Wednesday, June 26, 2002

Moderates in Arab Lands Accentuate the Positive
"This is a catastrophic speech that provided the Arabs with nothing," said Emad Fawzi Shueibi, a political analyst and professor at the University of Damascus. "Bush did not offer a solution — he gave new conditions that the Palestinians have to meet in order to start negotiations."

Officials in Syria kept silent, and government-run newspapers there ignored the fact that Mr. Bush had demanded that Syria expel militant Palestinian groups that Washington accused of terrorist activity and that Syria cut off its support for Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Saudi Arabia, which often takes its time in formulating official reactions, kept quiet at home, although a spokesman appeared on various American television channels to support the idea of a Palestinian state.


The gap between supportive government pronouncements on the speech and the anger voiced by the public at large sometimes made it seem as though the two had listened to different speeches.

"And the Americans wonder why do the Arabs hate them!" said Ahmed Abdel-Salam, a 28-year-old banker, sitting with his friends in downtown Cairo cafe. "The answer in one word is Bush. If his message succeeded in one thing, that is telling the few Palestinian voices that still had hopes in the Americans as a fair broker that they were completely wrong."
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/26/international/middleeast/26ARAB.html

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