The Volokh Conspiracy - Jimmy Carter, Advocate for Hamas.--

I have to confess that this Jimmy Carter op-ed in the International Herald Tribune left me almost speechless (tip to LGF):

It is almost a miracle that the Palestinians have been able to orchestrate three elections during the past 10 years, all of which have been honest, fair, strongly contested, without violence and with the results accepted by winners and losers. Among the 62 elections that have been monitored by us at the Carter Center, these are among the best in portraying the will of the people.

One clear reason for the surprising Hamas victory for legislative seats was that the voters were in despair about prospects for peace. With American acquiescence, the Israelis had avoided any substantive peace talks for more than five years, regardless of who had been chosen to represent the Palestinian side as interlocutor.

The day after his party lost the election, Abbas told me that his own struggling government could not sustain itself financially with their daily lives and economy so severely disrupted, and access from Palestine to Israel and the outside world almost totally restricted. They were already $900 million in debt and had no way to meet the payroll for the following month. The additional restraints imposed on the new government are a planned and deliberate catastrophe for the citizens of the occupied territories, in hopes that Hamas will yield to the economic pressure.

With all their faults, Hamas leaders have continued to honor a temporary cease-fire, or hudna, during the past 18 months, and their spokesman told me that this "can be extended for two, 10 or even 50 years if the Israelis will reciprocate." Although Hamas leaders have refused to recognize the state of Israel while their territory is being occupied, Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh has expressed approval for peace talks between Abbas and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel. He added that if these negotiations result in an agreement that can be accepted by Palestinians, then the Hamas position regarding Israel would be changed.

Regardless of these intricate and long-term political interrelationships, it is unconscionable for Israel, the United States and others under their influence to continue punishing the innocent and already persecuted people of Palestine. The Israelis are withholding approximately $55 million a month in taxes and customs duties that, without dispute, belong to the Palestinians. Although some Arab nations have allocated funds for humanitarian purposes to alleviate human suffering, the U.S. government is threatening the financial existence of any Jordanian or other bank that dares to transfer this assistance into Palestine.

The most accessible writing on Jimmy Carter's special relationship with Arafat and the Palestinians is Jay Nordlinger's. Although you should "read the whole thing," here is an excerpt:

For the past many years, he has been passionately anti-Israel, more or less embracing the PLO line. He has repeatedly been at the service of Yasser Arafat. After the Gulf War, the PLO chief was on the outs with Saudi Arabia, because he had backed Saddam Hussein. So he asked Carter to fly to Riyadh to smooth things over and restore Saudi funding to him — which he did. Arabs are also robust funders of the Carter Center, the ex-president's redoubt and vehicle in Atlanta.

While Carter has many warm words for Arafat and for dictators around the world (as we will see shortly), he has nothing but contempt and scorn for the democratic leader in Israel, Ariel Sharon. In Carter's eyes, the Arab-Israeli conflict is not unlike the pre-civil-rights South, with the Israelis as the oppressive whites and the Palestinians as the innocent blacks. As he told his chronicler, Douglas Brinkley, "The intifada exposed the injustice Palestinians suffered, just like Bull Connor's mad dogs in Birmingham."

JIMMY & YASSER

Last month [April 2002], Carter penned a remarkable op-ed piece for the New York Times, entitled "America Can Persuade Israel to Make a Just Peace." In it, he let it all hang out as an apologist for Arafat and a bulldog against Sharon. Before getting to that piece, however, we should be clear about just how attached to Arafat and his cause the ex-president is. As Brinkley writes in his book The Unfinished Presidency — about Carter's celebrated post-White House years — "there was no world leader Jimmy Carter was more eager to know than Yasir Arafat." The former president "felt certain affinities with the Palestinian: a tendency toward hyperactivity and a workaholic disposition...."

In their first meeting — held in 1990 — Carter boasted of his sternness toward Israel. For example, he said, "When I bring up the [PLO] charter, you should not be concerned that I am biased. I am much more harsh with the Israelis." Arafat, for his part, complained about the Reagan administration's alleged "betrayals." Rosalynn Carter, who was taking notes for her husband, interjected, "You don't have to convince us!" which, as Brinkley records, "elicited gales of laughter all round." The ex-president "agreed that the Reagan administration was not renowned as promise keepers" (this, to Arafat).

Later on, the parties exchanged gifts. "When Arafat presented Rosalynn with a dress for daughter Amy, decorated with Palestinian embroidery, he mentioned that he had followed Amy's political activities with great interest, especially her anti-CIA stance in Nicaragua and antiapartheid activities in South Africa." Then,

. . . in the course of conversation, Rosalynn began describing her revulsion and dismay over a story about Israeli troops dumping garbage in front of a Palestinian orphanage during the Carters' trip to the West Bank. Innocent Palestinian children were being treated as trash. As she recalled the inexcusable humiliation of their treatment, her eyes filled with tears. And the men, too, began to sob. Carter grasped the hands of his companions, and the three briefly prayed together. Then they dried their tears, embraced, and said farewell.

Shortly thereafter, Carter actually acted as PR adviser and speechwriter to Arafat. As Brinkley says, he "drafted on his home computer the strategy and wording for a generic speech Arafat was to deliver soon for Western ears . . ." The entire composition is nauseating, but its flavor can be captured in a single line: "Our people, who face Israeli bullets, have no weapons: only a few stones remaining when our homes are destroyed by Israeli bulldozers."

If Carter wrote Arafat's Western-ears-only speeches, Arafat could have written much of Carter's recent [spring 2002] New York Times op-ed. The former president began by describing Arafat's 1996 "election" as a "democratic" one, "well organized, open and fair." (It was "well organized," all right.) Of course, this "election" was like any other in the Arab world [up through May 2002], which is to say, rigged from beginning to end. As former CIA director James Woolsey told journalist Joel Mowbray recently, "Arafat was essentially 'elected' the same way Stalin was, but not nearly as democratically as Hitler, who at least had actual opponents." Arafat's "opponent" was a prop.

It seems to me that the line between being one of our best ex-Presidents and one of our worst is an awfully fine one.

	[Jim Lindgren, May 8, 2006 at 1:51am] Trackbacks Jimmy Carter, Advocate for Hamas.-- I have to confess that this Jimmy Carter op-ed in the International Herald Tribune left me almost speechless (tip to LGF): It is almost a miracle that the Palestinians have been able to orchestrate three elections during the past 10 years, all of which have been honest, fair, strongly contested, without violence and with the results accepted by winners and losers. Among the 62 elections that have been monitored by us at the Carter Center, these are among the best in portraying the will of the people. One clear reason for the surprising Hamas victory for legislative seats was that the voters were in despair about prospects for peace. With American acquiescence, the Israelis had avoided any substantive peace talks for more than five years, regardless of who had been chosen to represent the Palestinian side as interlocutor. The day after his party lost the election, Abbas told me that his own struggling government could not sustain itself financially with their daily lives and economy so severely disrupted, and access from Palestine to Israel and the outside world almost totally restricted. They were already $900 million in debt and had no way to meet the payroll for the following month. The additional restraints imposed on the new government are a planned and deliberate catastrophe for the citizens of the occupied territories, in hopes that Hamas will yield to the economic pressure. With all their faults, Hamas leaders have continued to honor a temporary cease-fire, or hudna, during the past 18 months, and their spokesman told me that this "can be extended for two, 10 or even 50 years if the Israelis will reciprocate." Although Hamas leaders have refused to recognize the state of Israel while their territory is being occupied, Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh has expressed approval for peace talks between Abbas and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel. He added that if these negotiations result in an agreement that can be accepted by Palestinians, then the Hamas position regarding Israel would be changed. Regardless of these intricate and long-term political interrelationships, it is unconscionable for Israel, the United States and others under their influence to continue punishing the innocent and already persecuted people of Palestine. The Israelis are withholding approximately $55 million a month in taxes and customs duties that, without dispute, belong to the Palestinians. Although some Arab nations have allocated funds for humanitarian purposes to alleviate human suffering, the U.S. government is threatening the financial existence of any Jordanian or other bank that dares to transfer this assistance into Palestine. The most accessible writing on Jimmy Carter's special relationship with Arafat and the Palestinians is Jay Nordlinger's. Although you should "read the whole thing," here is an excerpt: For the past many years, he has been passionately anti-Israel, more or less embracing the PLO line. He has repeatedly been at the service of Yasser Arafat. After the Gulf War, the PLO chief was on the outs with Saudi Arabia, because he had backed Saddam Hussein. So he asked Carter to fly to Riyadh to smooth things over and restore Saudi funding to him — which he did. Arabs are also robust funders of the Carter Center, the ex-president's redoubt and vehicle in Atlanta. While Carter has many warm words for Arafat and for dictators around the world (as we will see shortly), he has nothing but contempt and scorn for the democratic leader in Israel, Ariel Sharon. In Carter's eyes, the Arab-Israeli conflict is not unlike the pre-civil-rights South, with the Israelis as the oppressive whites and the Palestinians as the innocent blacks. As he told his chronicler, Douglas Brinkley, "The intifada exposed the injustice Palestinians suffered, just like Bull Connor's mad dogs in Birmingham." JIMMY & YASSER Last month [April 2002], Carter penned a remarkable op-ed piece for the New York Times, entitled "America Can Persuade Israel to Make a Just Peace." In it, he let it all hang out as an apologist for Arafat and a bulldog against Sharon. Before getting to that piece, however, we should be clear about just how attached to Arafat and his cause the ex-president is. As Brinkley writes in his book The Unfinished Presidency — about Carter's celebrated post-White House years — "there was no world leader Jimmy Carter was more eager to know than Yasir Arafat." The former president "felt certain affinities with the Palestinian: a tendency toward hyperactivity and a workaholic disposition...." In their first meeting — held in 1990 — Carter boasted of his sternness toward Israel. For example, he said, "When I bring up the [PLO] charter, you should not be concerned that I am biased. I am much more harsh with the Israelis." Arafat, for his part, complained about the Reagan administration's alleged "betrayals." Rosalynn Carter, who was taking notes for her husband, interjected, "You don't have to convince us!" which, as Brinkley records, "elicited gales of laughter all round." The ex-president "agreed that the Reagan administration was not renowned as promise keepers" (this, to Arafat). Later on, the parties exchanged gifts. "When Arafat presented Rosalynn with a dress for daughter Amy, decorated with Palestinian embroidery, he mentioned that he had followed Amy's political activities with great interest, especially her anti-CIA stance in Nicaragua and antiapartheid activities in South Africa." Then, . . . in the course of conversation, Rosalynn began describing her revulsion and dismay over a story about Israeli troops dumping garbage in front of a Palestinian orphanage during the Carters' trip to the West Bank. Innocent Palestinian children were being treated as trash. As she recalled the inexcusable humiliation of their treatment, her eyes filled with tears. And the men, too, began to sob. Carter grasped the hands of his companions, and the three briefly prayed together. Then they dried their tears, embraced, and said farewell. Shortly thereafter, Carter actually acted as PR adviser and speechwriter to Arafat. As Brinkley says, he "drafted on his home computer the strategy and wording for a generic speech Arafat was to deliver soon for Western ears . . ." The entire composition is nauseating, but its flavor can be captured in a single line: "Our people, who face Israeli bullets, have no weapons: only a few stones remaining when our homes are destroyed by Israeli bulldozers." If Carter wrote Arafat's Western-ears-only speeches, Arafat could have written much of Carter's recent [spring 2002] New York Times op-ed. The former president began by describing Arafat's 1996 "election" as a "democratic" one, "well organized, open and fair." (It was "well organized," all right.) Of course, this "election" was like any other in the Arab world [up through May 2002], which is to say, rigged from beginning to end. As former CIA director James Woolsey told journalist Joel Mowbray recently, "Arafat was essentially 'elected' the same way Stalin was, but not nearly as democratically as Hitler, who at least had actual opponents." Arafat's "opponent" was a prop. It seems to me that the line between being one of our best ex-Presidents and one of our worst is an awfully fine one.