"...Sadat proved one thing, which in my eyes is more important than anything else: one can change the emotional state of an entire people. One can cut the psychological knot with one bold stroke. For that one needs leaders, on both sides. Such leaders can appear quite suddenly, in the most unexpected place and at the most unexpected time. Barak Obama could prove to be a kind of American Sadat."

"Since the March 2008 elections, Anwar was seen as a vulture waiting to pounce upon the carcass of a dying UMNO. With Abdullah out and Najib in, it is feared that the vulture may turn out to be the eighty-something Mahathir, dying to have the last laugh. That is a scenario most Malaysians would want to avoid, at any cost."

"Today, many Americans are convinced that they have reestablished a firm ground from which they can depart once again to bring about massive changes within their country, and crucially, in the whole world. It appears to me that such attitudes of positivist exaltation have their own dangers, that they could lead to new monstrosities, especially in the "third worlds". So at this stage I am more hopeful than reassured that the Obama presidency will not be turned into yet another epitome of ferocity in international affairs. But at least there is this sense of hope."

"...the one year anniversary of the Annapolis Conference will pass with no more than Israel stating its goal of creating a Palestinian state. However, what no Israeli leaders will state is Israel's commitment to the establishment of an independent, viable and sovereign Palestinian state."

"Will you have the courage to be America’s president, a president of all Americans, Jews and Gentiles, a president for America’s interests, not Israel’s, a president who will heed the warnings of Washington, Jefferson, and Madison not to have a “passionate attachment” to any foreign nation, to avoid “foreign entanglements” that sabotage our interests, to end the influence of “factions”, i.e. special interests that dominate our national policies?"

“Israel says it wants to prevent the inhabitants of Nilin using the road so that it can ‘secured’,” said Sarit Michaeli of B’Tselem. “In practice that means the road will be reserved for settlers to reach settlements even deeper in the West Bank, on the far side of Nilin. The road will be for Jews only.”

"As Obama comes into office, he will encounter a global reality very different from that of eight years before: a multilateral one in which a weakened and isolated US must find its place. He will discover that much of America's isolation comes from the view that the Occupation of the Palestinian territories is, in fact, an American-Israeli Occupation. If restoring a weakened American economy depends on repairing relations with the rest of the world, he will learn that without resolving the Israeli-Palestine conflict he will not create those conditions in which the US will be accepted once more into the wider global community."

"Let's hope that the spirit of celebration becomes a force demanding real change, before the dream of a bright new day becomes the nightmare of a very long dark night. That fan club for an individual needs to become a movement for society, before war, unemployment and unpayable debts turn their idol into a scapegoat, and our nation into a dead zone . People need to keep the faith, by all means. But we can’t just exult over surface change and pray that it gets better. We need to organize for democratic change of substance, and work to create it, very soon."