[آية]

Dear President Obama,
Hello, Mr. Obama. I'd like to tell you just a little bit on what's happening in the world today.
I'd like to tell you a little something about the election in 2008. When there was you, Mccain, and Clinton, I personally wanted
you. I guess my parents wanted you too, because they both voted for you. I wanted you to be the president of the U.S.A. because I
knew that you could stop, and solve all of the problems out there. I knew you could fix the huge economy problem you were left to
face with, and surely, but slowly, it is being fixed. I knew you could help other countries that were in need, and sure enough, you
helped Haiti, with it's earthquake, scoring a measurement of 7.1 on the Richter scale. I knew that you could do everything to fix
America, and even some parts of the world. I even knew that you could fix the war occuring in Palestine. But that was the only
thing that I was proved to be wrong about.
Sorry, I apparently forgot to tell you a little bit about myself. I'm going into 7th grade, so that means I'm 11. I am also
Palestinian, but my parents were born in Lebanon, and I was born in our very own America, so I'm basically American.
Right now I'm on summer vacation in Lebanon, actually having fun in Lebanon for once. Do you know why that is? Beca-
use last time I came, it was the beginning of July, and the war in Palestine had found its way into Lebanon as well. My
grandparents on my mom's side live here, and we hadn't seen them for 4 years. We had to take a taxi all the way from Lebanon,
to Syria. Right now, the chances of you asking ,"What do I have to do with this?", are high.
If you want to know what you have to do with this, then listen up, please. When a little boy wants to go to the drug
store and buy candy, where does he get the money from? His mom or dad. When Israel wants to get money to buy missles
and bombs, and all of those bulldozers and cars, where does it most of the money from? America. So if you were wondering why
a 11 year old girl is complaining to you about a war, well, now you know.
Now, you're probably saying to yourself,"Yeah, but that's because 9/11 and all of those Muslim/Arab terrorists out
there bombing things and doing all that bad stuff". Well at that subject, both sides are right. It was wrong for Osama Bin Ladin to
kill the estimated 3,000 people, and destroy the Twin Towers. Osama was a spy, and even I, a Muslim/Arab, think that Osama
Bin Ladin, and anyone who is with him, is a FOOL. But isn't it also wrong, to kill over half of the population in Afganistan, and not
kill Osama Bin Ladin? He's appearing on television, using the internet, and still you can't track him down, and kill HIM? When
someone's name is Osama, or someone says "Allahu Akbar" (meaning God is the Greatest), that people back away, or someti-
mes talk about that person, in a bad way? My family has had incindents, with BOTH.
My dad's uncle's name is Osama. He moved into a town in Ohio a couple of years ago. Soon neighbors and others star-
ted getting concerned. And sure enough, someone wrote about him in the newspaper, saying that Osama has returned. Wouldn't
you get mad, if someone wrote about you in a newspaper, saying that you were a cruel person in disguise? He took that newspap-
er to the police, and they had to fix things up. And then the other incident. My mom and I were at the cinema, watching a movie.
We had gotten the large popcorn, and so when the movie was done, there was still half of the popcorn left over. We didn't want
to take it home with us, and so the only choice we had was to throw it away. My mom said, "Allahu Akbar", while throwing away
the popcorn. She said it because we were wasting food that a poor person would be full if he/she ate it. The people throwing
away their trash backed away, and the workers that were cleaning up the seats thought that we were throwing a bomb in the tra-
sh, not ordinary, lightly buttered popcorn.
And then there's the Twin Towers, in New York. That is also something to be mad about. But when Israeli troops are going into
Palestine, ruining Mosks and Churches, and American troops doing the same thing, isn't that also something to be mad about?
In my game, holy buildings beat modern buildings, by 100 points.
So I hope you learned a lot from this letter, and to know better than to send me an automated letter, saying that you
appreciate my concerns about the"war in Iraq", like how George Bush did when I sent him a letter saying NOTHING about the
war in Iraq, but EVERYTHING about what's happening in Palestine.

[عبدالله الخطيب]

I salute your braveness and wisdom
Our arabic leaders should be ashamed of themselves after reading your pearls of prose
I congratulate your parents and your grandfather whom have been your guide and inspiration for doing such a fine job
Thank you my dear

[آية]

Thank you so much for replying to me! I am planning to send this letter to him by email.
Thanks again,
Aya