The Middle East and Barack Obama.

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Kids in Ramallah, Palestine

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We know it.

Barack Obama knows that we know it.

And he knows it too!

The key to sorting out the conflicts in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Ethiopia can be summed up in one word:

Palestine

Obama has just a few months to give Israel some clear signals on what he is thinking, before they go to the polls in February. Although it is not up to the US to tell the Israelis how to vote, we know that Israeli prime ministers like to be persona grata in Washington.  And everyone knows what a mess the Israelis (and the Palestinians for that matter) have got themselves into.  We all had hopes that Tzipi Livini would make it as prime minister.  She looked as if she might have the necessary courage and punch to sort out the two-state solution that is inevitable, once and for all.

But she fell short - stupidly in my judgement. She could have stepped into Olmert's shoes without an election had she got enough of a coalition together. She almost did it but she failed.  She refused to give one small party the funds they asked for and she would not refuse to talk to the Palestinians about Jerusalem.  Maybe that was a mistake that some more wily negotiator would have handled better.  She may win in February:  Then too Binyamin Netanyahu may win.  Even if he does win, all may not be lost.  Hawks usually are better at winning the peace than are doves.  Look at Northern Ireland!

What we don't yet know is how Brack Obama will tackle the issue.  He blundered during the campaign when he promised that Jerusalen would not be divided.  Ok, that might be understandable in electioneering.

Obama had to deal with serious Islamaphobia during the election.

Yet he left it to Colin Powell to say clearly that there is nothing wrong with being Islamic.

There is nothing wrong with being Jewish either.

Barack Obama has many Jewish friends.  His chief strategist, David Alexrod, is a Jewish-American.  His chief adviser on the Middle-East, Dennis Ross, is a Jewish-American.  His chief-of-staff, Rahm Emmanuel, is a Jewish-American, who identifies with hawkish right-wing Israeli politics and himself did a stint in the Israeli military. And Candidate Obama has repeated America's usual support for the Jewish state, calling its security sacrosanct.

Imtiaz Muqbil, in today's Bangkok Post, lists the disappointments in his campaign.

ONE:  on the campaign he visited many synagogues, especially a large one in Florida.  Yet he never visited any mosques.

TWO:  two Muslim women wearing the hijab were removed from the backdrop of the photo-ops at the August 2008 Democratic Convention, where he won the nomination.

THREE:  Jimmy Carter who has done so much to bring peace to the Middle East, could not even get a speaking slot at that convention because of his views on Palestine (and Carter's recent book - Apartheid - was a bit over the top, to my mind).

Robert Fisk, the journalist on the Middle East for the Independent, and a leading authority on these issues, pointed out in an interview with Aljazeera, that Obama's victory speech never once contained the word - justice.

Now none of this may matter.  We might put it all down to the need to win the election.

Obama has promised change. And the Economist this week did point out that he has shown more sympathy than most previous presidents for the plight of the Palestinians. So how much will he actually deliver?  Those who are affected by change will fight hard to resist anything they do not like.  The Jewish lobby is well organised.  Always has been; always will be.  George Bush promised a two-state solution but we always knew he never would deliver on it.  Condy Rice has been to Israel and talked with both sides; eighty times (oops!  that should have read eighteen times!)I think.  But there is no peace in sight.

Oh I know things are difficult.  But President-Elect Barack Obama does have a Palestinian friend, Rashid Khalidi, (a prominent Palestinian-American scholar) formed in Chicago.  Call me naive if you want:  will he appoint Khalidi as his adviser on Palestinian affairs?  That would at least be a start.

The rest is up to us!

We need to make sure that Barack Obama knows that we know that peace will never fully arrive anywhere in the Arab world until the US President knocks heads together over the Middle East, as only he can do.We all know the two-state solution has to come.

Vigilence, brothers and sisters, vigilence.