Carter Lectures Israel On How To React To Her Kidnapped Soldiers

Jimmy Carter, the former president during whose term in office 52 Americans were held hostage by Iran for 444 days, now writes an op-ed for the Washington Post to lecture Israel on how to deal with her kidnapped soldiers.

In Stop the Band-Aid Treatment, Carter follows in the footsteps of Ismail Haniyeh, terrorist leader and prime minister of the Palestinian National Authority who wrote an op-ed back on July 11. Carter now takes the podium with similar distortions--the only difference being that we assume that at least Carter wrote his own material. The difference is negligible.

Carter writes about 'women, 'children' and 'Lebanese' imprisoned in Israeli prisons, neglecting to point out the common denominator: these are terrorists that attempted and in all too many cases were successful in brutaling murdering 'women', 'children' and Israelis.

Carter hits his stride early, blindly and shamelessly accusing Israel of the very tactic that Hizbollah has been using since its inception:

It is inarguable that Israel has a right to defend itself against attacks on its citizens, but it is inhumane and counterproductive to punish civilian populations in the illogical hope that somehow they will blame Hamas and Hezbollah for provoking the devastating response. The result instead has been that broad Arab and worldwide support has been rallied for these groups, while condemnation of both Israel and the United States has intensified.

Equally clueless is Carter's to-do list of what must be done to bring peace, starting of course with Israel's ceasing its attacks and continuing with all sorts of unenforceable measures to defuse the situation--but including the return of Shebaa Farms (which is actually recognized as belonging to Syria) and the release of terrorists. Missing from Carter's list is the return of the kidnapped Israeli soldiers. And Carter cannot seem to understand why Olmert refused to accept such a ceasefire, which Carter himself labels as ambitious--for lack of a more accurate term.

After taking the required swipe at "the almost unprecedented six-year absence of any real effort to achieve such a goal," ignoring the marginalizing of Arafat, the attempt to establish a real government for Palestinian Arabs, The Road Map, and The Disengagement, Carter sinks further into blurred distinctions.

He condemns--

leaders on both sides ignore strong majorities that crave peace, allowing extremist-led violence to preempt all opportunities for building a political consensus. [emphasis added]

But does not clarify for the sake of the reader who exactly are the extremist Israelis whom one assumes somehow parallel the Palestinian Arab terrorists.

He writes about the security barrier "that fails to bring safety or stability," in spite of the fact that the number of terrorist attacks are down since its construction.

One can read Carter's description for how to bring peace and almost miss the implied obligations of the Arabs--again with no mention of terrorism:

The general parameters of a long-term, two-state agreement are well known. There will be no substantive and permanent peace for any peoples in this troubled region as long as Israel is violating key U.N. resolutions, official American policy and the international "road map" for peace by occupying Arab lands and oppressing the Palestinians. Except for mutually agreeable negotiated modifications, Israel's official pre-1967 borders must be honored. As were all previous administrations since the founding of Israel, U.S. government leaders must be in the forefront of achieving this long-delayed goal.

Carter is of course expansive--though vague--on Israel's alleged violations, neglecting to mention--as expected--that the first requirement of the The Road Map was the disarming of the Palestinian terrorists. But in Carter's strange universe, the disarming of terrorists as per agreement is criticized as "subservient behavior."

Whatever Carter's accomplishments may have been as president, when it comes to international affairs in general--and the Middle East in particular--Carter's unmistakable bias renders his opinions, and this op-ed, a defense of terrorists.

Jimmy Carter is correct when he concludes that, "the people of the Middle East deserve peace and justice, and we in the international community owe them our strong leadership and support."

But the first requirement is to have leaders who know where they are going.

Technorati Tag: Israel and Hizbollah and Hezbollah and Jimmy Carter and Washington Post.