Obama's outreach: The view from Dubai

There are many who couldn’t help but share their cynicism about the fact that Obama went to Egypt and was hosted by President Hosni Mubarak, who is viewed by most of the Muslim world as a brutal autocrat who has violated human rights to suppress all political opposition. There are others who scoff at his meeting with the House of Saud, which embodies an American-backed monarchy that revels in profligate waste and excess while millions of Arabs suffer under tyranny, oppression and poverty.

“I like that Obama is here talking and listening. At least, I hope he is listening and not only talking," said Abdul Kader, 40, a Muslim from Kerala, India who works the counter at the Sonapour Grocery.

“America has many words about democracy, but we hope we will see the reality of those words. We are waiting for actions, not words,” added Kader, who was serving a long line of customers.

Many of them were picking up newspapers in Arabic and Urdu with headlines about Obama’s arrival in Cairo, where he gave his powerful, signature speech.

Sonapour is a sprawling city of 300,000 laborers who have come to Dubai to build the new, shiny skyscrapers that seem to fill every corner of the downtown here. The construction companies build the huge dormitories that make up Sonapour, where six men sleep in bunkbeds crammed into one 12-by-6 foot cell without air conditioning in the brutal heat.

The skyscrapers they build, including the Burj Dubai, the tallest building in the world, are monuments to the riches of the royal family and testaments to faith in the energy and creativity and cash that fuels Dubai and makes it one of the hottest cities in the world for real estate, finance and trade.

But the United Arab Emirates is a dream built on sand, and the laborers who build it live in a system akin to modern slavery. They come from desperately poor countries, all too often suffering from the corruption and despotism of U.S.-backed regimes in the Muslim world. When they arrive, most laborers see their passports taken and are forced into a kind of indentured servitude in which they must pay back the fees that brought them there before they can begin to send remittances home.

Their lives go largely unnoticed by a gilded class of bankers, hoteliers and oil industry executives who benefit from the riches of the kingdom and the economy it generates.

At an elegant dinner party Wednesday night in the neighborhood of Jumerieh, several of these successful businessmen and women talked about President Obama’s visit to the region as they were served by a butler in black tie.

This is the other side of Dubai, where they were focused on the economy and what Obama is doing here in the region and around the world to help it recover. They are mindful that Dubai’s construction boom has come to a near standstill in recent months, a fact made evident by the scores of cranes at building sites that stand frozen and silent.

Yet, still they also care about the overall message in the region and how Obama seeks to redefine America’s relationship with the Muslim world. The core of the issue for so many of these educated Arabs is Palestine and the appearance that America’s alliance with Israel has made it a less than fair broker for peace.

Lina Dajani Malas, a highly educated Palestinian woman married to an executive in finance here, tuned into Obama’s speech after a luncheon with friends. She said Obama’s speech provided important clarity about the need for Israel to stop building settlements and for there to be a two-state solution.

But she quickly added, “He is a beautiful speaker. He is eloquent. But the truth is we have heard this before. Can he really change America’s policies? Actions speak louder than words. And can Obama lead America to really take on those actions. We’ll see.”
 

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