I

World

Meeting The Enemy

Carter sounds upbeat note, but players see no progress.

Roy Eitan

Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Jerusalem

immy Carter is sounding a posi-
tive note about his meetings with
Israel's enemies, but few of the
major players in the region seem to share
the view that the former U.S. president
achieved any significant progress.
Though boycotted by both the Israeli
and U.S. governments, Carter was upbeat
on April 21 when addressing a packed
Jerusalem audience about the results of
his private shuttle talks with Hamas and
Syrian leaders.
"There's no question that both the Arab
world and Hamas would accept Israel's
right to live in peace within the 1967 bor-
ders:' Carter said.
"We believe that the problem is not that
I met with Hamas in Syria. The problem
is that Israel and the United States refuse
to meet with these people who must be
involved."
According to Carter, Hamas' supreme
leader, Khaled Meshaal, said his group
would accept a peace deal signed between
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud

Abbas and Israel as
long as it were put
to a referendum.
But such a plebiscite
would require partic-
ipation by millions of
Palestinians abroad,
including radicalized
refugees who long
have refused to give
up their "right of
return" to land now
in Israel — a non-
starter for the Jewish Jimmy Carter
state.
Meshaal, moreover, made clear in a
news conference after Carter's address that
Hamas would not recognize Israel even
if a Palestinian state were founded in the
West Bank and Gaza Strip.
A spokesman for Israeli Prime
Minister Ehud Olmert, who had declined
to meet Carter for fear of being seen
as negotiating with Hamas, said that
Jerusalem "sees no change in Hamas'
extremist positions!'
Even Mahmoud Abbas, despite the nod
to his authority from the same Hamas
Islamists who wrested control of Gaza
from his Fatah movement last June,

dismissed the idea that
Carter's trip had been
effective.
"Carter gave them the
right advice Abbas told
reporters en route to the
United States.
"He urged Hamas to
accept a two-state solu-
tion and accept past
Palestinian agreements
with Israel but, unfortu-
nately, he failed to con-
vince them and his visit
did not end up with posi-

tive results!"
Carter likely would disagree — if only
because his mission got a rise out of a
Bush administration whose Middle East
policies he has regularly lambasted.
"The United States is not going to
deal with Hamas, and we certainly told
President Carter that we did not think
that meeting with Hamas was going to
help the Palestinians:' Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice said on April 22. "We
wanted to make sure there would be no
confusion and there would be no sense
that Hamas was somehow a party to peace
negotiations which Abu Mazen [Mahmoud

Abbas] has undertaken with the Israeli
prime minister!"
Carter may be able to claim some suc-
cesses, however. While Hamas refused
to budge on its demand for hundreds of
jailed Palestinian terrorists to be freed in
exchange for Gilad Shalit, an Israeli soldier
being held hostage in Gaza, Meshaal did
agree to pass on a letter from the captive
Israeli.
On the issue of a cease-fire, Carter
proposed to Hamas that as a sign of good
will, it unilaterally stop rocket launches
from Gaza into Israel for a trial period.
"I told them, 'Don't wait for recipro-
cation; just do it unilaterally. This will
bring a lot of credit to you around the
world, doing a humane thing' They
turned me down. I think they're wrong,"
he said.
But Hamas signaled on April 22 that,
contrary to its previous insistence on any
cease-fire being applied reciprocally and
comprehensively in both the West Bank
and Gaza, it could settle for a Gaza truce
at first.
That might suit Israel, which wants to
deal with Hamas separately from Abbas,
whose Palestinian Authority controls only
the West Bank.

House Candidates Rap Carter

U.S. Rep. Joe
Knollenberg, R-
Bloomfield Hills, has
introduced a bill that
would prevent the
federal government
from giving taxpayer
money to the Carter
Joe
Center, headed by
Knollenberg
former President
Jimmy Carter. The center has received
at least $19 million in federal taxpayer
money since 2001.
The Michigan Republican acted
after Carter announced his intention
to meet with a leader of Hamas, a
Palestinian political/military network
deemed a terrorist organization by
the U.S. State Department as well as
Presidents Clinton and Bush.

Knollenberg hopes to send a clear
message to Carter to end freelance
diplomacy.
"America must speak with one voice
against our terrorist enemies," said
Knollenberg. "It sends a fundamentally
troubling message when an American
dignitary is engaged in dialogue with
terrorists. My legislation would make
sure that taxpayer dollars are not
being used to support discussions or
negotiations with terrorist groups."
House Resolution 5816, formally
the Coordinated American Response
to Extreme Radicals Act (CARTER
Act), was introduced two weeks ago.
Knollenberg is seeking cosponsors.
In an April 9 letter to Carter,
Knollenberg wrote: "As a former
president of the United States, you

undoubtedly understand that the
United States must speak with one
voice to our enemies. I hope and pray
that we all, as Americans, stand in
strong opposition to acts of terror and
the terrorist groups that coordinate
and fund them."
Knollenberg, first elected to
Congress representing the Ninth
District in 1992, is a senior mem-
ber of the House Appropriations
Committee. He is seeking re-election
this November.
Former Michigan Lottery commis-
sioner and State Sen. Gary Peters,
based in Bloomfield Hills, is seeking
the Democratic nomination to run
against Knollenberg. He also criticized
Carter.
"Hamas is a terrorist organization

and until it renounces
violence and recog-
nizes Israel's right to
exist, any meetings
between Hamas and
Americans are repre-
hensible and extreme-
ly counterproductive,"
Gary Peters
Peters said.
As a lieutenant
commander and a Seabee combat
warfare specialist in the Navy Reserve,
Peters traveled to the Middle East,
including Israel. His reserve duty
included time in the Persian Gulf sup-
porting Operation Southern Watch.
"My experience reinforced my belief
that a strong, vibrant and democratic
Israel is vital to American national
security interests," Peters said. ❑

May1- 2008

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