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Transcript of Obama's interview with Middle East cable TV

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January 27, 2009 12:04 pm
By Sheila Lennon

obamaarabtv.jpg
TV interview with President Obama on Al-Arabiya bears Arabic subtitles.

Transcript of President Obama's interview last night in Washington with Hisham Melhem of the Al-Arabiya cable network (based in Dubai, UAE) on Monday is below the story:

Story: Obama tells Al Arabiya peace talks should resume

Obama: And so what I want to
communicate is the fact that in all my travels throughout the Muslim world, what I've come to understand is that regardless of your faith -- and America is a country of Muslims, Jews, Christians, non-believers -- regardless of your faith, people all have certain common hopes and common dreams.

And my job is to communicate to the American people that the Muslim world is filled with extraordinary people who simply want to live their lives and see their children live better lives. My job to the Muslim world is to communicate that the Americans are not your enemy. We sometimes make mistakes. We have not been perfect. But if you look at the track record, as you say, America was not born as a colonial power, and that the same respect and partnership that America had with the Muslim world as recently as 20 or 30 years ago, there's no reason why we can't restore that. Andthat I think is going to be an important task.

Video, Part 1 (with annoying intro) | Part 2

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