In January of 2015 Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi began a journey of peace by asking the holiest and most influential Islamic Scholars in the Arab world to join him in stepping away from the noise of extremist voices and engaging in long-term introspective review of their Islamic faith. President al-Sisi called for a religious revolution to focus Islam toward a future of peace. The engaged Dar al-Iftaa scholarly audience erupted in applause.
President al-Sisi stood up, resolute, spoke of large truths with bold leadership, and took great risk upon himself. After the speech a coalition of like-minded voices began to grow in number and consequence. That moment became the pebble dropped in the shoe of the Arab leadership of consequence – the emphasis shifted toward peace.
That influential speech, and more importantly the leadership of all joining member states, including the praise of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia before his untimely death, paved the way forward toward this upcoming weekend. King Abdullah’s successor, his brother King Salman, is now positioned to put his own footprint in history.
All of the necessary elements, many of them taking years to organize, are aligned in common purpose for this specific moment in time.
More than a dozen heads of state from Arab and Islamic nations have been invited by Saudi Arabia’s King Salman to attend the conference with President Trump including: Abdel Fattah al-Sisi (Egypt), King Abdullah III (Jordan), Muhammad Fuad Masum (Iraq), Mamnoon Hussain (Pakistan) and all six members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (Bahrain, Oman, Kuwait, Qatar and the UAE). All are expected to be in attendance.
We are living in one of those rare moments when we are fortunate enough to see the building blocks of historic enterprise being erected while we watch. The results of these next several days will shape how our children view the landscape of the middle east in all the years to come.




