President Obama says he doubts whether he or any other politician could play a lead role in a national “conversation” about race in America today.

“I haven’t seen that be particularly productive when politicians try to organize conversations,” he said at theWhite House Friday, an observation in the middle of his long, unscripted comments on the shooting death of Trayvon Martin – except that what he said certainly will be seen as a key moment in just such a conversation.

Five years into his presidency, Mr. Obama spoke movingly and at length about the case of an unarmed teenager killed by self-appointed neighborhood “watch” volunteer George Zimmerman, apparently suspicious of, following, and then ignoring the direction of a 911 police dispatcher to confront the black youth.

“There are very few African-American men in this country who haven’t had the experience of being followed when they were shopping in a department store. That includes me,” Obama said. “And there are very few African-American men who haven’t had the experience of walking across the street and hearing the locks click on the doors of cars. That happens to me, at least before I was a senator.”

The reaction to Obama’s 18-minute unannounced oration in the White House press room Friday came quickly and across the political spectrum.

“I’m glad he spoke up today,” Robert Zimmerman, George Zimmerman’s brother and a family spokesman told FOX News. “I think he was very sincere in his remarks.”

“No matter what your opinion of the verdict is, there have to be things that bring us together, there have to be teachable moments that we learn from what happened here,” Robert Zimmerman said.

WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama on Tuesday conceded that an immigration overhaul cannot be achieved by his August deadline. With House Republicans searching for a way forward on the issue, the president said he was hopeful a bill could be finalized this fall — though even that goal may be overly optimistic.

The president, in a series of interviews with Spanish language television stations, also reiterated his insistence that any legislation include a pathway to citizenship for the 11 million people in the U.S. illegally. Many House GOP lawmakers oppose the citizenship proposal, hardening the differences between the parties on the president’s top second-term legislative priority.

“It does not make sense to me, if we’re going to make this once-in-a-generation effort to finally fix this system, to leave the status of 11 million people or so unresolved,” he said during an interview with Telemundo’s Denver affiliate.

The White House sees the president’s outreach to Hispanics as a way to keep up enthusiasm for the overhaul among core supporters even as the legislative prospects in Washington grow increasingly uncertain.

Some Republicans view support for immigration reform as central to the party’s national viability given the growing political power of Hispanics. But many House GOP lawmakers representing conservative — and largely white — districts see little incentive to back legislation.

The president said the lack of consensus among House Republicans will stretch the immigration debate past August, his original deadline for a long-elusive overhaul of the nation’s fractured laws.

“That was originally my hope and my goal,” Obama said. “But the House Republicans I think still have to process this issue and discuss it further, and hopefully, I think, still hear from constituents, from businesses to labor, to evangelical Christians who all are supporting immigration reform.”

Supporters are working on strategy to get the House to sign off on an overhaul. On Tuesday, most members of the so-called Gang of Eight — the bipartisan group of senators that authored the Senate immigration bill — met in the Capitol with a large group of advocates from business, religious, agriculture and other organizations to urge everyone to work together to move the issue through the House.

The senators distributed a list of 121 House Republicans seen as persuadable in favor of the bill and discussed honing a message for Congress’ monthlong August recess, when House members will meet with constituents and potentially encounter opposition to immigration legislation.

“When we go into the August break we want to be sure everybody’s working hard and trying to make our case,” said Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., after the meeting.

The landmark bill passed by the Senate last month would tighten border security, expand the highly skilled worker program and set up new guest worker arrangements for lower-skilled workers and farm laborers. It would also provide a pathway to citizenship for many of the 11 million immigrations illegally in the U.S., one that includes paying fines, learning English and taking other steps.

During his interview with Univision’s New York affiliate, Obama said the citizenship pathway “needs to be part of the bill.”

House Republicans have balked at the Senate proposal, with GOP leaders saying they prefer instead to tackle the issue in smaller increments. Many GOP representatives also oppose the prospect of allowing people who came to the U.S. illegally to become citizens.

House Republicans are considering other options, including proposals to give priority for legalization to the so-called Dreamers — those who were brought the U.S. illegally as children. Allowing only those individuals to obtain citizenship could shield Republicans from attacks by conservatives that they’re giving a free pass to those who voluntarily broke the law.

“I think that group of people — some call Dreamers — is a group that deserves perhaps the highest priority attention,” Rep. Bob Goodlatte, who chairs the House Judiciary Committee, said at an immigration-related conference in California Monday. “They know no other country.”

Goodlatte and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, both Virginia Republicans, are working on a bill to address the status of those immigrants, although the timing is uncertain. And Goodlatte cautioned that any such measure should hinge on completion of enforcement measures to prevent parents from smuggling their children into the U.S. in the future.

The House is not expected to act on any legislation before the August recess, though the House Judiciary Committee could hold a hearing on the bill dealing with people brought to the U.S. when they were young.

Obama also spoke with the Telemundo station in Dallas and the Univision station in Los Angeles.

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Flying on board Air Force One from Senegal, Obama paid tribute to Mandela who as South Africa’s first black president led the nation out of apartheid, but said he was not seeking a “photo op” with the ailing statesman.

Mandela, 94, has been in the Pretoria heart clinic with a lung infection for nearly three weeks, his fourth spell in hospital in six months.

A Nobel Peace Prize laureate like Obama, Mandela is admired around the world as a symbol of resistance against injustice and of racial reconciliation. His condition improved over Wednesday night but he remained critical.

Nearly 1,000 trade unionists, Muslim activists and South African Communist Party members marched through the capital to the U.S. Embassy where they burned a U.S. flag in protest, calling Obama’s foreign policy “arrogant and oppressive”.

Muslim activists held prayers in a car park outside the embassy. Leader Imam Sayeed Mohammed told the group: “We hope that Mandela feels better and that Obama can learn from him.”

South African critics of Obama have focused in particular on his support for U.S. drone strikes overseas, which they say have killed hundreds of innocent civilians, and his failure to fulfill a pledge to close the U.S. military detention centre at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba housing terrorism suspects.

Protesters said the first African-American president should not try to link himself to the anti-apartheid figure.

“Mandela valued human life … Mandela would condemn drone attacks and civilian deaths, Mandela cannot be his hero, he cannot be on that list,” said Yousha Tayob.

“TWO GREAT MEN”

A few blocks away at the Pretoria heart hospital, well-wishers paying tribute to Mandela had words of praise for Obama, who met Mandela in 2005 when he was still a U.S. senator.

Nigerian painter Sanusi Olatunji, 31, had brought portraits of both Mandela and Obama to the wall of the hospital, where flowers, tribute notes and gifts for Madiba, as Mandela is affectionately known, have been piling up.

“These are the two great men of my lifetime,” he said.

“To me, Mandela is a prophet who brought peace and opportunity. He made it possible for a black man like me to live in a country that was only for whites.”

During his weekend trip to Johannesburg, Pretoria and Cape Town, Obama is scheduled to visit Robben Island, the former penal colony where Mandela passed 18 years of the 27 years he spent in apartheid prisons.

White House officials have said they will defer to the Mandela family on whether a visit to the hospital would be appropriate.

Obama, who has been in office since 2009, is making his first substantial visit to Africa following a short trip to Ghana at the beginning of his first term.

South Africans held prayer vigils outside the Pretoria hospital and at Mandela’s former Soweto home Thursday night.

But as his health has deteriorated this year, there is a growing realisation among South Africa’s 53 million people that the man who forged their multi-racial “Rainbow Nation” from the ashes of apartheid may be nearing his end.

The possibility of his dying has already generated controversy among the extended Mandela clan.

A dispute between factions of the family over the anti-apartheid leader’s proposed final resting place in the Eastern Cape went legal on Friday when his eldest daughter and a dozen other relatives won a court order against his grandson, Mandla.

SABC, South Africa’s state broadcaster, said the court had ordered Mandla to return the remains of three of Mandela’s children from Mvezo, where Mandla is now chief, to Qunu, Mandela’s ancestral home 20 km (13 miles) away.

BERLIN: Five years and 50 years. As President Barack Obama revisits Berlin, he can’t escape those anniversaries and the inevitable comparisons to history and personal achievement.

With his own 2008 speech at Berlin’s Victory Column and formerPresident John F. Kennedy’s 1963 historic denunciation of the Soviet bloc as markers, Obama will use an address at the city’s Brandenburg Gate on Wednesday to renew his call to reduce the world’s nuclear stockpiles.

The White House said Obama will draw attention to his plan for a one-third reduction in U.S. and Russian arsenals, rekindling a goal that was a centerpiece of his early first-term national security agenda. Obama will also hold an afternoon news conference withGerman Chancellor Angela Merkel after a meeting between the two leaders.

His 26-hour whirlwind visit to the German capital caps three days of international summitry for the president and marks his return to a place where he once summoned a throng of 200,000 to share his ambitious vision for American leadership.

That was 2008, when Obama was running for president and those who supported him at home and abroad saw the young mixed-race American as a unifying and transformational figure who signified hope and change.

Five years later, Obama comes to deliver a highly anticipated speech to a country that’s a bit more sober about his aspirations and the extent of his successes, yet still eager to receive his attention at a time that many here feel that Europe, and Germany in particular, are no longer U.S. priorities. A Pew Research Center poll of Germans found that while their views of the U.S. have slipped since Obama’s first year in office, he has managed to retain his popularity, with 88 percent of those surveyed approving of his foreign policies.

Obama also has an arc of history to fulfill.

Fifty years ago next week, President Kennedy addressed a crowd of 450,000 in that then-divided city to repudiate communism and famously declare “Ich bin ein Berliner,” German for “I am a Berliner.” Since then, presidents from Ronald Reagan to Bill Clinton have used Berlin speeches to articulate broad themes about freedom and international alliances.

Obama, fresh from a two-day summit of the Group of Eight industrial economies, placed his hand over his heart outside the sunny presidential palace as a German military band played “The Star-Spangled Banner,” the American national anthem. He and German President Joachim Gauck inspected a lineup of German military troops before entering the palace, stopping to greet children who waved American and German flags.

The high point for Obama on Wednesday will be a speech at the Brandenburg Gate, a symbol of Germany’s division and later reunification. It is a venue that Merkel denied him in 2008, saying only sitting presidents were granted such an honor. Obama’s speech will also mark the first time a U.S. president will speak from the east side of the former Wall, a symbolic crossing into territory formerly under Soviet control.

Costa Rica: President Barack Obama says he won’t comment on an Israeli airstrikeagainst Syria that targeted a shipment of advanced missiles believed to be headed for the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.

Israeli officials on Saturday confirmed the strike, which took place early Friday.

Obama told the Spanish-language network Telemundo in an interview that he will defer to the Israeli government for comment. He also repeated his view that the Israelis justifiably have to guard against the transfer of advanced weapons to organizations like Hezbollah. The U.S. considers Hezbollah a terrorist organization.

Obama conducted the interview on Saturday, and a portion of the president’s answer to a question about the airstrike was broadcast on MSNBC.

SAN JOSE, Costa Rica: President Barack Obama came toLatin America eager to move the region’s relationship with the U.S. beyond fighting drugs and organized crime, yet the pervasive problems still trailed him throughout his three-day trip to Mexico and Costa Rica.

In the Costa Rican capital Friday, Obama defended his administration’s efforts to stem U.S. demand for drugs that many regional leaders see as a driving factor in their security issues. He said the U.S. and Latin America share “common effects and common responsibilities” for the troubles and argued that his country has suffered from the drug epidemic as well.

“There’s a cost obviously in the United States as well,” Obama said during a joint news conference with Costa Rican President Laura Chinchilla. “It’s not as if we don’t have tragic drug problems in the United States.”

The president singled out the violence that has raged in his hometown of Chicago, where the murder rate has soared, saying there are young people killed there “every day as part of the drug trade.”

Obama’s visit is his first to Latin America since winning a second term, in part due to the overwhelming support he received from Hispanic American voters. His trip is being followed with great interest by Hispanics in the U.S. as well as in Mexico, Central America and further to the south.

In both Mexico and Costa Rica, Obama cast economic growth as the best way to combat violence and keep drugs and organized crime from taking hold of another generation.

“We have to make sure that everybody feels opportunity,” the president declared in Costa Rica. “Even in countries that are doing well, the scourge of drugs and drug trafficking will still be there. And there still needs to be a strong law enforcement component. But we can do better than we are currently doing. ”

The president had sounded a similar message earlier Friday in Mexico, which he touted as a nation ready to take “its rightful place in the world.” During a speech to students, he urged Mexico’s young people to help the region move beyond “old stereotypes” and highlighted developments in technology and manufacturing.

While many people in Central America are also weary of the focus on the drug-fueled violence, it remains an undeniable part of daily life in many parts of the region. Costa Rica has fared better than many of its neighbors, but it worries about spillover from nearby countries. Honduras, for example, now has the highest homicide rate in the world, with about 7,200 people murdered last year in the tiny nation of 8 million people, most in drug-related crime.

Obama acknowledged the role of U.S. demand for drugs and said his administration has spent $30 billion to reduce demand in recent years. But he acknowledged that the U.S. is a “big market” and that “progress is sometimes slower than we’d like it to be.”

The president arrived in the capital of San Jose on a rainy afternoon but received a warm welcome from thousands of Costa Ricans who lined the road near the airport. Some waved American flags. Others held homemade signs, including one that said “Fired Up!” — a reference to his campaign slogan — in a much more demonstrative welcome than he had received in Mexico.

After Obama met one-on-one Chinchilla, the first woman to head the Central American nation, the two leaders were serenaded by local schoolchildren waving U.S. and Costa Rican flags.

Later Friday, Obama met with leaders of the regional Central American Integration system, chaired by Chinchilla. The network also includes Belize, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama. He’ll speak to business leaders in Costa Rica on Saturday before returning to Washington in the evening.

Obama has also been pressed throughout his trip about the immigration debate raging on Capitol Hill. The president is largely supportive of the bipartisan bill, which would strengthen borders and provide a pathway to citizenship for many of the 11 million people already in the U.S. illegally.

However, the draft legislation leaves out measures Obama has promoted on his own, including the recognition of gay and lesbian couples. Many Republicans are unlikely to support a bill that includes recognition of same-sex couples, raising the question of whether the president would fight for the provision if it meant losing out on a comprehensive bill.

WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama joked Saturday about his plans for a radical second-term evolution from a “strapping young Muslim Socialist” to retiree golfer, all with a new hairstyle like first lady Michelle’s.

Obama used this year’s annual White House Correspondents’ Association dinner to poke fun at himself and some of his political adversaries, asking if it was still possible to be brought down a peg after 4½ years as commander-in-chief.

Entering to the rap track “All I Do Is Win” by DJ Khaled, Obama joked about how re-election would allow him to unleash a radical agenda. But then he showed a picture of himself golfing on a mock magazine cover of “Senior Leisure.”

“I’m not the strapping young Muslim Socialist that I used to be,” the president remarked, and then recounted his recent 2-for-22 basketball shooting performance at the White House Easter Egg hunt.

But Obama’s most dramatic shift for the next four years appeared to be aesthetic. He presented a montage of shots featuring him with bangs similar to those sometimes sported by his wife.

Obama closed by noting the nation’s recent tragedies in Massachusetts and Texas, praising Americans of all stripes from first responders to local journalists for serving the public good.

Saturday night’s banquet not far from the White House attracted the usual assortment of stars from Hollywood and beyond. Actors Kevin Spacey, Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Claire Danes, who play government characters on series, were among the attendees, as was Korean entertainer Psy. Several Cabinet members, governors and members of Congress were present.

And despite coming at a somber time, nearly two weeks after the deadly Boston Marathon bombing and 10 days after a devastating fertilizer plant explosion in West, Texas, the president and political allies and rivals alike took the opportunity to enjoy some humor. Late-night talk-show host Conan O’Brien headlined the event.

Some of Obama’s jokes came at his Republican rivals’ expense. He asked that the GOP’s minority outreach begin with him as a “trial run” and said he’d take his recent charm offensive with Republicans on the road, including to a book-burning event with Rep. Michele Bachmann.

Casino magnate Sheldon Adelson would have had better success getting Obama out of office if he simply offered the president $100 million to drop out of last year’s race, Obama quipped.

And on the 2016 election, the president noted in self-referential irony that potential Republican candidate Sen. Marco Rubio wasn’t qualified because he hasn’t even served a full term in the Senate. Obama served less than four years of his six-year Senate term before he was elected president in 2008.

The gala also was an opportunity for six journalists, including Associated Press White House Correspondent Julie Pace, to be honored for their coverage of the presidency and national issues.

The New Yorker’s Ryan Lizza won the Aldo Beckman Award, which recognizes excellence in the coverage of the presidency.

Pace won the Merriman Smith Award for a print journalist for coverage on deadline.

ABC’s Terry Moran was the winner of the broadcast Merriman Smith Award for deadline reporting.

A letter addressed to President Barack Obama was found to contain Ricin Wednesday, the FBI announced, the same day Senate office buildings were partially evacuated following the discovery of “suspicious items” on the Hill.

“A second letter containing a granular substance that preliminarily tested positive for ricin was received at an offsite mail screening facility. The envelope, addressed to the President, was immediately quarantined by U.S. Secret Service personnel, and a coordinated investigation with the FBI was initiated,” the FBI announced.

For the second straight day, U.S. Capitol Police investigated a fresh potential threat to lawmakers: “Suspicious items” that led them to clear three floors in two Senate office buildings, according to a spokeswoman.

“Currently, we’re investigating two separate issues,” Lt. Jessia Baboulis told Yahoo News. Capitol Police “have asked that people remain off the first and third floors of the Hart office building, and the third floor of Russell,” another office building.

Asked whether there was any sign that those situations were linked to a letter addressed to Republican Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi, which tested positive of the poison Ricin, Baboulis replied: “None at this time.”

The suspicious letters and items on the Hill follow heightened tensions in the wake of Monday’s deadly Boston Marathon bombings.

The letter sent to the president was never near the president or the White House. Following anthrax scares in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks, the White House moved all mail processing off-site. The screening facility that caught the president’s letter Tuesday is “not located near the White House complex,” Leary noted in his statement.

“On 4-16-13, a letter addressed to the President containing a suspicious substance was received at the remote White House mail screening facility. This facility routinely identifies letters or parcels that require secondary screening or scientific testing before delivery,” Leary said.

“The Secret Service is working closely with the U.S. Capitol Police and the FBI in this investigation,” he said.

News of the intercepted letter to the president was reportedly announced to senators during a briefing Tuesday evening.

WASHINGTON: The White House has wholeheartedly embraced Yoga as a worthy physical activity at a time some schools inAmerica are railing against the ancient Indian practice, saying it promotes Hinduism.

The White House announced last week that President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama will include a ‘yoga garden’ for children and their parents who attend the traditional Easter Egg Roll festivities on Monday. “Come enjoy a session of yoga from professional instructors,” the White House exhorted thousands of workaday Americans parents and their kids from across the country who will troop into the Presidential lawns, reminding participants that the event’s theme is ‘Be Healthy, Be Active, Be You!’

It is not the first time that Obama’s residence has hosted a yoga garden for Easter, but this year’s event is significant because of an ongoing lawsuit in California challenging the teaching of yoga in schools. In fact, the case came up for hearing in a San Diego courtroom on Thursday with a mirthful opening.

In an indication of how deep-rooted mainstream yoga has become in the US, it turned out that the presiding judge himself is a yoga practitioner. “Does anybody have a problem with that?” San Diego Superior Court Judge John Meyer was reported asking at the start of the case.

Dean Broyles, representing parents suing the Encinitas Union School District in a lawsuit that has gained international attention, said he was fine with Meyer presiding over the case if the judge can keep an open mind about the plaintiff’s argument regarding spiritual connections to yoga, according to reports in the local media.

At the heart of the case is the argument by some parents that yoga is inherently religious, a contention most Americans, including the judge, seem to disagree with. Judge Meyer is reported to be a practitioner of Bikram Yoga, likening it to simple stretching exercises. “If you think there’s something spiritual about what I do, that’s news to me,” he was quoted as saying.

The White House meanwhile is stretching every muscle and sinew to get Americans, including children, to get more concerned about the decline in the nation’s overall well-being and its soaring healthcare bill. The drive is led by Michelle Obama, a health and fitness, and herself a yoga enthusiast.

The yoga garden is conducted by Leah Cullis, a certified yoga teacher who the White House reached out to in 2009 as soon when the Obamas came to office. Cullis, whose husband, event producer John Liipfert, handled Obama’s Presidential inauguration, selects yoga instructors from all over the US to put parents and children through basic yoga drills.

“The mission of the event is to share ways where families and children can use simple tools for an active lifestyle — tools that require no props and no money and which they can go home and do it themselves,” Cullis told TOI, speaking of her association with the White House initiative.

In fact, the White House has taken its yoga drive one step — or one stretch — further. It has now initiated a Presidential Active Lifestyle Award (PALA), a Obama White House Challenge designed to motivate Americans to make physical activity and healthy eating part of their everyday life. In embracing the practice, the White House also dismissed any specific religious connotation sought to be attached to yoga.

“Yoga has become a universal language of spiritual exercise in the United States, crossing many lines of religion and cultures,” the White House said without any reference to the ongoing controversies and lawsuit. “Every day, millions of people practice yoga to improve their health and overall well-being. That’s why we’re encouraging everyone to take part in PALA, so show your support for yoga and answer the challenge.”

Among the invitees for the White House Easter Monday festivities is Ajai Dhadwal, an Indian-American field hockey player, who had represented the US.

Jordan: President Barack Obama warned Friday that an “enclave for extremism” could fill a leadership void in war-torn Syria, a chilling scenario for an already tumultuous region, especially for Jordan, Syria’s neighbor and a nation at the crossroads of the struggle for stability in the Middle East.

In a significant step toward easing regional tensions, Obama also brokered a phone call between leaders from Israel and Turkey that resulted in an extraordinary apology from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for a deadly 2010 raid on a Gaza-bound Turkish flotilla. The call marked a diplomatic victory for the president and a crucial realignment in the region, given Israel’s and Turkey’s shared interests, in particular the fear that Syria’s civil war could spill over their respective borders.

Obama said he remains confident that embattled Syrian leader Bashar Assad’s government will ultimately collapse. But he warned that when that happens, Syria would not be “put back together perfectly,” and he said he fears the nation could become a hotbed for extremists.

“I am very concerned about Syria becoming an enclave for extremism, because extremists thrive in chaos,” Obama said during a joint news conference with Jordan’s King Abdullah II. “They thrive in failed states, they thrive in power vacuums.”

More than 70,000 people have been killed during the two-year conflict in Syria, making it by far the deadliest of the Arab Spring uprisings that have roiled the region since 2011. Longtime autocrats in Egypt, Tunisia, Yemen and Libya have been ousted, ushering in new governments that are sometimes at odds with the Obama administration and its Mideast allies.

Obama’s 24-hour stop in Jordan marked his first visit to an Arab nation since the 2011 Mideast protests began. Jordan’s monarchy has clung to power in part by enacting political reforms, including parliamentary elections and significant revisions to the country’s 60-year-old constitution. Still, tensions continue to simmer, with the restive population questioning the speed and seriousness of the changes.

Protecting Abdullah is paramount to U.S. interests. The 51-year-old king is perhaps Obama’s strongest Arab ally and a key player in efforts to jumpstart peace talks between Palestinians and Israel. Jordan has a peace treaty with Israel, and that agreement has become even more significant given the rise of Islamist leaders in Egypt, which was the first Arab country to ink a treaty with the Jewish state, in the 1970s.

Egypt’s new leaders have so far pledged to uphold the treaty, though there are strong concerns in Israeland the U.S. about whether that will hold.

By virtue of geography, Jordan’s future is particularly vulnerable to the turmoil in the Middle East. It shares borders with Iraq, Israel and the West Bank, in addition to Syria. More than 460,000 Syrians have flowed across the Jordanian border seeking refuge since the civil war began, seeking an escape from the violence.

The flood of refugees has overwhelmed the country of 6 million people, straining Jordan’s resources, including health care and education, and pushing the budget deficit to a record high $3 billion last year. Abdullah also fears the half-million refugees could create a regional base for extremists and terrorists, saying recently that such elements were already “establishing firm footholds in some areas.”

Obama announced that his administration planned to work with Congress to allocate $200 million to Jordan to help ease the financial burden.

Despite the influx, Abdullah firmly declared Jordan would not close its borders to the refugees, many women and children.

“This is something that we just can’t do,” he said. “It’s not the Jordanian way. We have historically opened our arms to many of our neighbors through many decades of Jordan’s history.”

Obama had come to Jordan from Israel, where he spent three days coaxing Netanyahu to apologize to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan for Israel’s role in the deaths of nine Turkish activists during a naval raid on a Gaza-bound international flotilla. The 20-minute phone call took place just before Obama departed, in a trailer on the airport tarmac near a waiting Air Force One, and resulted in the restoration of normal diplomatic relations between the two countries.

“The timing was good for that conversation to take place,” Obama said, adding that the phone call was the first step in rebuilding trust between Israel and Turkey.

The president opened the last full day of his Mideast trip with a series of stops around Jerusalem and Bethlehem, all steeped in political and religious symbolism.

Accompanied by Netanyahu and Israeli President Shimon Peres, Obama laid wreaths at the graves of Theodor Herzl, the founder of modern Zionism who died in 1904 before realizing his dream of a Jewish homeland, and former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was assassinated in 1995.

Obama and his hosts arrived at the Herzl grave site under cloudless skies. Obama approached Herzl’s resting place alone and bowed his head in silence. He turned briefly to ask Netanyahu where to place a small stone in the Jewish custom, then laid the stone atop the grave.

“It is humbling and inspiring to visit and remember the visionary who began the remarkable establishment of the State of Israel,” Obama wrote in a guestbook. “May our two countries possess the same vision and will to secure peace and prosperity for future generations.”

At Rabin’s grave a short walk away, Obama was greeted by members of the late leader’s family. He initially placed a stone on Rabin’s wife’s side of the grave, then returned to place one atop Rabin’s side. In a gesture linking the U.S. and Israel, the stone placed on Rabin’s grave was from the grounds of the Martin Luther King memorial in Washington, the White House said.

Friday’s stop at Herzl’s grave, together with Obama’s earlier viewing of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the ancient Hebrew texts, were an attempt by the president to emphasize his view that the rationale for Israel’s existence rests with its historical ties to the region and with a vision that predated the Holocaust. Obama was criticized in Israel for his 2009 Cairo speech in which he gave only the example of the Holocaust as reason justifying Israel’s existence.

Obama was to make a stop Saturday at Petra, Jordan’s fabled ancient city, before flying back to Washington.