By AMY HARDER
Nearly 250 people packed a room at the Council on Foreign Relations this afternoon to question former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and former Rep. Vin Weber, R-Minn., on the forward-looking report [PDF] that they and more than 30 other foreign policy experts produced for the U.S.-Muslim Engagement Project last fall.
There was no shortage of timely topics to jump-start the conversation. President Obama has already undertaken a series of actions, such as appointing special envoys to the Middle East and appearing on Arab TV, that suggest he's reaching out to Muslims. While Albright and Weber said they didn't know if the new administration had absorbed the report word for word, Obama seems to be taking the steps the group has put forth, they said.
The media's coverage of the president's early moves, paired with the conflict in Gaza, present the administration with a double-edged sword in its Middle East policy, Weber said. "The good news is that our issues are on the front burner," he said. "The bad news is our issues are really on the front burner." Weber said the administration is in "delicate stages" on various issues throughout the Middle East. Moderator Barbara Slavin, the Washington Times' assistant managing editor for world and national security, brought up two such sensitive topics: the upcoming elections in Israel and Iran. In both cases, Weber and Albright said, the U.S. needs to tread lightly and ensure that it doesn't interject itself into the politics surrounding the elections.
Weber emphasized that he's "most concerned" with the Iranian presidential elections, which take place in June. Iranians hang on America's "every word," he said, adding that the U.S. must be "very, very careful to hold our tongue until after the elections."
In responding to questions from the audience, the two briefly touched upon nearly all the daunting challenges the administration faces in the Middle East: where America's priorities should be regarding Afghanistan and Pakistan, promotion of democracy versus enforcement, and how the media influences both Americans' perception of the Middle East and the Middle East's perception of the U.S.
In recent interviews with with NationalJournal.com, Albright and Weber discussed these topics and more. At the CFR discussion, Albright said that a crucial first step in improving the relationship between the U.S. and the Muslim world is more comprehensive and educational coverage in the media. It should focus on more than just violence in the Middle East, for instance, Albright said. Weber echoed her thoughts. U.S. press coverage in this region "doesn't give a textured view of what the Middle East is really like," he said.
CFR's Melinda Brouwer, who helped coordinate the event, said that about 240 people attended, including many who were involved in the report, as well as foreign news organizations reporting back to Indonesia and Pakistan. Albright and Weber were certainly a big draw, giving CFR what Brouwer called its biggest audience and camera-drawing press corps since its recent relocation from Massachusetts Avenue to 18th and F streets.
On his first morning as president, Barack Obama found time to address the still-unstable situation in Gaza, calling the leaders of Israel, the Palestinian Authority, Jordan and Egypt, according to a statement from White House press secretary Robert Gibbs. In conversations with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, King Abdullah of Jordan and President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority, the president signaled that he would engage with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by supporting reconstruction efforts and working to prevent the smuggling of weapons into Gaza.
The move is notable for coming so early in Obama's term, something the White House statement is at pains to point out. His immediate predecessors, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, only turned their attention to the peace process further into their presidencies.
In an interview on ABC's "This Week" earlier this month, Obama declined to comment on Israel's invasion of Gaza, which had been prompted by Hamas rocket fire into southern Israel, but said he would take prompt action once in office. "What I am doing right now is putting together the team so that on January 20th, starting on day one, we have the best possible people who are going to be immediately engaged in the Middle East peace process as a whole," he said.
See the full statement after the jump:
By AMY HARDER
The latest round of violence in the Middle East has provided a timely backdrop for today's United States Institute of Peace conference examining the foreign policy challenges facing President-elect Barack Obama. At least brief mentions of the conflict found their way into several speeches at the Washington Convention Center, including those by former Defense Secretary William Perry and former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright in the first half of the daylong program.
It also kept away one of the program's keynote speakers: Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, slated to speak early in the day, was held up in New York with the U.N. Security Council. Henrietta Fore, director of foreign assistance at the State Department and administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, spoke on Rice's behalf. The outgoing secretary is "working around the clock to end the violence in Gaza," Fore said. She also said the Middle East conflict offers a "fascinating and timely discussion as we transition to the new administration."
The rest of the morning's program centered on the danger that nuclear weapons present to the U.S. Perry, who served as Defense secretary under President Clinton, delivered a somber speech about the threat of nuclear proliferation, especially from countries like Iran and North Korea. "I have a strong belief that the gravest danger our nation faces today is a terror group detonating a nuclear bomb in one of our cities," Perry said.
He expressed optimism about the incoming president, saying there are "actions Obama can take to move us in a direction in a world with no nuclear weapons," including inviting Russia to join the U.S. in its stand against nuclear proliferation. These actions, he added, can be achieved within the new administration's first year. But while Perry ended on an encouraging note, saying the country is on a "positive track," he wasn't shy in predicting trouble ahead. "President Obama will almost certainly face a serious crisis with Iran," he said. "Indeed, I believe that the crisis point will be reached in his first year of office."
Continue reading Gaza, Nuclear Weapons Take Early Focus At USIP Conference.
By AMY HARDER
Nearly 1,400 people are slated to attend the United States Institute for Peace's "Passing the Baton 2009" conference on Thursday, which will feature outgoing officials such as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley discussing "critical foreign policy challenges and opportunities facing the new administration as it transitions into power."
This is nearly twice as many attendees as USIP's first conference of this kind, which took place in 2001, and hundreds more than expected, said spokeswoman Lauren Sucher. She said that the Institute, which was established by Congress in the early 1980s, took pains to ensure that the conference was free so that anyone could attend.
Other noteworthy speakers include: Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Michael Mullen, Commander of U.S. Central Command Gen. David Petraeus, World Bank President Robert Zoellick, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, former Secretary of Defense William Perry and former National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski.
James Jones, Barack Obama's nominee for national security adviser, is not on the speaker schedule, but is on the list of speakers' biographies. Sucher could not yet confirm whether Jones will attend.
By AMY HARDER
All of President-elect Barack Obama's major national security designees will attend a meeting today in Chicago to discuss the incoming administration's "international opportunities and challenges," according to the transition team.
Reported attendees include Vice President-elect Joe Biden; Secretary of State-designate Hillary Rodham Clinton; Defense Secretary Robert Gates; Attorney General-designate Eric Holder; Homeland Security nominee Janet Napolitano; Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; U.N. Ambassador-designate Susan Rice; National Security Advisor nominee James Jones; Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell; incoming White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel; and White House Counsel-designate Greg Craig.
This is the second national security meeting Obama has held since the election; the first one was Dec. 1, the day the president-elect announced his foreign policy team. This time around, however, a much more exhaustive list of leaders is slated to attend. According to the team, this is one of a series of meetings between now and the inauguration to make sure they're "ready to hit the ground running."
• "Obama wants to pick his foreign policy roster first, and then turn to substance.... Among the big questions are whether to ask Bob Gates to stay on as defense secretary or, if not, whether to appoint a prominent Republican, such as Sen. Richard Lugar or Sen. Chuck Hagel, as secretary of state. Either way, Obama wants a bipartisan team."
• "For national security adviser, Obama is likely to pick a pragmatist."
• "Obama wants to make an early push on the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, despite political turmoil in Israel."
• "On Iran, Obama wants to open the door to a process of engagement and dialogue, even though his advisers aren't confident it will succeed."
• "On Iraq and Afghanistan, Obama will listen carefully to advice from Gen. David Petraeus, the Centcom commander, and other military leaders before making decisions."
• "Beware of Reorganitus: You are about to be besieged by proposals to reorganize government."
• "About Harboring Loyalists: There are folks who have spent tremendous energy trying to advance your cause and now want jobs. It would be grand if they were all experienced in government management. But take note of the trail left by the friends of Jimmy Carter."
• "Take No for an Answer: You will find no shortage of applicants willing to sacrifice for high-salaried government jobs."
• "Know When to Fold: When a nomination is in trouble, count votes and move quickly if you don't have enough of them."
• "And One More Thing: Here's my last piece of gratuitous advice -- although it will be hotly challenged by Bill Clinton: Never give major public policy responsibility to someone you cannot fire."
