“My job to the Muslim world is to communicate that the Americans are not your enemy”, President Obama said in an interview with the Dubai-based Al-Arabiya Network on January 26, 2009.

Did Americans attack the USS Cole? Did they attack Kuwait? Did they attack the Muslim world on 9-11?

It may seem fine to present “a humble and conciliatory face of America to the Islamic world” (Politico), but it is not without risks. A similarly young and inexperienced American president, John F. Kennedy, met with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev and held out the humble hand of reconciliation to him.

As recounted in The New York Times (May 22, 2008):

Paul Nitze, the assistant secretary of defense, said the meeting was “just a disaster.”

Khrushchev agreed, noting that the youthful Kennedy was “too intelligent and too weak.”

Kennedy’s assessment of his own performance was no less severe…“He just beat the hell out of me. I’ve got a terrible problem if he thinks I’m inexperienced and have no guts. Until we remove those ideas we won’t get anywhere with him.”

Unfortunately, especially from America, being humble, kind and conciliatory is often seen as being weak.

Ayman al-Zawahiri's comments described Israel’s actions in Gaza as “Obama's gift to Israel” before he takes office later this month. “This is Obama whom the American machine of lies tried to portray as the rescuer who will change the policy of America…He kills your brothers and sisters in Gaza mercilessly and without affection.”

On July 23, 2007, Mr. Obama stated he was “willing to meet separately, without precondition…with the leaders of Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba and North Korea”.