He won't go away

Matthew Hoy
By Matthew Hoy on December 9, 2006

Jimmy Carter won't do the world a favor and shut his trap. He had an op-ed in Friday's Los Angeles Times and John Hinderaker does an excellent job of fisking it.

He retails the same myth that John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt peddle: you can't have an honest discussion of the Middle East here in the United States because the Jewish Lobby is too strong. Carter writes:

For the last 30 years, I have witnessed and experienced the severe restraints on any free and balanced discussion of the facts. This reluctance to criticize any policies of the Israeli government is because of the extraordinary lobbying efforts of the American-Israel Political Action Committee and the absence of any significant contrary voices.

Thus, Carter postures himself as the lone, courageous voice of truth on this issue (although, actually, doesn't it seem that there are an awful lot of lone, courageous voices attacking Israel these days?). He implies that criticisms of his book are just another reflection of the power of the Jewish Lobby:

Book reviews in the mainstream media have been written mostly by representatives of Jewish organizations....

The problem with Carter's writing on the Middle East, though, isn't that it has run afoul of some nefarious lobby. The problem is that it is so bizarrely out of touch with reality that it is hard to interpret except as a manifestation of some kind of animus. Carter writes:

The book describes the abominable oppression and persecution in the occupied Palestinian territories, with a rigid system of required passes and strict segregation between Palestine's citizens and Jewish settlers in the West Bank.

Note that just a few paragraphs earlier, Carter called for "a balanced position between Israel and Palestine." Is this what he meant by "balanced?"

The obvious reason that Israelis "segregate" themselves from Palestinians is not because they consider themselves racially superior or because they have some deep-seated disgust for Palestinians. They "segregate" themselves because Palestinians have a nasty habit of exploding!

This man is a fool whose continued public statements may eventually result in Democrats losing the Jewish vote.

0 comments on “He won't go away”

  1. This man is a fool whose continued public statements may eventually result in Democrats losing the Jewish vote.

    Sorry to say this, but Jews vote Dem no matter how many foul anti-Semites are in their party. You would think after the names and anti-Semitic invective thrown at Joe Lieberman the past couple of years, Jews would almost to a man refuse to vote for Dems until they cleaned house. After all, Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton both ran for President as Dems, and Jews continued to vote. Imagine if anti-Semites ran in the Republican primaries, for President.

    Jews ranks with blacks in voting for Dems no matter what. Crooked black? Blacks vote for them. A black who is a racist, a criminal? Blacks continue to vote for them.

    Jews are the same, except they vote for the party which would sell Israel out to the Palestinians in a heartbeat.

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