Thank you for this post. You make important points, and I wrote a response to some of them on my own blog. It seems that once again things boil down to the dangerous us versus them mentality. I have to say that it hard to maintain hope about the middle east when it seems that most of the leaders are unwilling to do anything that moves in the right direction towards peace.

Former President Carter's trip to Palestine was dangerous for one reason: it exposed the racket that the Bush administration and a number of Jewish extremists have been running on Americans and on Israelis themselves.

Clearly Palestine has every reason to bind itself to prior agreements. Every country in the entire world would like to see nation-hood for the Palestinians save for a small contingent of extremists in Israel and a small contingent of extremists in Palestine.

Carter called Rice and others on their bluff. Is it an embarrassment? You betcha.

But I guess one man's terrorist is another man's Nelson Mandela.

"I've found that many Jews understand this and are privately praising Carter"

Care to mention any names Lerner? I don't know any Jews who have praised Carter in the LA area, even in local Jewish Journals.

I guess being a Marxist means you can say whatever you like without any factual support.

Lerners's quest for the good trumphs facts.

Oh yes, isn't it great that Carter said how much fun he had with meeting with Hamas. How special.

"Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid by Jimmy Carter" is so biased that it inevitably raises the question of what would motivate a decent man like Jimmy Carter to write such an indecent book. Whatever Mr. Carter's motives may be, his authorship of this ahistorical, one-sided, and simplistic brief against Israel forever disqualifies him from playing any positive role in fairly resolving the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. That is a tragedy because the Carter Center, which has done much good in the world, could have been a force for peace if Jimmy Carter were as generous in spirit to the Israelis as he is to the Palestinians."

-Alan Dershowitz

On this solemn Yom HaShoah day, Lerner chooses to praise Jimmy Carter.

Ambasteve writes:

"I don't know any Jews who have praised Carter in the LA area, even in local Jewish Journals.

I guess being a Marxist means you can say whatever you like without any factual support."

...like Jonathan Tasini: "My father was born in then-Palestine. He fought in the Hagannah (the Israeli underground) in the war of independence; my father's cousin, whose name I carry as a middle name, was killed in that war. I lived in Israel for seven years, during which I went through the 1973 war: a cousin of mine was killed in that war, leaving a young widow and two children, and his brother was wounded. My step-grandfather, an old man who was no threat to anyone, was killed by a Palestinian who took an axe to his head while he was sitting quietly on a park bench; it was a retaliation killing for the massacre of 30 Muslims who were murdered by an ultra-nationalist Jewish settler while they were kneeling in prayer. Half my family still lives in Israel. I have seen enough bloodshed, tears, and parents burying their children to last many lifetimes."

He writes at Daily Kos:

***********************
A week ago, I wrote about Jimmy Carter's meeting with representatives of Hamas. Carter had a simple idea: you only make peace with your enemies and you can only make peace when you talk to your enemies. Today, Carter explains his position more fully in public.

He does so in an op-ed in The New York Times:

"A COUNTERPRODUCTIVE Washington policy in recent years has been to boycott and punish political factions or governments that refuse to accept United States mandates. This policy makes difficult the possibility that such leaders might moderate their policies"

.

While Carter is not explicit about this, I will be: this is a position that has been bi-partisan. Republican and Democratic policymakers set down mandates and believe that, unless an adversary meets those conditions, the U.S. will not engage in discussions with certain factions, movements or governments.

This is not meant to be a campaign diary but here is the truth: all of the remaining candidates in the race--both Democrats and the Republican--support that kind of foreign policy, particularly as it relates to Hamas and the Middle East.

Carter points out that in Nepal, the Carter Center agreed to mediate between warring factions, including a Maoist insurgency that the U.S. had branded as terrorists. The result was a cease-fire and an agreement by all to take part in elections.

"After a surprising victory in the April 10 election, Maoists will play a major role in writing a constitution and governing for about two years. To the United States, they are still terrorists."

Carter, then, agreed to meet with Hamas and Syria, understanding that there can be no peace in the Middle East unless those powers are a part of the solution. Here's what he says happened:

"We met with Hamas leaders from Gaza, the West Bank and Syria, and after two days of intense discussions with one another they gave these official responses to our suggestions, intended to enhance prospects for peace:

• Hamas will accept any agreement negotiated by Mr. Abbas and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel provided it is approved either in a Palestinian referendum or by an elected government. Hamas’s leader, Khaled Meshal, has reconfirmed this, although some subordinates have denied it to the press.

• When the time comes, Hamas will accept the possibility of forming a nonpartisan professional government of technocrats to govern until the next elections can be held.

• Hamas will also disband its militia in Gaza if a nonpartisan professional security force can be formed.

• Hamas will permit an Israeli soldier captured by Palestinian militants in 2006, Cpl. Gilad Shalit, to send a letter to his parents. If Israel agrees to a list of prisoners to be exchanged, and the first group is released, Corporal Shalit will be sent to Egypt, pending the final releases.

• Hamas will accept a mutual cease-fire in Gaza, with the expectation (not requirement) that this would later include the West Bank.

• Hamas will accept international control of the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, provided the Egyptians and not the Israelis control closing the gates."

We should do everything possible to support Carter's attempt to create an open dialogue. That does not mean accepting that everything is good about either Hamas, Syria or Israel--or that they are all bad. It means TALKING and NEGOTIATING.
**************

On 21 of April, 2008 Jonathan Tasini in a blog entry titled "On Passover: Thank You, Jimmy Carter" wrote:

...Every day that Jimmy Carter continues his works of peace and humanitarian outreach justifies the day that I cast my first vote in a presidential election for him some...okay, a lot of years ago. His recent foray to establish another line of communication with Hamas is another act of courage--where courage means ignoring the inevitable hail of criticism and invective thrown your way because you are guided by a strong, moral compass. And maybe this is bearing some fruit.

...I write this from a deep, personal experience--not one that comes from just ideological slogans lobbed from the comfy confines of the U.S., nor from the perspective of some ideologues who see one side or another in this conflict as evil incarnate or pure goodness.

President Carter is carrying on a simple idea put forth by none other than Moshe Dayan, the Israeli general/politician who is so revered in the U.S. (who, by the way, modern Israelis have a much more complicated and mixed assessment of his legacy--but that's another story). Dayan famously said: "If you want to make peace, you don't talk to your friends. You talk to your enemies."

That is just a fact of life. I'm not going to spend a lot of time here defending or criticizing either Israel or Hamas. Both sides, led my democratically-elected governments, have a lot to account for, in the positive and negative. Trying to establish a set of scales upon which you value one set of misdeeds versus another is not a particularly useful exercise. The point is: how do you find a way to resolve the endless bloodletting?

The idea that you make progress towards peace by refusing to talk to your adversary, as belligerent and threatening as they might be, is childish, idiotic and just plain dumb. I've never quite understood the notion that you boycott talking to somehow until they agree to your conditions--and maybe that would make me a bad diplomat. In my labor world, sometimes you do go out on strike but that comes after a long process of talking to people who do not have your interests in mind--and would like you go away. Now, it is true that most employers aren't likely these days--at least, in this country--to take out guns and begin firing at you. But, most adversaries, when you are actively engaged in real conversation, not posturing, will usually hold their fire, too.

I suspect that this post will be met with a lot of justifications for one side or another, or a recitation of the sins of one side or another. I may even agree with some of them.

But, for a moment, I wanted to just give thanks--on Passover--to President Carter who just wants to hear what people have to say. We should give space to people who explore conversations and seek to find common ground.

And if I remember well, conservative foreign policy expert and the national security adviser to George H. W. Bush absolutely agrees with Jimmy Carter about negotiating with Hamas.

"I don't know any Jews who have praised Carter in the LA area, even in local Jewish Journals."

Perhaps the poll junkie Ambasteve is not aware that a poll by Ha'aretz a couple of months ago showed that two thirds of Israelis are willing to negotiate with Hamas.

And perhpas Israelis do not need Carter to tell them that it would be a good thing to work out some agreement that stops rockets from falling on their cities. That's why many may not really "praise" Carter whom they see as a tedious bore, and his involvement entirely unnecessary.

But then, what DO Israelis need to get their priorities respected by their government?

A majority was for talking with Hamas ever since they got elected. Instead, we got escalation, mutual killings, a shameful siege, the Lebanon war as a spin-off - and still no end in sight.

I've seen a bit of concern trolling over this issue. OMG!!!! how can he talk to THEM!!! It might cause.....PEACE!!! We just cannot stand for that!

You mean Carter thinks that there's a way to Peace that doesn't involve war?

Nawww, that's extremist talk, I don't believe it. Carter is clearly part of the lunatic fringe.

Peace is achieved by waging war. Everybody knows that.

Thanks for posting this!

I just received a message from a Nepali friend.

Her husband was an organizer in the 1990 uprising, and then a member of Parliament.

Later when they were here in the US, his mom was threatened by the Maoists, who knew who her son is.

Yet, now my friends are happy with the election outcome in Nepal.

People, especially men, fighting oppression often become terrorists. When the path to freedom becomes clear, they lay down their arms.

I wish we'd learn that lesson about the Middle East as well, instead of clinging to the paranoid-racist-ahistorical "clash of civilization" frame of mind.

Thank you, Jimmy Carter.

Assaf

#9

"And perhpas Israelis do not need Carter to tell them that it would be a good thing to work out some agreement that stops rockets from falling on their cities. That's why many may not really "praise" Carter whom they see as a tedious bore, and his involvement entirely unnecessary."

Here's an Israeli who... does NOT think Carter is a "tedious bore." And if anything, his mediating abilities have improved since the 1970's, when he erroneously left the Palestinians out of the equation determining their fate - instead counting on Israel's commitment to Egypt, guaranteed by the US, to withdraw from West Bank & Gaza and set up an autonomy there. Begin did not intend to make good on this commitment even for a second. Biggest single flaw in the 1979 peace accords.

Speaking of Haaretz
-Shmuel Rosen Chief US Corespondant writes:

There's no moral virtue in talking to one's enemies

My frequent readers already know what I think about the latest visit of Jimmy Carter to the Middle East. Last week I wrote this:

The choice of those who still continue to insist on the need to listen to Carter is based on lies - it is possible to ignore him, protest his manipulative tricks, and still continue to work for true peace between Israel and the Arabs. There is no contradiction.

A couple of days ago, though, I wrote another piece on Carter for Slate, essentially analyzing his latest OpEd published in the New York Times. You can read it in full on Slate, or a couple of paragraphs here:

How Carter is helping Hamas

In his op-ed, two reasons emerged for the necessity of such talks, but Carter, misleadingly, turned them into one.

The first is that "Hamas [is] steadily gaining popularity." That's the let's-just-deal-with-reality argument: Hamas is strong, Hamas makes the rules, and we have to talk to the party in power. The second is "there can be no peace with Palestinians divided." That's the what-we're-trying-to-do-here-is-help-make-peace argument. Presumably, Carter is not in the business of sabotaging the peace talks being conducted by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas or undermining his efforts to rebuild a moderate, democratic Palestinian Authority. It just looks that way.

It is no accident that in Carter's version, these two arguments are mushed together and left unrecognizable. Carter is a calculating diplomat, and he knows his way around land mines. He needs the arguments to be confusingly entangled, because neither can stand on its own feet. Helping the cause of peace by engaging a party that expresses no interest in a two-state solution makes no sense. Talking to a villain because he is strong while giving up on the possibility of moderates being able to overcome their difficulties is a despairingly defeatist goal.

"This policy" Carter argues, "makes difficult the possibility that such leaders might moderate their policies." The hope of eventual moderation is another easy argument made by proponents of engagement, who fail to recognize that in some cases, moderation is not a reasonable expectation. Here, Carter is guilty not only of miscalculation but of hubris. He apparently believes that by the force of his personality and powers of persuasion, he can make Hamas change a deeply rooted ideology. Unfortunately, he can't.

There's no moral virtue in talking to one's enemies. Engagement is a tool, but so are disengagement and isolation. Both are effective, if used wisely; both can be damaging if used in haste. Talking to one's enemies is a tool - as is complaining about one's reluctance to talk to one's enemies. This is the tool now being used by Hamas and Syria - assisted by Carter - as they try to escape and counter the isolation being applied to them. Making the case for engagement helps them achieve their strategic goal.

Btw, isn't Carter promoting his new book these days? The man sure knows how to get publicity.

Lerner should be happy that he is getting more than the usual 2 or 3 responses to his posts. He can thank me for that!!!! Ha Ha

Cheers everyone

Steve

You wnat to know why Lerner and friends get so excited by Jimmy, and wants the rest of us to follow his lead? Carter's quote below says it all, a leftist dream come true:

“In a democracy, I realize you don’t need to talk to the top leader to know how the country feels. When I go to a dictatorship, I only have to talk to one person and that’s the dictator, because he speaks for all the people.”

Let it be said, Jimmy never met a dictator he didn't like.

Cheers,

Steve

I have owed President Jimmy Carter an apology for 29 years. It's about time I made it public. He was right and I was wrong about his response to the Iranian hostage crisis.

When the Iranian hostage crisis went down, I didn't have a historical context for the middle east. I didn't know that the CIA had helped to overthrow the democratically elected government to re-install the Shah after the Iranian oil fields had been nationalized. I didn't know that the Shah was a brutal despot. What I did know, was that our embassy had been attacked, and some of the guys on "our team" were being held against their will. When you have been training for the "big game" for nearly three years, you think that is all you need to know.

In 1979 I was in the US Army. Many people without a military background assume that rank and file military people are either hawkish... wanting to kick some ass, or peaceful... not wanting to get into harm's way.

Neither of these views reflect my experience. Spending time in the military during times of peace is an odd thing. I imagine it is like being a fireman when there are no fires, or a swat team sniper when there are no crises. You train day and night for hostilities. You study weapons and tactics constantly. You drill and practice and wait for the phone to ring. You are mentally prepared to mete out violence on command.

The top of the chain of command in the military is the President. I don't know how the Joint Chiefs operate. I wasn't a high ranking officer. From the perspective of a lowly Sgt, the President tells us who to kill and what to break, and we say "Yes, Sir!" and begin hurting people and breaking things. To me, and many of my brothers in arms, failing to attack Iran was a curious choice that implied weakness.

In the years since, I have appreciated on a number of occasions that I was NOT asked to go and kill the people of Iran. My estimation of former President Carter has climbed continuously as he left office and continued his work for peace and justice.

My late apology was inspired by an interview with President Carter on April 28th on Jon Stewart's Daily Show last week. During the discussion, mention was made that the Bush administration had expressed displeasure at Carter's recent meeting with Hamas. Carter said that he did not receive word before the trip that the administration cared. Stewart sympathized with the administration's position a bit, asking the question - "During the Iranian hostage crisis, let's say Nixon had gone and met with..."

Carter interrupted him before he could finish the sentence.
"I would have thanked him from the bottom of my heart. We sent everyone who was willing to go."

Mr. Carter, you have consistently talked the talk and walked the walk. Please forgive my slow recognition of your truly honorable actions. I am thankful that I was not asked to kill innocent people to avoid a misplaced perception that you were a wimp. It was a difficult and complex situation, and, in retrospect, you handled it thoughtfully and well. I hope that future Presidents can learn from your outstanding example. I regret it took me so long to recognize the courage of your actions. It was a pleasure to serve under you.

http://leftcenterlibertarian.dailykos.com/

Nice,

You made it sound like the one who posted this on Intent was the actual Sargent.

Interestingly, the hostages were released as soon as Reagan was elected President.

Speaking of the CIA infiltrating, that was really great of Jimma sending the Company after Maharishi's TM movement in the late 70's. How do I know? I was a part of the movement back then and Maharishi in lectures that I attended called them out time and time again, in the US and India.

It seems that Carter screws up everything he touches.

Time to retire to the peanut farm X-Prez

Steve

Bush promotes terrorist attacks in Iran? ‎Does support of terrorists make one a terrorist? Presumably that depends on whether you take Mister Bush’s squint-eyed November 2001, prescription – "You're either with us or against us in the fight against terror" – in a blindly nationalistic fashion or in a moral one. Terrorism isn’t an ideology. It’s a technique. Much as sophists and thugs such as the late Jeane Kirkpatrick like to twist definitions depending on who is carrying out a certain policy, terrorism can't be one thing for them and something else for us.

Yet one of the most pre-eminent of the Pentagon’s chosen propaganda team of ex-military-cum-television-analysts, retired Lt. Gen. Tom McInerney, not only supports but promotes terrorism against Iran. He's still spewing on Fox News despite having been exposed by David Barstow’s revelations three weeks ago in the NY Times.

This isn’t new territory for McInerney. He’s argued for attacks on Iran for as long as Bill Kristol and other neoconservatives.

As a member of the Iran Policy Committee, McInerney has long argued that the State Department should take the Mujahideen-e Khalq off its terrorist watch list. The group originated as leftwing opposition to the Shah of Iran in 1963 and was involved in various operations, including the taking of U.S. Embassy hostages in 1979 and the bloody suppression of the Shiite revolt in Iraq under Saddam Hussein. Although MEK killed Americans as well as Iranians in the past, it has since adopted a public veneer of being a backer of freedom and democracy as soon as the Iranian mullahs are overturned, the idea being to install one of its founders as Iran’s president.

Although thousands of MEK fighters based in Iraq were disarmed in 2003 when the U.S. military arrived, the organization has since been implicated in attacks in Iran, including assassinations and bombings in public places. Given Mister Bush’s ordering of clandestine activities in Iran and long-standing White House support for various armed groups along Iran’s borders as – belatedly – reported in the Los Angeles Times three weeks ago, such activity can hardly be surprising to anyone who has followed U.S.-Iranian relations even cursorily.

But, just as Max Boot and Robert Kaplan and Stephen Peter Rosen and others argue quite openly for American empire, now we have a well-connected ex-general openly calling for terrorist attacks – excuse me, responses – in Iran. With a Fox News reader cheering him on.

McInerney starts one minute into the video linked here.

http://www.redlasso.com/ClipPlayer.aspx?id=b3a67713-d022-4f67-a2ec-069dd7044619

"Question: If we do have evidence, and apparently we do, according to officials, that Iran is killing U.S. troops in Iraq or supporting that, why haven't we struck by now?

McInerney: It beats me, Greg. I don't know why we haven't. They have killed hundreds of Americans with their explosively formed projectiles [EFPs], and that's why I think we have to take action. And here's what I would suggest to you. No. 1, we take the National Council for Resistance in Iran off the terrorist list that the Clinton Administration put them on, as well as the Mujahideen-e Khalq that are at Camp Ashraf in Iraq. Then I would start a tit-for-tat strategy. For every EFP that goes off that kills Americans, two go off in Iran. No questions asked, people don't know have to know how it was done. It's covert action. They become the most unlucky country in the world. And then I would start moving U.S. carrier battle groups into the region, as well as some of our stealth aircraft, just to make sure they understand, don't try to kick off a major insurrection come October and September, October to impact our elections. They are deliberately ratcheting up and we’ve got to counterattack."

As McInerney pointed out, this isn’t the first time he has made this suggestion. And while he suggests that the tactic won’t endanger civilians, this is a detestable lie. IEDs, whether equipped with EFPs or not, kill civilians in Iraq all the time. Deploying McInerney’s monstrous terrorist proposal would mean murdering Iranians - men, women, children - who happen to get "unlucky."