WASHINGTON — He sat with his legs crossed in an armchair in the Oval Office, his brow furrowed. Aides clustered on the couches around him. They could see black scratch marks all over their proposal for the most sensitive speech of his young presidency -- his long-promised address to the world's 1.5 billion Muslims.
For weeks, they had toiled over the text. Now, some stole glances at the lead writer of the address, 31-year-old Ben Rhodes, as the lengthening silence confirmed that their best shot had fallen short.
Finally, President Obama dropped the manuscript into his lap and took a deep breath.
"I know you've been under a lot of pressure to get this right," he said. "But this speech is way too cautious. We have to say everything and say everything candidly. I'm not going all the way to Cairo to do anything else."
Despite the risk that he would give offense, he told his staff that he intended to address some of the most sensitive issues in foreign policy -- terrorism, the Arab-Israeli conflict, the inflammatory rhetoric of many Islamic leaders -- in terms that would grab the world's attention.
Obama worked his way around the cream-colored couches that flank the Oval Office fireplace, probing his aides' thoughts.
"We knew all the arguments not to say things," one recalled.
"He said, 'Look, put all those concerns aside. We need to be aware of them. . . . But I'm not going to fail to raise 9/11. I'm not going to not talk about women's rights in this way because it might be uncomfortable for some people.' "
The story of how the speech came into being is based on interviews with senior White House staffers and others directly involved. It reveals how Obama embraces opportunities for landmark addresses that can define him and his presidency -- as he did in his campaign speech on race and the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. -- and how once given the right platform he prepares obsessively.
Whatever else it achieved, the June 4 address at Cairo University inspired discomfort.
Some Israelis and American Jews recoiled at the way Obama juxtaposed the suffering of the Holocaust and centuries of anti-Semitic persecution with the experience of Palestinians under Israeli occupation.
Some Muslims were stunned to hear a Christian American president quote the Koran as he spoke to them about changing their attitudes toward Israel.
