The exuberant reaction to Ms Mogahed’s nomination suggests that, for those willing to look, there are easy ways to warm up relations between the United States and the Muslim world (including America’s Muslims); the Obama presidency is busy finding them. Such was the suspicion between most Americans and most Muslims in the Bush era that it did not take much to improve the climate. One thing that helps is big presidential speeches (in Turkey in April and in Cairo this week); another is a sprinkling of domestic job offers, mostly to younger Muslim Americans.

In Turkey Mr Obama’s visit is remembered less for what he said, than for some neat choreography that managed to please devout Muslims without upsetting secularists. His body language went down well—”He’s like us, eastern, warm.”

And as some recent Gallup findings show, the change of guard in the White House led to an immediate upturn in attitudes to America’s leadership among most Arab Muslims (see chart 1), with the exception of Lebanese and Palestinians. Meanwhile the American public perceives the Muslim world as hostile to the United States, but it does not—to anything like the same extent—reciprocate that hostility. Although a steady 80 per cent of Americans believe Muslim countries are unfavourably disposed to their homeland, only 39 per cent of Americans (see chart 2) return the compliment by voicing “unfavourable” attitudes to the Muslim world.

This suggests that a section, at least, of America’s electorate is open to the idea of better links with Islam. In Washington’s establishment, meanwhile, venerable figures like Madeleine Albright (who as secretary of state gave military help to the Balkan Muslims) are rehearsing reasons why America and Islam can be friends.

... contd.