Get stuck in, Mr President

摘要

The American president may think he has enough on his plate without worrying about the dog's dinner simmering away in the corner: the sickly Middle East peace process, with its often nauseous ingredients. This week he has sent an arrayrnof colleagues to stir the pot, including his envoy, George Mitchell, who has been in and out of the region; Robert Gates, his secretary of defence; and Jim Jones, his security adviser, who knows the Palestinians from the past. But Mr Obama is the indispensable head chef. However preoccupied, it is he who must decide what to serve up-and when.rnHe has made an excellent start. His speech in Cairo to the Muslim world was masterly. He persuaded many Arabs and quite a few Palestinians that he was determined to be even-handed. And he squeezed Israel's new prime minister, Binya-min Netanyahu, into conceding for the first time in public, however grudgingly, that the Palestinians must have a state.