Obama's Middle East Speeches Compared (INFOGRAPHIC)

NEW YORK -- Since President Obama's much-praised speech at Cairo University in June 2009, a lot has changed in the Middle East.

Thursday's highly anticipated speech, which Obama delivered at the State Department, reflected the recent upheaval in the region, with a renewed focus on resolving the Israeli/Palestinian stalemate and a strong commitment to advancing democratic change. Yet while Obama hailed the unrest sparked by the "Arab Spring" as a "historic opportunity," his speech also demonstrated the administration's bifurcated approach to the protests shaking the Middle East, with tough words for Syria and, in contrast, conciliatory language about the monarchy in Bahrain and the regime in Yemen.

In Thursday's speech, the president referenced democracy more than twice as many times as he did in his 2009 address to the Muslim world. There were also far fewer mentions of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Interestingly, he mentioned Pakistan twice in 2009 but ignored it on Thursday -- even though Osama bin Laden was just found in that country, and officials there are currently facing tough questions about their knowledge of the al Qaeda leader's whereabouts.

Frequency of terms in Obama's speeches

	May 2011	June 2009
Afghanistan	1	5
America	11	25
Democracy	9	4
Iran	2	6
Iraq	4	12
Israel	15	12
Osama Bin Laden	4	0
Pakistan	0	3
Palestine	4	2
Peace	9	19
Terrorism	2	0

Here is a word cloud of today's speech:

And here is a word cloud of the 2009 speech:

Comments

[chaya]

12:40 PM on 05/20/2011

It's too bad he neglected to mention women in the 2011 speech.

I'm just sayin'.

[bluereality909]

01:55 PM on 05/20/2011

He did, look above the "y" in young in the 2011 cloud.

[chaya]

05:44 PM on 05/20/2011

Ah, thank you. My faith restored. :)

[Mr Hoodoo]

09:41 AM on 05/20/2011

What's that watching the television?

A banshee?

[vicbar88]

08:46 AM on 05/20/2011

Word Cloud? Finally a 100% accurate description of Obama's speeches. We can use it other places too since pretty much everything he does is cloudy in one way or another.

[pkafin]

02:47 PM on 05/20/2011

It's too bad your antipathy for Obama is clouding your ability to see the additional perspective that a word cloud provides. I do wish, however, that the 2011 word cloud had all the words right side up like the 2009 one does.

[waujvari1274]

07:57 AM on 05/20/2011

"Since President Obama's much-praised speech at Cairo University in June 2009,"

Curious...who praised it? Because listening to world news and not US news, nobody praised it and a vast majority of people around the world thought it was empty words. So again, who praised it? And reading articles like this is another good reason why I don't take anything US journalism says as a fact. I don't think we report facts anymore..just opinions based on what party your paper or network supports.

[Shannon Foreman]

07:09 AM on 05/20/2011

Who cares! Sat is the end of the world. ROTFL

[walkabodog]

01:54 AM on 05/20/2011

I think it goes something like this: I will curse them that curse thee, and I will bless them that bless thee. Tread lightly with Israel. You have been warned.

[Bootoomee]

05:22 AM on 05/20/2011

Obama must be really scared now! You have done it!

[vicbar88]

08:29 AM on 05/20/2011

He's not smart enough to be scrared - actually he's barely smart enough for anything

[justitia]

10:32 PM on 05/19/2011

Before 1949, there were only a few Jews (called Sabra) living in Palestine. While relationship with between Jews and Palestinians (both Muslim and Christian) may not have been exactly harmonious there was none either of the intense hatred that one can find these days. Muslim and Christian Palestinians were the overwhelming majority then and the Jews could have been easily wiped out then if the Palestinians were really bent on exterminating them. This is one historical fact that Christian Zionists have overlooked or chosen to ignore.

But the creation of the state of Israel and the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories has changed all that. Jewish extremists have displayed contempt of Palestinians in driving the latter out of their homes and farms, and built walls around Palestinan communities that are virtual concentration camps, mimicking their erstwhile Nazi tormentors in a kind of ironic twist. Jewish extremists and their Western allies have succeeded in eliciting hatred from Palestinians, making the ground fertile for extremism.

Now the Zionists, both Jewish and Christian, use the violence and hatred created by the occupation as the very rationale to keep the status quo.

It still is never too late. But just like Afrikaner extremists fearing the end of apartheid in South Africa, expect vigorous and violent opposition to moving back to 1967 borders from Zionists. But just like the end of apartheid, it's possible to move back to 1967 borders.

BTW, Jew and Zionist are not one and the same, except for the bigot.

[R Car]

10:18 PM on 05/19/2011

Obama said what other American presidents wouldn't say in public.

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Peace/bushplan.html

[limpinalien]

09:34 PM on 05/19/2011

Isreal is criticized because it's innocent? Think again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMGuYjt6CP8

[walkabodog]

01:52 AM on 05/20/2011

Don't mess with Israel. Somebody bigger than the current President watches over them. You wouldn't like going up against Him.

[Bootoomee]

05:25 AM on 05/20/2011

Yeah, but his God has a bigger d*ck so no probs

[pinouye]

08:47 PM on 05/19/2011

At least he can bring himself to use the word "terrorism"...

[justitia]

10:37 PM on 05/19/2011

Yes, how long has your bigoted mind think he couldn't?

[pinouye]

10:44 PM on 05/19/2011

Bigot??? Are you for real???

[MarkRB]

02:06 AM on 05/20/2011

Uhmmm...when he first took office we weren't supposed to call them terrorist attacks but "man made disasters".......how quickly you forget. And I suppose you'll call me a racist or bigot as well, because that seems the only response you libs know how to say.

[HansB]

05:57 PM on 05/19/2011

Apples and oranges. In June 2009 Obama delivered his Cairo speech on the Islamic world. His latest speech concerns only the Middle East, and more specifically the parts of it affected by the Arab Spring.

So yes, he mentioned Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran more often in 2009 than now. Duh.

[jarjax1632b]

05:47 PM on 05/19/2011

wtf? A "word cloud"? Is this art class?

[cs rider]

07:01 PM on 05/19/2011

yeah I was thinking the same thing, when it said chart I thought I would find useful information....but a word cloud? wow HP epic fail

[maxom]

08:36 PM on 05/19/2011

Word cloud= Obama speech

[JBDenver]

05:44 PM on 05/19/2011

The chick wearing the burkha in the photo is HOT!

She's the bomb!

[jarjax1632b]

05:50 PM on 05/19/2011

Repressed and subjugated women are always hot.

[justitia]

10:39 PM on 05/19/2011

That's how maniacs look at them.

[Peter Combs]

06:09 PM on 05/19/2011

she probably has a Chanel Suit on under it..

[JBDenver]

06:33 PM on 05/19/2011

No kidding...

From the Slow-Burn Fuse Collection

[Hal Donahue]

05:37 PM on 05/19/2011

An interesting visual picture of Obama's carefully crafted message and its target.

[peanutsintexas]

05:04 PM on 05/19/2011

I think it's gonna rain.

[mflorian]

08:55 PM on 05/19/2011

At least it's only raining words. Last Tuesday it was raining men and there was six car pile-up on the interstate.