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Obama Faces Second-Term Middle East Challenges

(BBC News) Jeremy Bowen - The Middle East is in a process of change that will take a generation. However much the U.S. would like to influence, the people of the region show every sign of wanting to take back control of their lives from foreigners and their current and former allies. President Obama shows every sign of realizing America's limits. You get the feeling that President Obama would love to be able to turn his back on the Middle East. The trouble with that is the Middle East is too important to be left alone. If by next summer the U.S. and its key allies still believe that Iran is developing a nuclear weapon, despite talks and sanctions, President Obama will have to decide whether or not to attack Iran's nuclear sites, or to give Israel a green light to go to war. Barack Obama will not want his presidency to be remembered as the time when Iran became a nuclear weapons power. If Iran rebuffed an offer that President Obama considered fair, and if he felt Iran was going to go nuclear, there is every chance that he would order an attack. Behind every decision that crosses the president's desk will be the knowledge that, despite its huge military power, America's political leverage in the Middle East is in decline. Compliant, reliable, authoritarian allies have been deposed. And a new generation that sees America as an adversary, not a friend, is being empowered.
2012-11-09 00:00:00
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