Obama reaches out to Muslims

RIYADH, SAUDI ARABIA - Aiming to repair the U.S. relationship with the Muslim world, President Obama was greeted on Wednesday with reminders of the vast gulfs his Cairo speech must bridge, as voices as disparate as Al-Qaida's and the Israeli government's competed to shape how Obama's message would be heard.

In a new audiotape, Osama bin Laden condemned Obama for planting what he called new seeds of "hatred and vengeance" among Muslims, while in Jerusalem, senior Israeli officials complained that Obama was rewriting old understandings by taking a harder line against new Israeli settlements.

The speech that Obama was to deliver early today in Cairo was intended to make good on a two-year-old promise to use a major Muslim capital as the venue for a major address. Obama has pledged a new face and tone to relations between the United States and the Muslim world. But whether his expected call for America and Islam to come together can trump Bin Laden's call to arms is a question that could define Obama's presidency in the years to come.

Aware of the high expectations for the speech, Obama and his advisers have spent months soliciting opinion and advice from a wide range of experts, from men of the cloth to Arab businessmen to Persian scholars.

High expectations

On his first stop in the Middle East, Obama spent Wednesday afternoon with King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, home to Islam's two holiest sites, and declared on arrival, "I thought it was very important to come to the place where Islam began."

In a bid to make sure that Obama's message will be heard, particularly among young people, the White House has mounted a strong campaign, including a website created in Arabic, Persian, Urdu and English where people outside the United States can receive the speech via text message.

The speech will cover a wide range of territory, advisers said, beginning by challenging the misperceptions that Americans may hold about Muslims and that Muslims may hold about Americans. Obama will touch upon violent extremism, the threat of a nuclear Iran and the need for the expansion of human rights and democracy.

But even on Wednesday night, as Obama headed to his quarters at Al Janadriyah Farm, where he is a guest of the king, he told his advisers that he had more thinking to do on the speech and would deliver a final version by dawn.

As the son and grandson of Muslims, Obama has had years to reflect on America's troubled ties with the Islamic world. Yet on his path to the Cairo address, as described by some advisers, Obama reached out to dozens of people on how to shape his message.

Before his trip, he and his aides talked to American chief executives of major companies who are Muslims. He read unsolicited essays that were sent to the White House. And he sought out not only Muslims, but also Jews and people of other faiths and experts across academia.

In recent weeks, as advisers presented him with drafts of the speech, Obama would end sessions with a question. "Are you making sure that we are hearing a Muslim voice?" he would say, according to participants.

Kisses, medals and tents

On the first of a five-day trip through four countries, Obama was treading carefully, with every move being closely watched in the Middle East.

On his arrival in Riyadh, Obama exchanged a light embrace and a double-kiss with King Abdullah, but the president did not bow as he did at their first meeting in London earlier this year in a gesture that drew criticism.

Abdullah showered Obama with compliments in the welcoming ceremonies and presented him with the King Abdul Aziz Order of Merit, a large medallion with a thick gold chain that is the kingdom's highest honor.

"Those are only given to the very few friends of the king, and you are certainly one of those," Abdullah said.

"I consider the king's friendship a great blessing, and I am very appreciative that he would bestow this honor on me during this visit," Obama said.

The two then retreated to hold private talks on a range of issues at the king's ranch outside of Riyadh.

At the ranch, Abdullah introduced Obama to several princes in an enormous room decorated to look like a tent, with a billowing draped ceiling, large candelabras, and a towering picture of King Abdul Aziz, founder of the modern Saudi monarchy.

Looking up, Obama joked: "This is a much nicer tent than you gave to Prince Charles."

That drew a laugh from Abdullah, who then explained that Saudi royals try to maintain ties to their desert roots even inside buildings.

"I've been struck by his wisdom and his graciousness," Obama said of the king and thanked him for his "extraordinary generosity and hospitality."

Abdullah, in turn, expressed his "best wishes to the friendly American people who are represented by a distinguished man who deserves to be in this position."