Was there a way to address this? (Erin)

We talked here the other day about President Obama' speech in Cairo; most of us saw it as a positive thing for the most part, and certainly the wish for peace in the Middle East is shared by everyone here.

But Andre Aciman, writing an op-ed in the New York Times, found an aspect of the speech less than stellar:

And yet, for all the president's talk of "a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world" and shared "principles of justice and progress," neither he nor anyone around him, and certainly no one in the audience, bothered to notice one small detail missing from the speech: he forgot me.

The president never said a word about me. Or, for that matter, about any of the other 800,000 or so Jews born in the Middle East who fled the Arab and Muslim world or who were summarily expelled for being Jewish in the 20th century. With all his references to the history of Islam and to its (questionable) "proud tradition of tolerance" of other faiths, Mr. Obama never said anything about those Jews whose ancestors had been living in Arab lands long before the advent of Islam but were its first victims once rampant nationalism swept over the Arab world.

Nor did he bother to mention that with this flight and expulsion, Jewish assets were -- let's call it by its proper name -- looted. Mr. Obama never mentioned the belongings I still own in Egypt and will never recover. My mother's house, my father's factory, our life in Egypt, our friends, our books, our cars, my bicycle. We are, each one of us, not just defined by the arrangement of protein molecules in our cells, but also by the things we call our own. Take away our things and something in us dies. Losing his wealth, his home, the life he had built, killed my father. He didn't die right away; it took four decades of exile to finish him off.

Mr. Obama had harsh things to say to the Arab world about its treatment of women. And he said much about America's debt to Islam. But he failed to remind the Egyptians in his audience that until 50 years ago a strong and vibrant Jewish community thrived in their midst. Or that many of Egypt's finest hospitals and other institutions were founded and financed by Jews. It is a shame that he did not remind the Egyptians in the audience of this, because, in most cases -- and especially among those younger than 50 -- their memory banks have been conveniently expunged of deadweight and guilt. They have no recollections of Jews.

I'm sympathetic to Aciman's story. But I don't think, given the audience President Obama was speaking to, that he could have brought up the subject of the Jewish expulsion from Arab countries in a way that wouldn't have provoked anger among those listening. That doesn't mean the issue should be ignored; but could the president really have made any reference to this situation, giving the location and circumstances surrounding his speech?