum Burg's new book The Holocaust Is Over: We Must Rise from Its Ashes. ( An old story that dominates the past ... and the present ... and the future. )  He rightly called on fellow Israeli's to move on. Yet, for all the need to move on, we do not do so by sweeping it aside, ignoring it, dismissing it. To break the power of the story through which all other stories in the Holy Land are interpreted we must rightly remember the Holocaust, rather than just forget it.

This week therefore like many I have been watching the new BBC minseries of The Diary of Anne Frank. (See also the Anne Frank Trust site ).

Why do they hate the West so much, we will ask - Robert Fisk

A penetrating set of questions from Robert Fisk.

Robert Fisk: Why do they hate the West so much, we will ask - Robert Fisk, Commentators - The Independent.

In  my previous post, Another Qana I anticipated Fisks comments. He can appear as the cynical veteran of too many middle eastern wars who has just been given another reason to rant. Maybe he is cynical. It can appear like the needle got stuck in the groove. (that metaphor barely works now.) Maybe he does go on.  He can appear anti-semitic. Avrum Burg in my post from yesterday also nails that: An old story that dominates the past ... and the present ... and the future. It is not anti-Semitic to question the inhumane policy of the Israeli government. And that is on the official OK of a former member of that government.

Another Qana?

Reports are appearing of a UN run school being hit in Gaza, with many Palestinian children and women being killed. Details are unclear:  CNN has 10 killed: 10 dead as Israeli missile hits near U.N. school.  The BBC and the Times have upwards of 40.

Whatever happened it is going to provoke a storm. Could it even be as big as the Israeli shelling of  a UN command post in Qana, Southern Lebanon in 1996 when 102 civilans, mainly women and children were killed?  Robert Fisk of the Independent reported on that trajedy: Massacre in Sanctuary; Eyewitness  and I have commented on it in July 2006 just after an Israeli airstrike in Qana had again killed innocents: Discontent during the Lebanon War, summer 2006.

How long must this senseless killing go on? Hamas may or may not be finished off by the current campaign in Gaza, but others will be radicalised and rise up to take their place, albeit with another name. The tragic thing about the Qana massacre is that it would appear to have been the event that sealed the  future of Mohammed Atta who headed the 9/11 events. Read more here.

The cycle of violence just goes on an on unless both side make a conscious effort to break its power.

An old story that dominates the past ... and the present ... and the future.

An interview in Time on New Years Day gives powerful insight into the problems that Israel and the wider Jewish community has in reshaping its game plan. (see previous post: Reading Stories from Gaza)   

Can the Jewish People Survive Without an Enemy?  is an interview with Avrum Burg, the author of The Holocaust Is Over: We Must Rise from Its Ashes.   Burg, a former member of the Israeli cabinet and from a family that underpins the state of Israel, shocks many of his fellow countrymen by suggesting that "an obsession with an exaggerated sense of threats to Jewish survival cultivated by Israel and its most fervent backers actually impedes the realization of Judaism's higher goals."  

Burg argues that the central defining metaphor for Israel remains the Holocaust, and to move on it is crucial that they  break the power of that metaphor. Much of it has been said before, but the credibility of the author is the critical piece here.        

Reading stories from Gaza

With no reporters in Gaza its easy to lose sight of the individual stories of horrific suffering. But there are some good reports in Palestinian media and blogs. One good source is Philip Rizk, who is an Egyptian-German who lived in Gaza from August 2005 till August 2007. Philip is pursuing graduate studies in Cairo, writes for the Palestinian Chronicle, and runs a blog: Tabula Gaza. Take a read of an sms message from Gaza that he just received:

"I have decided not leave our house even if I die. All the people have decided this, we won't resettle again." 

The true story behind this war is not the one Israel is telling

This article in the Independent yesterday moved me to tears.  It is so true.

Johann Hari: The true story behind this war is not the one Israel is telling - Johann Hari, Commentators - The Independent.

The world isn't just watching the Israeli government commit a crime in Gaza; we are watching it self-harm. This morning, and tomorrow morning, and every morning until this punishment beating ends, the young people of the Gaza Strip are going to be more filled with hate, and more determined to fight back, with stones or suicide vests or rockets. Israeli leaders have convinced themselves that the harder you beat the Palestinians, the softer they will become. But when this is over, the rage against Israelis will have hardened, and the same old compromises will still be waiting by the roadside of history, untended and unmade. ...

Hari paints a profound picture of the foolishness of it all. Self harm is a powerful picture.