In its quest to win hearts and minds in the Arab world, the administration has hired no less than three high powered Undersecretaries of State for Public Diplomacy; Karen Hughes, the latest to declare victory and go home (obviously she hadn't paid attention to this advice from former US diplomat John Brown); her predecessor Margaret Tutwiler, a retread from the George H.W. Bush White House who left in frustration after five months; and Charlotte Beers ("the most powerful woman in advertising"), brought in from Madison Avenue to revamp the US image before it went down the tubes in "Mission Accomplished."
But read this account of the recent US tour of legendary Lebanese composer and musician Marcel Khalife and you'll get an inkling of why all the high-priced PR people in the world cannot help the US deal with the Arab world. Khalife describes his arrival experience:
At the end of the interview [see below*] with the immigration officer (naturally, this was not the first time; anywhere I landed, I had the same conversation), I had a CD and I gave them a copy and I told him I would like to give you this as a gift so that you’ll know I am just an artist and musician. He was surprised I gave him a CD. I told him at the same time, I'm the UNESCO Artist for Peace. And he said, what does UNESCO mean? This happened here in New York. I told him this was a UN organization for culture.
The lucky but clueless Immigration officer (Immigration and Customs Enforcement, part of DHS) had just received an album from the "Bob Dylan of Arab music," (which probably understates his talent) and UNESCO, of course, is the UN's Educational and Scientific Organization.
My point here is not to excoriate some hapless immigration official in a chaotic JFK arrival hall. No, my point is that Marcel Khalife, on his way to concerts throughout the United States in this time of American travails with the Arab world ("why do they hate us?") -- and in the week before the Annapolis conference -- misses an opportunity to win points through its welcome (or lack thereof) to one of the most influential artists in the secular Arab world. I stress secular, since Khalife has been attacked by extremists in Bahrain and elsewhere, who once objected to his presentation of an ancient Arab love story.
In other hands, in a different age, the US might have handled this differently. The US Information Agency, which former Senator Jesse Helms succeeded in dismantling and handing over to the State Department, might have organized a US tour for Khalife. It would have ensured a smooth arrival in the US, and would have given his American tour prominent coverage on the Arabic service of VOA. Instead
*Once I come to the airport, you feel a certain difference in treatment, in the negative, not positive sense. Once our names are checked in the computer, the computer reacts unnaturally. They isolate us inside rooms and questions are asked which have to do with our very humanity. ... the identity that you have become grounds for accusation.
When I was a young vice consul at American embassies, I quickly learned that foreign visa applicants had no Constitutional right to a US tourist visa. In fact, the burden of proof is on the applicant. There is an assumption of ineligibility, if not "guilt" per se. But Khalife had already been through the visa process, and in fact had been to the US before (I remember hearing him on NPR a couple of years ago). Does "traveling while Arab" mean that humiliation is de rigueur at every "checkpoint" - even after you've been approved?
I think Khalife has probably left the US by now, and is presumably back in Lebanon. Maybe the State Department should task its cultural attache in Beirut to organize a little gesture - a dinner invitation? a concert? a travel grant?- to make amends to Marcel Khalife. It could go a long way.