Jimmy Carter, IP Thief

[Corlyss_D]

Jimmy Carter Fires Back at Longtime Aide Over Book

Friday , December 08, 2006

By Melissa Drosjack

WASHINGTON — Former President Jimmy Carter faced new criticism Friday over his controversial book on Palestinian lands when a former Middle East diplomat accused him of improperly publishing maps that did not belong to him.

The new charge came as Carter attempted to counter charges from a former top aide that the book manipulates facts to distort history.

Ambassador Dennis Ross, a former Mideast envoy and FOX News foreign affairs analyst, claims maps commissioned and published by him were improperly republished in Carter's book.

"I think there should be a correction and an attribution," Ross said. "These were maps that never existed, I created them."

After Ross saw the maps in Carter's book, he told his publisher he wanted a correction.

When asked if the former president ripped him off, Ross replied: “it sure looks that way.”

Carter's book, "Palestine: Peace, Not Apartheid," was released last week.

"A former Carter Center fellow has taken issue with it, and Alan Dershowitz called the book's title 'indecent.' Out in the real world, however, the response has been overwhelmingly positive," Carter wrote in a Los Angeles Times op-ed piece published in Friday's edition.

Click here to read Carter's op-ed published in the LA Times.

Carter disputed alleged "lies" and "distortions" against content in his book.

"With some degree of reluctance and some uncertainty about the reception my book would receive, I used maps, text and documents to describe the situation accurately and to analyze the only possible path to peace: Israelis and Palestinians living side by side within their own internationally recognized boundaries," he wrote.

Kenneth Stein, director of the Institute for the Study of Modern Israel, resigned Tuesday as Middle East Fellow of the Carter Center of Emory University, stating in his resignation letter that "President Carter's book on the Middle East, a title too inflammatory to even print, is not based on unvarnished analyses; it is replete with factual errors, copied materials not cited, superficialities, glaring omissions, and simply invented segments."

"The purpose of the book should be to try to bring people together, to try and reconcile them. He published in the LA Times because his book tour is going in that direction," Stein said. "I'm a historian, I believe in the integrity of my profession, I believe that things should be written accurately, even if you disagree with them."

Carter is scheduled to sign books at Vroman's in Pasadena, Calif., on Friday.

"I wouldn't have chosen the words I chose on my resignation letter if I hadn't read the book really closely and hadn't been reasonable familiar for a lifetime with the details associated with the conflict," Stein said.

Click here to read Dr. Kenneth W. Stein's letter.

"I just want to be sure that when people write history, people don't do it for purpose of special pleading," Stein told FOXNews.com on Thursday. "They write it the way it was. They don't try to shape a person's opinion and slide them down a path in order to come to an inevitable conclusion."

Stein leaves the center after serving as its first executive director and founder of its Middle East program.

Carter issued a statement in response to Stein's letter noting that Stein hasn't been directly involved with the center in more than 12 years and did not address specific allegations by Stein.

"If Ken has read my latest book he knows that, as the book's title makes clear, "Palestine Peace Not Apartheid" is devoted to circumstances and events in Palestine and not in Israel, where democracy prevails and citizens live together and are legally guaranteed equal status," according to a statement by Carter released by Deanna Congileo, Carter's spokeswoman.

Stein hasn't talked directly with Carter, but has been contacted through third parties.

"Ken is one of the finest teachers I have ever known, and has been of great help during the early years of our center, as an advisor to me on Middle East affairs, and as a personal friend. I thank him for this, and wish him well," Carter said.

Stein alleged an inaccuracy on page 131 in the book of a 1990 White House meeting where Carter cites that Washington was mostly preoccupied with the Iraq/Kuwait conflict. Stein said that was in 1980, not 1990.

"He makes it appear that the reasons people didn't pay attention to what he was saying was because of the invasion," Stein said. "How was that possible? I was there."

"Carter can disagree with me. I don't think if you're president of the United States you have a specific privilege to overstate," he added.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center, an international Jewish human rights group based in Los Angeles, has received more than 16,000 signatures to an online petition to "act now against President Carter's one-sided bias against Israel."

Click here to read the petition.

Rabbi Marvin Hier, dean and founder of the center, who read the book, said people in the Jewish community are outraged at Carter's book.

"I think the point of the book is to be hostile to Israel," Hier said. "I think he deliberately did it."

Hier said the book sides with the Palestinian cause and blames Israel for troubles in the Middle East.

"The reason he wrote this book is because he has become a spokesman for the Palestinian cause," Hier said. "Having read the book, I can tell you these are not the words of a person who is objective, who is trying to see a way out of this. He has come down 100 percent on the Palestinian side."

As for more specifics on questions to the book, Stein hinted at offering more details on factual errors and challenges to Carter's book in his letter.

"In due course, I shall detail these points and reflect on their origins," according to his letter.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,235422,00.html
****************************************************************

Isn't there a reservation we can put him on? Some place padded? You know, to save him from his excruciatingly embarrassing naivete?

[living_stradivarius]

Now I'm going to have to read his book

[Barry]

He and Koffi Annan should be stranded together on a remote island for the rest of their lives. They can spend their remaining days negotiating over who gets which coconut to eat.

[Gregory Kleyn]

He and Koffi Annan should be stranded together on a remote island for the rest of their lives. They can spend their remaining days negotiating over who gets which coconut to eat.

That island may soon be the only peaceful place on the entire planet unless we learn to elect leaders with some deftness and sagacity (not to mention integrity) in responding to and managing threats and conflict.

[Werner]

I agree with Gregory.

AND Corlyss hits the nail on the head with Carter's "Excruciatingly Embarrassing Naivete."

[living_stradivarius]

The source of the map is still being disputed and it is definitely possible Carter derived his map from a source that effectively drew from Ross' map.
As for the one specific example Stein cites, I don't see how the "mistaken" date (if he is right) is an indication of anything more than a simple mistake or plain senility. Accusations of "lies" and "distortions" in the book are overblown barring better examples of possible incidences in the book.

[pizza]

Carter's Distorted World
by Alan M. Dershowitz

Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid is so biased that it inevitably raises the question of what would motivate Jimmy Carter to write such an indecent book.

Sometimes you really can tell a book by its cover. President Jimmy Carter's decision to title his new anti-Israel screed "Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid" (Simon & Schuster, 288 pages, $27) tells it all. His use of the loaded word "apartheid," suggesting an analogy to the hated policies of South Africa, is especially outrageous, considering his acknowledgment buried near the end of his shallow and superficial book that what is going on in Israel today "is unlike that in South Africa -- not racism, but the acquisition of land." Nor does he explain that Israel's motivation for holding on to land it captured in a defensive war is the prevention of terrorism. Israel has tried, on several occasions, to exchange land for peace, and what it got instead was terrorism, rockets, and kidnappings launched from the returned land.

In fact, Palestinian-Arab terrorism is virtually missing from Mr. Carter's entire historical account, which blames nearly everything on Israel and almost nothing on the Palestinians. Incredibly, he asserts that the initial violence in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict occurred when "Jewish militants" attacked Arabs in 1939. The long history of Palestinian terrorism against Jews -- which began in 1929, when the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem ordered the slaughter of more than 100 rabbis, students, and non-Zionist Sephardim whose families had lived in Hebron and other ancient Jewish cities for millennia -- was motivated by religious bigotry. The Jews responded to this racist violence by establishing a defense force. There is no mention of the long history of Palestinian terrorism before the occupation, or of the Munich massacre and others inspired by Yasser Arafat. There is not even a reference to the Karine A, the boatful of terrorist weapons ordered by Arafat in January 2002.

Mr. Carter's book is so filled with simple mistakes of fact and deliberate omissions that were it a brief filed in a court of law, it would be struck and its author sanctioned for misleading the court. Mr. Carter too is guilty of misleading the court of public opinion. A mere listing of all of Mr. Carter's mistakes and omissions would fill a volume the size of his book. Here are just a few of the most egregious:

Mr. Carter emphasizes that "Christian and Muslim Arabs had continued to live in this same land since Roman times," but he ignores the fact that Jews have lived in Hebron, Tzfat, Jerusalem, and other cities for even longer. Nor does he discuss the expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Jews from Arab countries since 1948.

Mr. Carter repeatedly claims that the Palestinian Arabs have long supported a two-state solution and the Israelis have always opposed it. Yet he makes no mention of the fact that in 1938 the Peel Commission proposed a two-state solution, with Israel receiving a mere sliver of its ancient homeland and the Palestinians receiving the bulk of the land. The Jews accepted and the Palestinians rejected this proposal because Arab leaders cared more about there being no Jewish state on Muslim holy land than about having a Palestinian state of their own.

He barely mentions Israel's acceptance, and the Palestinian rejection, of the United Nation's division of the mandate in 1948.

He claims that in 1967 Israel launched a preemptive attack against Jordan. The fact is that Jordan attacked Israel first, Israel tried desperately to persuade Jordan to remain out of the war, and Israel counterattacked after the Jordanian army surrounded Jerusalem, firing missiles into the center of the city. Only then did Israel capture the West Bank, which it was willing to return in exchange for peace and recognition from Jordan.

Mr. Carter repeatedly mentions Security Council Resolution 242, which called for return of captured territories in exchange for peace, recognition, and secure boundaries, but he ignores that Israel accepted and all the Arab nations and the Palestinians rejected this resolution. The Arabs met in Khartum and issued their three famous "no's": "No peace, no recognition, no negotiation." But you wouldn't know that from reading the history according to Mr. Carter.

Mr. Carter faults Israel for its "air strike that destroyed an Iraqi nuclear reactor" without mentioning that Iraq had threatened to attack Israel with nuclear weapons if Iraq succeeded in building a bomb.

Mr. Carter faults Israel for its administration of Christian and Muslim religious sites, when in fact Israel is scrupulous about ensuring those of every religion the right to worship as they please -- consistent, of course, with security needs. He fails to mention that between 1948 and 1967, when Jordan occupied the West Bank and East Jerusalem, the Hashemites destroyed and desecrated Jewish religious sites and prevented Jews from praying at the Western Wall. He also never mentions Egypt's brutal occupation of Gaza between 1949 and 1967.

Mr. Carter blames Israel, and exonerates Arafat, for the Palestinian refusal to accept statehood on 95% of the West Bank and all of Gaza pursuant to the Clinton-Barak offers at Camp David and Taba in 2000-2001. He accepts the Palestinian revisionist history, rejects the eyewitness accounts of President Clinton and Dennis Ross, and ignores Saudi Prince Bandar's accusation that Arafat's rejection of the proposal was "a crime" and that Arafat's account "was not truthful" -- except, apparently, to Mr. Carter. The fact that Mr. Carter chooses to believe Arafat over Mr. Clinton speaks volumes.

Mr. Carter's description of the recent Lebanon war is misleading. He begins by asserting that Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers. "Captured" suggests a military apprehension subject to the usual prisoner of war status. The soldiers were kidnapped, and have not been heard from -- not even a sign of life. The rocket attacks that preceded Israel's invasion are largely ignored, as is the fact that Hezbollah fired its rockets from civilian population centers.

Mr. Carter gives virtually no credit to Israel's superb legal system, falsely asserting (without any citation) that "confessions extracted through torture are admissible in Israeli courts," that prisoners are "executed," and that the "accusers" act "as judges." Even Israel's most severe critics acknowledge the fairness of the Israeli Supreme Court, but not Mr. Carter.

Mr. Carter even blames Israel for the "exodus of Christians from the Holy Land," totally ignoring the Islamization of the area by Hamas and the comparable exodus of Christian Arabs from Lebanon as a result of the increasing influence of Hezbollah and the repeated assassination of Christian leaders by Syria.

Mr. Carter also blames every American administration but his own for the Mideast stalemate with particular emphasis on "a submissive White House and U.S. Congress in recent years." He employs hyperbole and overstatement when he says that "dialogue on controversial issues is a privilege to be extended only as a reward for subservient behavior and withheld from those who reject U.S. demands." He confuses terrorist states, such as Iran and Syria, to which we do not extend dialogue, with states with whom we strongly disagree, such as France and China, but with whom we have constant dialogue.

And it's not just the facts; it's the tone as well. It's obvious that Mr. Carter just doesn't like Israel or Israelis. He lectured Golda Meir on Israeli's "secular" nature, warning her that "Israel was punished whenever its leaders turned away from devout worship of God." He admits that he did not like Menachem Begin. He has little good to say about any Israelis -- except those few who agree with him. But he apparently got along swimmingly with the very secular Syrian mass-murderer Hafez al-Assad. Mr. Carter and his wife Rosalynn also had a fine time with the equally secular Arafat -- a man who has the blood of hundreds of Americans and Israelis on his hands:

Rosalynn and I met with Yasir Arafat in Gaza City, where he was staying with his wife, Suha, and their little daughter. The baby, dressed in a beautiful pink suit, came readily to sit on my lap, where I practiced the same wiles that had been successful with our children and grandchildren. A lot of photographs were taken, and then the photographers asked that Arafat hold his daughter for a while. When he took her, the child screamed loudly and reached out her hands to me, bringing jovial admonitions to the presidential candidate to stay at home enough to become acquainted with is own child.
There is something quite disturbing about these pictures.

"Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid" 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.

This article originally appeared in the NY Sun.

Author Biography:
Alan M. Dershowitz is the Felix Frankfurter professor of law at Harvard Law School and author of The Case for Israel.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Re ... p?ID=25653

[Werner]

The New York Sun? Looking over it quickly, it sems to me exactly the piece I saw in the New York Times Book Review.

Let's give credit where credit is due!

[pizza]

The New York Sun? Looking over it quickly, it sems to me exactly the piece I saw in the New York Times Book Review.

Let's give credit where credit is due!

OK!

http://www.nysun.com/article/43958

[burnitdown]

It seems to me that we miss the point on this thread, which is that every population needs its own space and culture. Carter is embarrassingly naieve, like most of his political bent, but I sense that stating the obvious - that each population needs its own nation, and they won't get along or agree on basic values - is taboo in the West at this time.

Although this is changing.

[Donald Isler]

Saw Jay Leno interview Carter last night. Good ol' Jimmy was amiable as ever, said he only wants peace for Israel, and that it's a terrible thing to be accused of being anti-Semitic. Unfortunately he's not very good when it comes to dealing with facts.

Leno said "Isn't it true that when Israel gives up land it just brings them a lot closer to some really unfriendly people?"

Carter responded (these are not his exact words, but the gist of what he said) "Not really. Well, they gave up part of Gaza, and after the Palestinians took an Israeli soldier they attacked Gaza, whereas the Palestinians just wanted to make a deal to get back hundreds of prisoners for that soldier."

He never explained why it was ok for them to take that Israeli soldier.

Moreover, Israel gave up ALL of Gaza, and almost every single day since then Palestinians have sent rockets into the neighboring Israeli town of Sderot, causing damage, wounds, and occasionally death.

Oh yes, and he never mentioned Palestinian terrorism. Guess it's not a problem for him.

[burnitdown]

Leno said "Isn't it true that when Israel gives up land it just brings them a lot closer to some really unfriendly people?"

Carter responded (these are not his exact words, but the gist of what he said) "Not really. Well, they gave up part of Gaza, and after the Palestinians took an Israeli soldier they attacked Gaza, whereas the Palestinians just wanted to make a deal to get back hundreds of prisoners for that soldier."

I don't understand why American liberals defend pluralism in Israel. Can't they see the future of the Jewish people is threatened? Sure, so Zionism is Nationalism - big deal. The Israeli people democratically elected a far-right nationalist in part because of the continued failure of trying to make two states into one.

While I'd like to like Carter, I wonder where his head is at, y'know.

[pizza]

Leno said "Isn't it true that when Israel gives up land it just brings them a lot closer to some really unfriendly people?"

Carter responded (these are not his exact words, but the gist of what he said) "Not really. Well, they gave up part of Gaza, and after the Palestinians took an Israeli soldier they attacked Gaza, whereas the Palestinians just wanted to make a deal to get back hundreds of prisoners for that soldier."

I don't understand why American liberals defend pluralism in Israel. Can't they see the future of the Jewish people is threatened? Sure, so Zionism is Nationalism - big deal. The Israeli people democratically elected a far-right nationalist in part because of the continued failure of trying to make two states into one.

While I'd like to like Carter, I wonder where his head is at, y'know.

American liberals have little if any interest in the future of the Jewish people as Jews. They haven't outgrown their '60s thinking and probably never will; pluralism is their societal template and they apply it to every situation regardless of consequences.

For that matter, the average Israeli leftist doesn't give a hoot about Jewish identity either. Many haven't the vaguest notion why they live where they do and couldn't care less about the country's ethnic or religious character. And if Olmert and those like him personify far right nationalism, Israel's future as a Jewish State is in serious trouble.

[living_stradivarius]

Pluralism just can't work in a society where people are actively opposed to its values.

[dulcinea]

Francisco de Quevedo y Villegas said of the very weak and very inept King Philip III that, when he died, people spoke with more sorrow of his life than of his death. Pundits and obituary writers will speak of Jimmy the Crater in identical vein. If he had never gotten elected, he might possibly have been included in that impressive group of statesmen of whom historians say that they undoubtedly would have made very fine Presidents if only they had been elected. Unfortunately for his reputation and the country's honor, he actually won the election of 1976--or, rather, Gerald Ford lost it. WHO GIVES A D--- HOW GOOD AN EX-PRESIDENT YOU MAY BE?! BEING A GOOD PRESIDENT IS WHAT REALLY COUNTS!

[anasazi]

I'll have to read the book also now. It's difficult for me to believe a lot of the accredited stories. I can't forget that as President, Carter was quite instrumental in getting Israel and Egypt together. A peace that sill holds. And I really can't think of any public figure since then who has done just that much for middle-east peace.

Books, schmooks. It's results that matter. A rose by any other name!!!And I do need to read reviews from other than such biased news networks as FOX before I even think otherwise.

I don't suppose I care much for some of the people Carter has had to deal with either. But isn't that always the case when one is trying to negotiate a peace?

You do actually have to talk to the other side, what ever the other side is, to negotiate anything. If you are offended by having to talk to the likes of Hassad, Begin, Hussein, etc., then the alternative is what we are doing at the moment in Iraq.

[pizza]

I'll have to read the book also now. It's difficult for me to believe a lot of the accredited stories. I can't forget that as President, Carter was quite instrumental in getting Israel and Egypt together. A peace that sill holds. And I really can't think of any public figure since then who has done just that much for middle-east peace.

Books, schmooks. It's results that matter.

Carter, schmarter. The results were assured before he (literally) stepped into the picture. Begin and Sadat had come to terms privately and had worked out all the important details between them. Carter hadn't a clue concerning the sticking points. That's common knowledge among those who were involved. The Washington handshakes were strictly for public consumption.

[Werner]

I'm with you, Pizza, on the "Carter, schmarter" thing. But what you say here is news to me, and I don't remember ever hearing that Begin and Sadat had an agreement before the Camp David meeting. If that's so, why did all this expensive talent have to waste ten days up there?

I'll listen to any new information, but, pending that, I still give Carter credit for the Camp David accords - if little else.

[anasazi]

I'll have to read the book also now. It's difficult for me to believe a lot of the accredited stories. I can't forget that as President, Carter was quite instrumental in getting Israel and Egypt together. A peace that sill holds. And I really can't think of any public figure since then who has done just that much for middle-east peace.

Books, schmooks. It's results that matter.

Carter, schmarter. The results were assured before he (literally) stepped into the picture. Begin and Sadat had come to terms privately and had worked out all the important details between them. Carter hadn't a clue concerning the sticking points. That's common knowledge among those who were involved. The Washington handshakes were strictly for public consumption.

Do you have a source you can quote for this information?

[pizza]

I'll have to read the book also now. It's difficult for me to believe a lot of the accredited stories. I can't forget that as President, Carter was quite instrumental in getting Israel and Egypt together. A peace that sill holds. And I really can't think of any public figure since then who has done just that much for middle-east peace.

Books, schmooks. It's results that matter.

Carter, schmarter. The results were assured before he (literally) stepped into the picture. Begin and Sadat had come to terms privately and had worked out all the important details between them. Carter hadn't a clue concerning the sticking points. That's common knowledge among those who were involved. The Washington handshakes were strictly for public consumption.

Do you have a source you can quote for this information?

It required a year and several months after Sadat's visit to Jerusalem for the peace treaty to be developed and agreed upon. The treaty contains about a dozen articles, a military protocol, a protocol dealing with the relationship between the parties, minutes interpreting the main articles of the treaty, the withdrawal from Sinai schedule, and the protocols for the exchange of ambassadors and security arrangements. The work was done at the professional diplomatic level between the two countries. It required a great deal of time and effort, and the deal almost fell through several times. When it was finally finished, both Egypt and Israel sent a joint letter to Carter indicating it was a done deal. That much information is a matter of public record and I'm sure anyone interested can find it without much difficulty.

[pizza]

I'm with you, Pizza, on the "Carter, schmarter" thing. But what you say here is news to me, and I don't remember ever hearing that Begin and Sadat had an agreement before the Camp David meeting. If that's so, why did all this expensive talent have to waste ten days up there?

I'll listen to any new information, but, pending that, I still give Carter credit for the Camp David accords - if little else.

It's not really "new information". As I mentioned before, there was a ton of work done at the professional diplomatic level long before the media glitz.

It's probably not well-known but at the last minute, Sadat threatened to walk away from the deal if Israel didn't agree to dismantle the settlements in Judea and Samaria. This may have occurred at Carter's initiative, or at least with his connivance -- hard to prove but knowing what is now known about him, quite possible if not probable. Carter spent most of the time at Camp David trying to convince Begin to withdraw from the territories. Begin adamantly refused. When negotiations on this issue appeared to be at an impasse, Sadat relented and the deal was announced. Begin's memoirs contain some oblique references to the issue, but for obvious reasons, he was careful to praise Carter's efforts.