"Israel learned the lesson Carter never did: negotiating with terrorists breeds more terrorism"

Jimmy Carter: A Terrorist's Best Friend

By FrontPage Magazine
FrontPageMagazine.com August 2, 2006


The anti-Israeli bias in Jimmy Carter’s op-ed in yesterday’s Washington Post could not have been more evident if he had concluded, “Allahu akhbar!” Unlike Mel Gibson, Carter presumably wrote while sober, but his analysis and demonology barely differed for it.

The moral equivalence that led the worst president of the 20th century to decry our “inordinate fear of Communism” was on display from his first sentence, in which he took aim at “key players on all sides waiting for every opportunity to destroy their enemies.” The genocidal intent of Hezbollah, Hamas, and Iran is well known; he failed to indicate their opposite number in the Jewish State of Israel.



Carter indicates the cause of the most recent “cycle” of terrorism: the fact that Israel jails terrorists. “One of the special vulnerabilities of Israel, and a repetitive cause of violence, is the holding of prisoners,” he writes. Noting Hezbollah generously “offered to exchange the soldier” – the one they didn’t kill – “for the release of 95 women and 313 children…in Israeli prisons,” he huffs, “this time Israel rejected a swap and attacked Gaza in an attempt to free the soldier and stop rocket fire into Israel.”



He overlooks the fact that, in addition to women and children, Hezbollah demanded the release of a number of terrorists, including a monster named Samir Kuntar, a Palestine Liberation Front terrorist from Lebanon who smashed a four-year-old girl’s skull against a rock with his rifle butt after forcing her to witness her father’s execution. In the process, the girl’s mother, who watched helplessly from a crawlspace, suffocated her two-year-old daughter while covering her mouth to muffle her wails. Nasrallah has indicated Kuntar’s release is a prerequisite. It was to secure Kuntar’s release that the Front hijacked the Achille Lauro in 1985, pushing the wheelchair-bound American Leon Klinghoffer into the ocean for kicks.



Israel long rewarded such behavior by releasing convicted terrorists in exchange for a handful of Israeli soldiers…or their remains. Israel learned the lesson Carter never did: negotiating with terrorists breeds more terrorism.



Carter continues that while Israel has the “inarguable” right to defend itself, “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.” Israel has taken pains to avoid civilian casualties. Its opening response was to bomb an empty building, and it has warned civilians to flee from areas of attack – including Qana – losing tactical surprise in the process.



Although the 39th president believes it is “illogical” for the victims to properly identify their persecutors, this is exactly what is occurring.



The New York Times had to admit most Christians in southern Lebanon blamed Hezbollah for their devastation and accused the terrorists of killing villagers attempting to leave the war zone.
Saad Al-Hariri, chairman of the Lebanese Tayyar Al-Mustaqbal (“Current for the Future”) Party and son of murdered Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, said: “These adventurers [i.e. Hezbollah] have placed us in a difficult situation because of their irresponsibility, and in fact, the Saudi position [presented] the present situation as it really is...We demand a reckoning with these adventurers who embroiled Lebanon in a crisis it does not need."
Other Lebanese blame Hezbollah’s benefactor, Syria. Lebanese Druze leader Walid Jumblatt told reporters: “The Syrian regime is bearing a grudge [and saying to the Lebanese]: ‘You dared to rebel against [being] a [Syrian] protectorate, [so] this is our reaction. Our answer will be destruction.’”
Former Lebanese President Amine Gemayel stated, “Lebanon…is not willing to be the spearhead of the Arab-Israeli conflict.”
Lebanese Communications Minister Marwan Hamada told Al-Mustaqbal newspaper, “Syrian Vice President Faruq al-Shara gives the commands, Hezbollah carries them out, and Lebanon is the hostage.”
A Beirut-based poster on the Lebanese Forces bulletin board wrote that the Israelis were justified in their undertaking: “We had 1 year to disarm Hizbollah. The Lebanese people couldn't do it…So now the free world is going to do it for us, backed by the UN and the Arab world. The cost will be heavy on Lebanon for sure, but there's no other way.”
Carter lies on. “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.”



On the contrary:



Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Jordan’s King Abdullah together condemned Hezbollah’s “adventurism that does not serve Arab interests.” and called on Lebanon "to establish its authority over all of Lebanese territory."
Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal blasted the terrorists’ “unexpected, inappropriate and irresponsible acts” before a meeting of the Arab League, adding, “we cannot simply accept them.”
Saudi Sheikh Al-Muhsin Al-‘Obikan wrote in the London daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat: “The capturing of the two Jewish soldiers - which [Hezbollah] thought of as gain - has [actually] led to disaster and to obvious loss. What [we] got in exchange [for the capture] of the Jews [was this]: One of our countries has been entirely destroyed; there have been severe damage to [its] infrastructure, expulsion and starvation of its inhabitants, the killing of many of [its inhabitants], the weakening of the strength of the Muslims, the breaking of their unified position, and division in their ranks.”
Wahhabist Abdullah bin Jabreen, who helped the Saudi government determine when to issue fatwas, announced “The Shari’a position on what is going on” as follows: it is sinful to help, aid, or pray for Hezbollah. “Our advice to the Sunnis is to denounce them and shun those who join them to show their hostility to Islam and to the Muslims.”
Ahmed Al-Jarallah, editor-in-chief of Kuwait's Arab Times wrote, “The operations of Israel in Gaza and Lebanon are in the interest of people of Arab countries and the international community.”
The former president’s blood libel rolls on: “Israel belatedly announced, but did not carry out, a two-day cessation in bombing Lebanon, responding to the global condemnation of an air attack on the Lebanese village of Qana, where 57 civilians were killed this past weekend and where 106 died from the same cause 10 years ago.” It appears, through the work of Robert Spencer in today’s lead story, that the Qana “massacre” was stage managed by Hezbollah; at a minimum, it is open to reasonable doubt.



Finally, Jimmy Carter proposes his solution:



The urgent need in Lebanon is that Israeli attacks stop, the nation's [Lebanon’s] regular military forces control the southern region, Hezbollah cease as a separate fighting force, and future attacks against Israel be prevented. Israel should withdraw from all Lebanese territory, including Shebaa Farms, and release the Lebanese prisoners.



The sentence bears as much resemblance to reality as its slurred run-on sentences do to English (another similarity to Gibson’s drunken tirade). The United Nations considers Shebaa Farms not Lebanese territory but Syrian; thus, the UN certified Israeli withdrawal from all of occupied Lebanon. The number of Lebanese nationals remaining in Israeli jails is between two and four, all terrorists in the mold of Samir Kuntar. Why should they be released instead of, perhaps, executed?



His ceasefire plan would allow Hezbollah to survive infinitely. Lebanon’s army, deeply infiltrated by the terrorists’ Syrian confederates, is weaker than Hezbollah and cannot independently assert control over the south, a necessary condition if future attacks are to “be prevented.”



The champion of Kim il-Sung’s interests warns this ceasefire would be but a “band-aid” to the real problem in the Middle East: Israel and the United States.



“Palestinians,” he whimpers, are “surrounded by a provocative ‘security barrier’ that…fails to bring safety or stability.” Since construction of the security fence, terrorist attacks are down sharply, declining by 90 percent according to some estimates.



“There will be no substantive and permanent peace for any peoples in this troubled region as long as Israel is violating key UN resolutions…by occupying Arab lands and oppressing the Palestinians.” Somehow in Jimmy’s schema, Israeli “oppression” of innocent Arabs – by allowing them suffrage and representation in Knesset – displaced the Palestinian penchant for strapping munitions to preteen shahids and telling them to hug Jewish children as a threat to lasting peace.



He resolves, “Except for mutually agreeable negotiated modifications, Israel's official pre-1967 borders must be honored.” This has long been Israel’s goal: to negotiate for defensible borders approximating those of pre-1967 in return for elusive peace treaties. The Arab Street has shown no interest in the talks, and the Muslim nations would never grant the al-Naqbah defensible boundaries. Ceding the Golan Heights to Syria would mean the resumption of daily bombardments from the north, Haifa everyday. One of Carter’s (many) superior Democratic predecessors, LBJ, acknowledged, “a return to the situation of June 4, 1967, will not bring peace.” The settlements cannot be the cause of war, if the Arab nations attacked before they existed.



In any event, UN Resolution 242 requires no such thing: international law recognizes Israel’s right to keep any land gained in a defensive war, including all of Sinai had it so chosen.



Carter then adds the final villain: he has met the enemy, and it is us. He writes, “A major impediment to progress is Washington's strange policy that dialogue on controversial issues will be extended only as a reward for subservient behavior and will be withheld from those who reject U.S. assertions.” In his view, and that of the Left he represents, Americans are imperialists imposing their will upon innocent brown people who would otherwise frolic amid their liberated olive groves contemplating the beauties of Islamic doctrine. The sooner we (and the Little Satan, Israel) begin rewarding terrorists, the sooner this event can come to be.



How long until Jimmy Carter’s plan produces peace? At least 444 days.
[Jimmy carter]
[Israel]
[Hezbollah]
[terrorism]