If Obama Can Bring Change to DC, Why Not Middle East?

As Barack Obama’s inauguration brings one thing once deemed impossible—a black US president—it will be accompanied by the renewal of another seemingly intractable issue, David Remnick writes in the New Yorker: the Arab-Israeli conflict. Obama claims to understand “the obligation to repair the world” set out in the Talmud; “the obligation of constant engagement is deep; the cost of negligence is paid in blood,” Remnick writes.

“History has proved that the seemingly impossible can be achieved: the Irish and the English have all but resolved a conflict that began in the days of Oliver Cromwell,” Remnick writes, “and on Jan. 20 an African-American President will cross the color line and move into the White House––a house that slaves helped build.” (More President Obama stories.)