Consider a May 2004 report from an objective third-party observer, Amnesty International, recounted by Prof. Norm Finkelstein in “Beyond Chutzpah.”  Finkelstein just happens to be Jewish:

“In the past three and a half years the scale of the destruction carried out by the Israeli army in the Occupied Territories has reached an unprecedented level.  The victims are often amongst the poorest and most disadvantaged who were expelled by Israeli forces or who fled in the war that followed the creation of Israel in 1948…More than 3,000 homes, hundreds of public buildings and private commercial properties, and vast areas of agricultural lands have been destroyed….Tens of thousands of men, women and children have been evicted from their homes and made homeless or have lost their source of livelihood.  Thousands of other houses and properties have been damaged, many beyond repair.  In addition, tens of thousands of other homes are under threat of demolition, their occupants living in fear of forced eviction and homelessness….Thousands of families have had their homes and possessions destroyed under the blades of the Israeli army’s US-made Caterpillar bulldozers.  In the wake of the demolitions, men, women and children return to the ruins of their homes searching for whatever can be salvaged from under the rubble.”

Like Alan Dershowitz, Howard appears to be but another dissembling apologist for an indefensible, brutal occupation of Palestinian lands by Israel in direct violation of UN resolutions.  His accusation of bias on the part of President Carter appears to be a variation on what Prof. Finkelstein refers to as “the misuse of anti-Semitism and the abuse of history,” the sub-title to his exhaustively researched book.

Of course it will “never be sufficient for Israel” as Israel will never lift its boot from the neck of the Palestinians as long as we taxpayers in the US continue to send them our billions of dollars in support of their thuggery.

The Korean war never really ended, and both sides did not recognize the other, but there was a truce in which withdrawal to recognized borders was established, and the fighting stopped, and after many years of this they have just recently began to mend relations.

The fighting will not stop for Israel because Israel uses the excuse of “demanding recognition” by those it intolerably oppresses.

Lift your boot from Palestinian necks, and they may yet eventually forgive you, better yet; we in the states need to stop supplying those jack boots!

Even Churchill said it: Jaw-jaw is always better than war-war.

Former President Carter is quoted as saying, “Hamas will, in effect, recognize Israel, if the people agree on the plan.”  But Khaled Meshal, the Hamas leader with whom Mr. Carter met, is quoted as saying, “Hamas will not recognize the state of Israel.”

These two remarks illustrate the biased nature of Mr. Carter’s perceptions fo the Arab-Israeli conflict.  Mr. Carter fails to grasp its central issue:  60 years without an unequivocal statement from the Palestinians and the Arab world that Israel has a right to exist.

  “In effect” may be good enough for Mr. Carter, but history has shown more than once that it can never be sufficient for Israel.

Howard appears on this forum periodically to blame Palestinian victims for being occupied, starved, collectively punished, ethnically cleansed, tortured, terrorized, and randomly murdered. Those like Howard, who defend and support these crimes against humanity, although not involved personally, are accomplices to these crimes, both morally and legally. For Howard and the Zionists, Palestinians are occupying territory belonging to God’s chosen people, and are therefore always the aggressors, deserving whatever punishment or atrocities Israelis decide to inflict on them.

What you ALL ignore is that Jimmy Carter is the only one to recognize that you have to TALK if you want to avoid fighting.  Talking may not avoid fighting, but not talking never will.

That’s what Carter sees.  If he can touch the rational in Hamas and Syrian leaders, that’s half the battle.  Then he needs to touch the rational in Israeli leaders.

It would be a bonus if he could touch the rational in American leaders but that cannot happen until 20 Jan 2009.  Because there is nothing rational in George W. Bush or his regime.

Wrong, Howard, Israeli tanks have repeatedly rolled into Gaza since the settlements were removed.  They go in and out as they please.  Gaza is the closing thing to the Warsaw Ghetto the 21st Century has seen.

He says it here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F583p_KZyGU

... and almost EVERYONE else in the present administration misses completely is…

YOU EITHER TALK OUT YOUR “PROBLEMS” OR YOU GO TO WAR. There’s no middle ground sustainable for very long.

Those who don’t understand that, with all it’s faults, COMMUNICATION beats NO COMMUNICATION, should never be allowed to even tour Congress let alone hold a seat there. They’re just too blind and stupid to be leading anybody.

RE:  By Ernest Canning, April 22 at 9:01 am #
(1474 comments total)
==============================

Well, occupation is not occurring. Anyone else can help. Israel left Gaza 2 years ago !  As mentioned above nothing but rockets as a return on leaving. Without Israel they would be starving.

Finkelstein is not taken seriously by anyone for documenting anything.

Checkpoints are a necessity because of the suicide bombers who were walking through.

IDF goes out its way to NOT harm civilians who the terrorists hide amongst. Rockets and missles from Hamas go onto civilians on purpose.

Howard, like a clock you can be depended on to blindly support Israel and even a broken clock is right once a day.

The Palestinian media isn’t helping matters any and should develop a more subdued tone in reporting Israeli misdeeds against it’s population.

While I am sympathetic to the Palestinian people I am concerned about Israeli misdeeds against the United States. 

They are many.

http://muhajabah.com/israel.htm

TW,

Interest rates during Carter were market driven, now they are manipulated and artifically kept low. 

The Republicans are smart enough to know this is the quickest way to get kicked out of office.

By Ernest Canning, April 22 at 6:47 am #
(1474 comments total)

Yes Ernest - by your definition, there is no such thing as a terrorist group because every group can cite grievances of one kind or another (or manufacture them if need be).  That kind of relativist thinking places no blame and levels the playing field for fear of having to take a side.

Once two sides engage in conflict, rules will be broken, innocent will die, and the relativists like yourself will no longer have a definition for right and wrong, even when it means condoning the actual targeting of civilians in the name of grievance.

Yet the simple fact remains: Hamas does not, and will not recognize Israel’s right to exist.  That indisputable fact betrays Hamas’ true motivations which are not to seek peace, but to remove Israel from the ME.

Israel left Gaza 2 years ago….completelly nothing but artillary shells since.  Hamas has sent rockets and missles off from farms and the extensivee greenhouse grounds that Israelis left them.  Makes you wonder if they should give more land back in the West bank.

No apartheid at all that has been touted.  Thousands of Gazans worked in Israel; but Hamas now forbids it right out.  Offers its citizens nothing…but misery.  Any other country wants to help its people. Not this group running Gaza.

Even Egypt which is closest to them physically and culturally is refusing to take Gaza back which they had for decades before ‘67. Amazing.  And Saudi Arabia and oil rich Arab countries don’t put up a dime to their subsistence. The Gazans have been on the UN ‘s dole for 40 years.  Other Arab countries love it.

Tony, it would be nice if those inside the Obama campaign, like yourself, pressured him on single-payer.  His current healthcare proposal may be his greatest weakness.

Howard, your post is a bit one-sided, don’t you think?  It is disingenuous to point only to the shelling of Israeli villages while ignoring the brutality of Israel’s 41 year occupation, an occupation that has continued in direct violation of U.N. Resolution 242; an occupation in which Israelis have used U.S.-made bulldozers to demolish homes with both small children and elderly civilians trapped inside (not to mention the bulldozer that intentionally ran over Rachel Corey); an occupation which has seen the Israelis wall in and then starve the indigenous population of Gaza in a manner sadly reminiscent to what the Nazis did to the Jewish ghetto in Warsaw; an occupation in which Israeli aircraft have targeted apartment buildings in the hopes of killing one or two Fatah or Hamas fighters even though the buildings house hundreds of innocent civilians; an occupation that has made life nearly impossible for Palestinians who are sometimes stopped at checkpoints and prevented from traveling to hospitals even when they are dying; an occupation which, as documented by Prof. Norm Finkelstein in “Beyond Chutzpah” has included a calculated resort to torture by the IDF.

Yes it is terrible and deplorable when Palestinian fighters target Israeli civilians with their pitifully ineffective rockets or when suicide bombers target innocent civilians on Israeli buses.  But that in no way lessons the impact of the brutality dished out by the Zionists who persist on this brutal apartheid occupation.

Many progressive Israelis and progressive Jewish Americans are fed up with the occupation and want to see its end.  Only the end of the occupation and a recognition of the humanity of Palestinians, so long denied by the Zionist occupiers, will bring a just and lasting peace.

If you would take the ideological blinders off long enough to see past the dehumanizing fog of the racist Zionist propaganda, you might begin to see that efforts like the current one being made by President Carter provide the only real means to ending the vicious cycle of violence.

What with the shelling of Israeli villages not having stopped for one day; and now they are attacking and killing at the one border crossing that delivers essentials to close it down to then be able to scream for humanitarian reasons its all unfair.

The Arab countries have not supported the Gazans with any economic, social, business, or educational help to the in 40 years. They want to keep them penned up and not come into their countries.

Meanwhile the mosques and schools print death to all Israel men, women and childresn and western citizens.  Hamas rules Gaza with an iron hand; they could show how much they want to have peace in hours.

The fact that the Zionists, in violation of U.N. Resolution 242, continue to illegally and brutally occupy Gaza and the West Bank, no more negates the fact that there is a sovereign nation we call Palestine than does the illegal U.S. occupation of Iraq.

It’s all in how you apply the words you use, Marshall.

“Terrorist” is the label occupying powers always resort to whenever referring to the inevitable armed resistance of the irregular forces in an occupied territory who are forced to resort to guerrilla tactics against a vastly superior conventional force.

When Israelis in U.S.-made bulldozers mow down buildings with innocent children inside, when they drop cluster bombs specifically designed to target civilian populations, when they seal off and starve the civilians inside the Gaza strip as an act of collective punishment or when target apartment buildings knowing that 95% of the occupants are civilians, these are as much acts of terror as are those carried out by suicide bombers who target buses carrying Israeli civilians.  War is terror. 

If we are to look at the deeds rather than the formality of government, then the Israeli government must be regarded as a “terrorist organization.”

The label, “terrorist organization,” does nothing to break the cycle of violence.  Only a recognition of the valid grievances of the Palestinian people and a much needed recognition of those Israelis who are fed up with the depravity of the occupation and want to live in peace and harmony with their Palestinian neighbors can do that.  That is why Carter’s bold mission of peace is so important.

PH,

As I recall, the “stagflation” with the high interest rates of the Carter years was caused by an OPEC embargo that raised the price of oil. I think we may be about to have another such period, maybe a lot worse than last time. Oil is $117 a barrell now. The dollar is plunging and inflation is ramping up.

I don’t think the Iran hostage event did as much to sink his presidency as 18% mortgage interest rates.

Americans directly relate their government with their pocketbooks.

I wonder who controlled those rates.

Fadel,

I have been spending most of my time on barackobama.com advocating the same views. Why don’t you get an account and join the Free Palestine group? I am currently posting to five groups including that one. I’m getting a lot of flak from pro-Israel people in the campaign. I have had my account deleted twice for this. They found my posts offensive and said they should not be posted on the Obama site because people would use them to smear Obama as anti-Semitic. My response was that there are indeed such people trying to smear Obama, but they are not Obama’s friends or ours, and we should stand up to them rather than be intimidated by them.
For Obama to stand with Carter would be an act of courage which the American people would reward.

I do not think the Israel lobby is really so powerful. Our politicians are so cowardly. The Lobby’s power consists in calling anyone who opposes it anti-Semitic, but this tactic is rapidly losing its effectiveness. It has gone to the well too often. Take Jimmy Carter. He has been around a long time. The American people have known him since 1976, more than thirty years. Everybody remembers him as a one-term president whose presidency was destroyed by the Iranian hostage affair. He was also the first president to formulate a universal human rights policy. He was also the mediator in the Camp David accords, the only peace ever negotiated between Israel and one of its neighbors, Egypt. Since then everybody knows he has had a very distinguished humanitarian career as an ex-president all these years. No American speaks with greater authority on the subject. Will Americans believe he is anti-Semitic? 

Barack Obama could break the grip of the lobby by courageously embracing Carter and supporting his talks with instead of allowing himself to be pressured into distancing himself.

TW:  Unlike you, I did not support Obama from the outset.  My first choice was Dennis Kucinich.  Since Ralph Nader is really not a viable alternative, I am supporting Obama as I believe it critical that we avoid a Mad Dog McCain presidency above all else.  I am hopeful that a President Obama will have to courage to do something that no sitting President has done—to act as an honest broker who could force the Israelis into a meaningful peace.

But before either you or I come down too hard on Obama, consider what President Carter had to say during his Sept. 10, 2007 interview on Democracy Now concerning his book, “Peace not Apartheid.”

“Americans don’t want to know and many Israelis don’t want to know what is going on inside Palestine.  It’s a terrible human rights persecution that far transcends what any outsider would imagine.  And there are powerful political forces in America that prevent any objective analysis of the problem in the Holy Land.  I think it’s accurate to say that not a single member of Congress with whom I’m familiar would possibly speak out and call for Israel to withdraw to their legal boundaries or to publicize the plight of the Palestinians or even to call publicly and repeatedly for good faith peace talks.  There hasn’t been a day of peace talks now in more than seven years.  So this is a taboo subject.  And I would say that if any member of Congress did speak out, as I’ve described, they would probably not be back in Congress the next term.”

Excellent comment Tony Wicher! I totally concur and I am pleased to see you back after some absence to continue your noble and much appreciated work for truth and justice.

All the best for the best!

Excellent post Ostrogoth!
However, if Mashaal is proven to be mistaken, he is still a winner by proving to the world who is the true enemy of peace and who is the trouble-maker in that part of the world.

As for me to stand in the forming line to spit and to throw up on Sue Myrick, it would a pleasure to wait as long as it takes; the longer the wait the merrier!

I have been inside the Obama campaign strenuously advocating that Obama should warmly embrace Carter, not “distance himself”. Obama criticized Carter’s talk with Hamas last week according to Reuters:

PHILADELPHIA, April 16 (Reuters) - Democratic White House hopeful Barack Obama on Wednesday disagreed with former President Jimmy Carter’s overtures toward Hamas, saying he would not talk to the Islamist group until it recognized Israel and renounced terrorism.

The Illinois senator, campaigning in Pennsylvania which holds the next presidential voting contest on Tuesday, told a group of Jewish leaders he has an “unshakable commitment” to help protect Israel from its “bitter enemies.”

“That’s why I have a fundamental difference with President Carter and disagree with his decision to meet with Hamas,” Obama said. “We must not negotiate with a terrorist group intent on Israel’s destruction. We should only sit down with Hamas if they renounce terrorism, recognize Israel’s right to exist and abide by past agreements.”

I am the biggest Obama supporter around, but he is going to have to do a lot better than this. Hamas is the democratically elected representative of the Palestinian people, as certified by the Carter Center and other credible international observers. I think he only makes statements like this because of enormous political pressure from the Israel lobby. Ahmed Yousef, senior advisor to Ismael Haniya, who has said he likes Obama, is the man who wrote the op-ed piece in the New York times “A Pause for Peace”

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/01/opinion/01yousef.html

This offer was completely ignored by Israel and by Washington. This is what Obama ought to be pointing out while embracing the Carter mission, not criticizing it. If Obama really believes in talking to our so-called enemies, this is the perfect case for it. Obama should not allow himself to be intimidated by right-wing Zionists, Christian or Jewish,  who are themselves racists and who are trying to tar him with the brush of “anti-Semitism”. It is these people themselves who are anti-Semites because they are anti-Arab, and Arabs are a Semitic people.

In reference to a previous post I wrote “through up” in stead of “throw up”; sorry for the typo!

As an unbiased observer who has no dog in the fight between Palestinians and Israelis, I can assure you that BOTH SIDES have committed atrocities. There really are legitimate Palestinian grievances that need to be addressed. This was Jimmy Carter’s reason for TALKING to HAMAS (which, by the way, is the legally-elected representative of the Palestinians in Gaza).

I continually hear both sides in effect saying, “Yeah, but those Palestinians did such-and-such,” or: “Those Israelis did such-and-such.” I have no doubt that most of these accusations are true.

What will solve the unsolvable problem? Both sides have to TALK. Jimmy Carter has shown unusual courage in trying to get people TALKING.

Fadel, I heard there’s a line forming to throw up on Sue Myrick. You’ll just have to wait your turn like the rest of us.

Rodney:  Hamas is not the “enemy.”  It is the duly elected representative of the Palestinians in Gaza.  The “enemy” is everyone who believes that might makes right, be they Israeli Zionists, Christian or Muslim fundamentalists.  Peace is the answer.

“Sue Myrick [of North Carolina] went so far as to call for the former president’s passport to be revoked on Fox News.”
==================================
When I first read these words coming from Sue Myrick, I was overcome with a strong feeling to through up. This bitch, daughter of bitch, must be the ultimate fascist one can ever imagine. This so-called representative from damned North Carolina, is a disgrace for any system of government, let alone a democracy.

I always thought that the problem with America was with crude, chauvinist and cowardly men playing the macho thing, but to hear this from a woman is extremely troubling. Now I know there are also women political whores.

What I feel at this moment is that if I ever meet this bitch, I will first spit in her face, then I will throw up all over her to let her know what I think of her.

Re: Re: NOT the Paris Hilton School of

“marshall, you are soooo smart!  where did you go to school?  i gotta know coz your posts blow me away!  your attention to detail and semantics is astounding!  did you get picked on a lot at school?”

My point was that the rules that apply to dialog between two sovereign countries do not apply to dialog between one sovereign country and a terrorist organization.

The only problem I have with Holland’s otherwise excellent article is the suggestion that the unscrupulous attacks on Carter have only come from right-wing Republicans.  Hillary Clinton was quick to denounce this vital effort and Barack Obama sought to distance himself as well.  It is a reflection of the undue influence of the combined forces of AIPAC and the Christian right on the American political process.

Fortunately, a group of Jewish progressives are seeking to change that.  On April 16 Democracy Now reported:

”...a group of prominent Jewish liberals have formed a new lobbying group and political action committee they hope will be a counterpoint to AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.  The new initiative will be called J Street.  Part of its mission will be to push for an Arab-Israeli peace settlement.  Democratic fundraiser Alan Solomont said, ‘We have heard the voices of neocons, and right-of-center Jewish leaders and Christian evangelicals, and the mainstream views of the American Jewish community have not been heard.’”

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/4/16/headlines

I am sure Holland’s piece, like all others that call into question the official Israeli line, will trigger a slew of anti-Arabic rants from the Zionist posters whose perceptions of all things Arab and Muslim have been so skewed by a process of racist dehumanization that they see a man of peace, like Carter, as their enemy.

For the rest of us, it is time to move past such virulent propaganda; to see that it is the Israeli occupation that is the source of the problem, and, considering the sensitivity of the subject, it is best that a progressive American Jewish group, like J Street, lead the way.

Cbsnews.com summarized Khaled Mashaal’s recent offer of implicit recognition of Israel as follows:

“Khaled Mashaal’s comments were one of the clearest outlines Hamas has given for what it would do if Israel withdrew from the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem, which it seized in 1967. He suggested Hamas would accept Israel’s existence alongside a Palestinian state on the rest of the lands Israel has held since 1948.”

Mashaal is mistaken if he thinks the Zionists will ever recognize a viable Palestinian state. Zionism is a unique, predatory theology/ideology based on racist supremacy and territorial expansion. Zionists, with a few exceptions, can’t be appeased or reasoned with. It’s simply against their religion.

While the past persecution of Jews should inspire compassion and solidarity in all of us, Zionist depredations in the ME should not. Fanatical religious sects like Zionism have a right not to assimilate with other cultures, but not a right to annihilate them.

Zionist theology, not Hamas intransigence, is the true deal-breaker.

Palistine.

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/mapstellstory.html

Actually, THIS has been not so much the ‘deal breaker’ but the deal PREVENTER..

“It’s an ideological construct that defies both common sense and the “best practices” that have been developed in the field of conflict resolution—best practices that were borne of hard experience. What Carter seems to understand, and his detractors appear unable to grasp, is that there is absolutely no chance of establishing and implementing a peace agreement between the Israelis and Palestinians without offering Hamas a seat at the negotiating table.”

Marshall…your constant repetition about a Hamas committment to the destruction of Israel is bullshit. Rhetorical bullshit.

Period.

Hamas is not a sovereign country.  There is no country of Palestine.  Your point fails.

“Any side that kills innocent people is guilty of terrorism,” he told an audience at Cairo’s American University after his sit-down with members of Hamas.”

What a brilliant comment.  Of course he failed to give any examples of military conflicts without innocent casualties, thereby rendering his statement meaningless since all sides in every conflict fit his definition of “terrorist”.

The prerequisite to any negotiation is that both sides acknowledge the other’s right to exist.  This isn’t a “concession”, as the article states, but a given.  Without this, there is no negotiation.  You can talk your way around this all you want, but it doesn’t make it go away.  Hamas is officially, and in writing, dedicated to the destruction of Israel.  I’m afraid that is a deal breaker.  Period.

And the author’s example of police legitimizing a “gun-toting lunatic who’s barricaded himself in a house” is, well, really lame.  The police’s goal is to arrest the guy and incarcerate him, not “negotiate” with him.  By equating the Palestinians with the gun-toting lunatic, the author unwittingly makes the case for subduing and prosecuting Hamas… hey, maybe we agree after all!

Holland’s otherwise excellent piece fails to state the obvious conclusion: Israel in fact, does not want peace, at least not until it’s colonial project is complete.

In the current situation, Zionists are getting all the carrots while the Palestinians are getting all the sticks. Why should Israel change it’s course? The voices of moderate Israelis, who might favor a return to pre ‘67 borders, are denounced as unpatriotic by the Israel’s fanatical Zionist element. That same element has convinced American leaders, by conflating Palestinians with muslim terrorists, that their fight is America’s fight.

Meanwhile, lobbyists effectively make it impossible for our politicians to speak out against these tactics. Taken as a whole, one could admire the efficiency of the Israeli machine—provided, of course, that one has absolutely no morals.

It is interesting that 30 years ago it was forbidden to speak with Yassir Arafat or the PLO because of a terroristic association.  Now, here we are 30 years later with Hamas and its leaders associated with terrorism.  I just love the way history repeats itself!

Yet another seemingly fool-proof plan, bit the dust, because of the intransigence of the Israeli and Palestinian sides of the conflict. The problem lies in the fact that neither side will appear to want to talk openly for fear of seeming weak and about to fold.  President Carter, has taken the initiative and has started to open up the dialogue between the hawks of Israel and the “terrorists” of the duly elected government of Palestine, Hamas.  The neo-conservative, ultra-right wing, Pro-Israeli Republicans have done nothing to further the cause of peace in the region, they have only backed themselves and the Israelis into a corner by stating that the parties to this conflict should not talk and are right to use force against the so-called terrorists of Hamas.  How in the world is there to be any movement towards a lasting and reasonable peace, if the Israelis and Palestinians will not talk to each other?  And with the interfering help of those Christian Zionists, who by backing Israel in this ongoing conflict, hope to further their own causes, lead Israel to believe that there is no other option than conflict, can we truly expect that peace will be an option in the region in the near future?  Yet, the pundits, on the conservative side of the spectrum, rail against the efforts and fair-mindedness of a man who will not take sides other than to get each of them to the table to begin the process of communication and resolution of the conflict. President Carter is to be commended for his efforts on behalf of peace in this troubled region of the world, but instead of laudatory comments on the efforts he is expending at his own expense, he is treated like a common criminal and lambasted by the neo-conservative press as a shill for terrorists and worse branded a person that is not deserving of respect, even though all the efforts of the current administrations of both Israel and America have done nothing to further the process of peace.  Come on, America, wake up and smell the manure of the neo-conservative line of bull%#^&, they are no more willing to talk than the “thinker” of Rodin can talk.

The last two paragraphs summarize the obvious situation in the Middle East: Both sides in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict believe that a military solution is possible. Hamas says so openly while Israel’s leadership pretends to pursue diplomacy while creating facts on the ground that openly negate its diplomatic pretense. Carter understands that in order for the killing to stop diplomacy has to be given a chance. His efforts are admirable but probably in vain. As every week brings new atrocities committed by Israelis and Palestinians the gulf between these nations widens, requiring much more than the admirable efforts of the world’s most admired ex-President to overcome.

If there were any question as to whether Carter’s meeting with Hamas (the duly elected leaders of Palestine, by the way), it is only necessary to look at who opposes the meeting: The NeoConZionistas, and their puppets in the Bush administration.

If one needs a roadmap to a fair and just peace, all that’s necessary is to do the opposite of what AIPAC, AEI, and the Israelis want.

It takes a lot of moral courage to stand up to the Israel lobby—ask Mearsheimer and Walt. It takes even more moral courage for a former president to stand up to the Lobby; after all, it’s so easy just to go along to get along. Jimmy Carter is now facing the full fury of the Lobby, with all their shills in the media, for having the audacity to SIT DOWN AND TALK with the other side. Given the shrillness of the attacks on him, you would think he just authorized an air raid on Tel Aviv.

I have often disagreed with Carter’s politics, but I have to admire his moral courage. It is such a rare quality among our top American “leaders.”