Barack Obama Reaches Out To The Islamic Community

In a way that George Bush never could, Barack Obama set out to reach out to Islamic world yesterday. It was noticeable to everyone that there was a purpose in giving his first interview to Al Arabiya. There has been an incredible amount of tension between the "West" and the "Middle East" from the last eight years of Bush's foreign policy, but now it is time to start to heal the divide.

From McClatchy:

Now, my job is to communicate the fact that the United States has a stake in the well-being of the Muslim world, that the language we use has to be a language of respect. I have Muslim members of my family. I have lived in Muslim countries.

Q The largest one.

THE PRESIDENT: The largest one, Indonesia. And so what I want to communicate is the fact that in all my travels throughout the Muslim world, what I've come to understand is that regardless of your faith -- and America is a country of Muslims, Jews, Christians, non-believers -- regardless of your faith, people all have certain common hopes and common dreams.

And my job is to communicate to the American people that the Muslim world is filled with extraordinary people who simply want to live their lives and see their children live better lives. My job to the Muslim world is to communicate that the Americans are not your enemy. We sometimes make mistakes. We have not been perfect. But if you look at the track record, as you say, America was not born as a colonial power, and that the same respect and partnership that America had with the Muslim world as recently as 20 or 30 years ago, there's no reason why we can't restore that. And that I think is going to be an important task.

It is an enormous task Mr. President and not one that is easily achieved. The rhetoric so far is encouraging, that that can be turned from hope and promise to sound policy and relief for the people's who have been oppressed by their own leaders and the world geopolitical dynamic. Of course, in the next paragraph he stated exactly that it is his actions that will be judged and not anything else.