Supporting Scholarships for Young Muslim Americans

I am honored to be here tonight -- it's wonderful to see such a turnout supporting scholarships for young Muslim Americans.

I have just returned from a trip to Morocco, and the focus of my trip was outreach to young people -- as with many Arab countries, more than half the population of Morocco is under the age of 25 -- so I'm especially focused on shaping our public diplomacy programs to reach out to the rising generation like many of you in this room who are the future leaders of our world.

You may know that Morocco and the United States have long had a special relationship -- Morocco was the very first nation to recognize the newly-formed United States of America back in 1777 and it remains today a close friend and ally, as well as the geographically closest Muslim majority nation to our shores. So it is uniquely situated to be a bridge between the nations of the west and the nations of Islam -- I also view our Muslim American community as a vital bridge to foster understanding and dialogue between diverse Muslim communities across the world and America, a friendly, frank and honest dialogue that is vitally needed at a time of much misunderstanding, suspicion and mistrust.

I view my job as reaching out to the peoples of the world in a spirit of respect and friendship -- we have public diplomacy programs in virtually every part of the world -- President Bush asked me to make outreach to our neighbors here in this hemisphere one of my priorities -- public diplomacy also seeks to nurture our transatlantic relationship with our allies in Europe, to reach out to an emerging China and India -- we even try to reach out to the people in nations when we don't have relations with their governments -- we've recently restarted people-to-people exchange programs with Iran for the first time since 1979.

Tonight as I discuss America's broad public diplomacy objectives, I want to give special attention to our outreach to Muslim communities and countries across the world because it's vitally important to you and to me, and I believe to the cause of peace in our world.

All our public diplomacy efforts are guided by three strategic imperatives.

First -- that America must offer people across the world a positive vision of hope that is rooted in our deepest values, values that are universal: our belief in liberty, in justice, in opportunity, in the dignity and worth of every single person. As I was preparing to take this job, I saw an interview with a young man from an impoverished neighborhood in the Arab world -- he was asked: "What do you think when you think of America?" And he said, "For me, America represents the hope of a better life." It's vitally important that our country continue to be that beacon of hope, that shining city on a hill that President Reagan talked about so eloquently -- not because we are perfect, but because our values speak to the universal human longings for freedom, dignity, equality and opportunity.

Our second strategic imperative is to isolate and marginalize the violent extremists and undermine their efforts to try to appropriate religion to their cause. I am concerned when I see polls like one recently conducted by World Public Opinion that show many Muslim populations mistakenly believe a goal of American foreign policy is to weaken and divide Islam -- as I've traveled the world, I've found a lot of what people in other countries think about Americans is shaped by what they perceive we think about them -- I remember a stark moment in Egypt even before the Dubai Ports controversy where a woman looked at me and said, "You think we're all terrorists." "No, we don't," I told her. It is vitally important that we make it clear that Al Qaeda and similar extremists are a death cult that perverts faith with their acts of mass murder.

You and I know that America is open and respectful to people of all faiths -- as a government official, I represent several million American Muslims who live, work and worship freely in our country -- everywhere I go, people ask me what life is really like for Muslims in America and you can be an important part of helping me share that story with the rest of the world.

Our third strategic imperative -- and this one sounds simple but is actually quite profound -- came from a conversation I had with a beloved former ambassador named Frank Wisner, who told me that especially at a time of war and common threats, it's vitally important that America actively nurture and foster common interests and common values between Americans and people of different countries and cultures and faiths across the world.

I've found most of us, in most countries, want the same things -- a good education for our children, health care for our families, a job and economic opportunity so we can better ourselves, a safe neighborhood in which to live, the opportunity to contribute to make our communities and countries a better place, to make a difference with our lives. We need to nurture these common values.

As we seek to further these three objectives, I find myself increasingly focusing on three key areas: our education and exchange programs, our communications efforts, and what I call America's "diplomacy of deeds" -- the concrete things that we do to help people improve their lives, especially in the areas of education, health care and economic opportunity.

First -- our education and exchange programs, which I believe are our single most effective PD programs of the last 50 years. These people-to-people programs foster life-long connections and I am convinced they are the single best way to build positive, lasting relationships with other peoples and nations. I'm happy to be able to tell you that we have increased participation in these vital education and exchange programs dramatically from 27,000 in 2004 to more than 40,000 this year -- and I'm working on a proposed budget that we hope will allow us to reach more than 50,000 in the years ahead -- these include programs you've probably heard of, like the popular and successful Fulbright scholarships -- which by the way are at record highs, both for American scholars traveling overseas and foreign students coming here.

They also include a number of programs that don't get as much attention but I believe are vitally important. For example, we've significantly expanded a high school exchange program, which brings young people from Muslim majority countries to the United States for a year to live with an American family and attend high school. Last year, we partnered with a radio station in Indonesia to the broadcast the story of a couple of Indonesian young people who were living with families in Denver -- they interviewed them once a year and at the end, we were able to document that listeners to that radio station, the number one station for young people in Jakarta, had a much more positive view of the united states as a result of hearing about us from their own peers -- that program was expanded this year to Pakistan and I am hoping it can be further expanded.

One of our most effective programs is English language teaching -- it's a skill young people want, and it's a skill that improves that improves their opportunities in life. I remember visiting Malaysia and seeing a sign advertising a madrassa -- it said: "Good Islam, Good English" -- and I thought, I'm not going to let anyone beat us on English. This year, we are teaching English to about 10,000 young people in more than 40 countries with significant Muslim populations. We especially focus on young people from disadvantaged neighborhoods who might not otherwise have this opportunity. I remember meeting with a group of them and asking: what difference does it make that you can speak English -- one young man looked at me and said: "I have a job and none of my friends do." That young man came from the same neighborhood that produced the Casablanca suicide bombers -- I submit that young man also has a hope, and a reason to live rather than die in a suicide bombing.

This summer, we are reaching out to even younger audiences. We worked with our embassies in countries where we were particularly concerned about the impact of violent extremists -- and almost all of them reported we needed more programs for young people to counter efforts to radicalize them. So this summer, we launched youth enrichment programs for a younger population than we have ever comprehensively reached before -- young people ages 8-14, too young to participate in traditional exchange programs.

We are partnering with local governments, community organizations, the Peace Corps and others to reach more than 6,000 young people in 13 countries and the West Bank and Gaza.

The exact programs are unique to each country, but most combine English teaching with sports activities in a fun, camp environment -- that includes creative projects and citizenship and leadership training. The program is modeled after one in Morocco where our Peace Corps volunteers and embassy personnel work with youth ministry to reach young people. We provide scholarships so that low-income youths can attend the camp and American workers -- for many young people, it's the first time they've ever met an American.

We are starting to receive feedback from this summer's programs. From Rabat to Manila to Cairo -- it is hugely positive. Here are some of the reactions:

"Americans have big hearts and they help everybody regardless if they are poor or rich."

"I had another picture of Americans and I learned from them here and have changed that picture."

"They want peace just like we do."

"Americans respect diversity."

"People are good in both countries; we all want to do good things together."

"Americans are generous."

"I learned how to have a relationship with Americans and to learn about myself better."

During my visit to Morocco, they told me they want more Americans to come there. I talked with the ambassador about getting more American volunteers to spend the summer teaching English, opportunities to practice Arabic, and learn about the rich culture and traditions of Morocco.

We're also working to expand student exchanges to a record 591,000. The perception after September 11 was it was hard to get a student visa. Our embassies began putting the students at the head of the line -- last year we issued a record 591,000 student visas. Everywhere I go -- I tell young people we WANT and welcome them to come to America. I also tell American young people we want them to go abroad, study, learn foreign languages, appreciate rich culture and history of the rest of the world.

Another of our most successful new programs is called "Citizen Dialogue," which sends delegations of Muslim Americans abroad as citizen envoys to other countries. It grew out of a conversation I had with a Turkish woman in Germany. She told me how isolated the Muslim community in Germany often feels. I asked her if I could visit her community and meet with people there. She told me, quite bluntly, "No." Shocked, I asked why. -- "We're not interested in meeting with our own government," she said, "Why would we want to meet with yours?" I asked, "Could I send some Muslim American citizens?" She replied, "That would be wonderful."

Based on that conversation, we launched a "citizen dialogue" program, sending Muslim Americans from all walks of life -- business, students, Imams -- to places as diverse as Jordan, Pakistan, India, Denmark -- the group that recently went to Malaysia, including an Imam, appeared on Malaysia's top-rated morning television program -- the station was so interested that is sending a camera crew to America to film American Muslims in their homes for an 8-part prime time series on Islam in America. It will air during the month of Ramadan. If any of you are interested in participating, we would love to get you involved.

These education and exchange programs are invaluable in building bridges and helping us get to know, as they say in the Arab world, "the other."

A second area of focus is improving communications -- empowering our Ambassadors and other government representatives to speak out, get on television and represent our country across the world.

We are living in a time of dramatic change in the communications environment. During Cold War, we were trying to get information into largely closed societies whose people were hungry for news and information -- today we are competing for attention and credibility in a noisy and crowded communications environment. News travels instantly on the internet, and mass audiences are getting their news on television, with huge implications for our country. I remember meeting a young man in China, he told me he was surprised by his visit to America -- he learned Americans are friendly, care about families, lot of them go to church and synagogue and mosque to worship. I asked him why that surprised him and he responded, "America is not the way it looks on television." With mass audiences seeing us on television -- that is a concern.

We've created a new Rapid Response Unit to monitor media across the world -- informs policy makers on how U.S. policies are being received by foreign audiences, also gives government officials key policy points -- my way of trying to get federal government on the same page.

To get more American officials out on television, we have established three regional media hubs in Dubai and Brussels and London with language qualified spokesmen. These hubs recognize the increasingly regional nature of today's media, which transcend borders... In a media center like Dubai, more than a thousand media outlets are represented -- and they aren't just focused on the country, they're focused on the entire pan-Arab world. As a result, we are doing more interviews than before and our presence on Arab media has increased by more than 30 percent.

This summer we opened a new Counter-terrorism Communications Center. This center's daily mission will be developing culturally sensitive messages to undermine ideological support for terror. The center's job is to develop the message framework to inform all our federal agencies. A lot of those messages won't be delivered by USG officials -- sometimes the most credible voices are Muslim, both local and international. For example, our State Department's international web site currently features an excerpt from a recent speech by Afghanistan's President Karzai, where he says extremists cheat children and are not acting in keeping with Islam when they recruit them to become suicide bombers.

We have been working to improve our use of technology -- we now have web sites in English and six foreign languages and a digital outreach team that counters misinformation and myths on blogs in Arabic.

I've challenged my team to use new technology to reach younger people -- we've put TV cameras in the hands of some of our exchange students, so that they can do postings to You Tube -- and I'm thinking about ways to engage young people across America in helping share our country's story -- perhaps a competition to produce their own videos sharing what they want young people across the world to know about our country.

Our third major area of focus is highlighting what I call our diplomacy of deeds -- the concrete ways in which our government and private sector humanitarian and development initiatives are improving lives around the world -- particularly in the areas that people care the most about -- education, health, and economic opportunity. The compassion of our country has made a positive difference after disasters like the tsunami in the Pacific and the earthquake in Pakistan. America believes in the dignity and value of every person -- and our actions in the world live out that conviction. We're partnering with NGOs on the fight against malaria, which kills 3,000 children a day. We're partnering with Nancy Brinker to promote early detection of breast cancer in the Susan G. Komen Foundation in the first women's health initiative in the Middle East. Such lifesaving diplomacy shows Americans truly care about people around the world.

I recently returned from the Palestinian territories, where I helped announce a small business grant program -- $228 million dollars, for small family businesses, to help develop infrastructure -- recognition that as we seek a path to peace, toward a Palestinian state vital to improve the daily lives and economic opportunities of the Palestinian people.

I have seen research that showed that after the Navy hospital ship USNS Mercy went to Bangladesh after the tsunami two years ago, polls showed the favorable opinion of the United States rose to 87 percent.

Just a few weeks ago, I visited our other hospital ship, the USNS COMFORT near Lima, Peru -- and I can tell you those heroic volunteer doctors are not just providing life-saving and life-changing health care to thousands of people in that region, they are winning friends for our country.

These "deeds of diplomacy" display the compassion of America in tangible and important way. It's a message of peace and goodwill that speaks to our fundamental belief in the value of every person in the world.

Since I took this job two years ago, I have traveled to several dozen countries and I am convinced that most people want progress toward peace. The vast majority of Muslims who make up 19 percent of the world population want to live in peace. But there are many misperceptions that can often divide our countries and our citizens.

That's why your work is so important. Interfaith dialogue and understanding are more important than ever before.

We need to strengthen the involvement of Muslim Americans in public life -- as a recent study by the Chicago Council on World Affairs said, it is in the interest of all Americans to bring Muslim Americans into the mainstream of social and political life -- that inclusiveness will strengthen our civic institutions and homeland security.

One of the things I've worked to do is to demonstrate respect for Muslim culture and contributions both here and abroad. In today's diverse, global and multi-cultural world, people need to be more respectful of all faiths.

America's strength has long been tied to our diversity -- the energy and hard work of our immigrant population is what has propelled America ahead. Many in our Muslim American population came here long before 9/11 in search of the American dream and we must all work together to protect that dream.

The people on my own staff represent that kind of diversity -- Catholic, Jewish, Muslim, Protestant staffers gather every day in our conference room to plan public diplomacy. I want to encourage the young people here tonight to consider careers in what I consider the very noble endeavor of public service -- whether it's the Peace Corps or the F.B.I. or the Foreign Service. We need and want your talent and your ideas -- encourage young people to follow their passion, in keeping with your priorities.

Many of you here today are from a generation with new ways of delivering messages -- if you are anything like my son, you are expert at text-messaging -- perhaps you can bring new energy and new ways to creating a truly global interfaith dialogue. Inter-faith dialogue may not resolve all our differences, but I believe that by learning from each other and listening to each other, we can prepare the way for a safer, more prosperous, more respectful world for the next generation.

On my very first trip abroad in my new role, a young man in Turkey asked a haunting question -- he said: "Does the statue of liberty still face out?" I think he meant-- is America still that welcoming country -- that beacon of hope and opportunity -- a place that embraces the her inscription: "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free."

It is vitally important to our future progress and prosperity that the answer to that question always be yes.

Thank you for listening -- I look forward to hearing your questions.