Spotlight
Living in a divided country
JOSE M. KOCHUPARAMPIL
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Jimmy Carter's book on Israel evokes personal attacks rather than debate from the American Jewish community.
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PHOTO: AP
WRITING SIMPLE TRUTHS: Jimmy Carter
IS Jimmy Carter, the 39th President of the United States, "a liar, a bigot, an anti-Semite, a coward and a plagiarist?" According to Carter, in a speech in late January at Brandeis University in Massachusetts, these were some of the names he was called in the wake of the release of his latest book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid.
Since the book's November 2006 release, it is fifth on The New York Times bestseller list for non-fiction and seventh on Amazon. Despite its unprecedented popularity, the criticism of Carter reached a point where the former President, who negotiated the Camp David Accords between Egypt and Israel in 1978, was branded anti-Semitic.
Factual or prejudiced?
It is the first time that a former U.S. President has come out to tell the world about Israel's treatment of Palestinians. While those who agree with Carter see the book as a factual and realistic exposition of the problems in West Asia, critics say Carter is biased and his book is thinly researched and anti-Semitic, full of errors and misstatements.
As a fallout of the book's truth revealing mission, the internationally known Carter Centre lost its Middle East fellow, an American Jew, Kenneth W. Stein, who resigned in protest in December. Adding to this in January this year, 15 Jewish members of the Centre's Board of Councillors that has a total of over 200, quit en masse.
All these and the barrage of ongoing criticisms attacking the integrity and craftsmanship of Carter affected him so much that for the first time he said at his Brandeis address that he was hurt by the personal criticism. He said: "I thought there would be a much more scholarly debate about what the book actually said, more about what I said about the persecution and oppression of the Palestinians." And he added, "What surprised me were the personal attacks."
In a quote that appeared in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Zbigniow Brzezinski, who was Carter's national security advisor said: "I don't think he expected the viciousness or nastiness. Books on international affairs can be provocative. But, in most cases, they don't produce this kind of assault."
Ground realities
During his visits to this land of conflict, Carter took time to interact with people from all walks of life, both Palestinians and Israelis. After measuring the existential pulse of these warring sections of humanity, Carter realised the existence of two Israels: "One encompassed the ancient culture and moral values of the Jewish people, defined by the Jewish scriptures with which I had been familiar since childhood and representing the young nation that most Americans envisioned. The other existed within the occupied Palestinian territories, with policies shaped by a refusal to acknowledge and respect the basic human rights of the citizens" (p.112).
The cover page depicts Carter in a contemplative mood visualising the ongoing plight of the typically "imprisoned" Palestinians in their own land by the Israelis who have built a huge concrete wall to keep the Palestinians in a kind of permanent "lock up". The book, quoting the Israeli human rights organisation, B'Tselem, tells that on an average, 12 innocent families lose their homes for every person accused of participation in an attack against Israelis, with half of the demolished homes never occupied by anyone suspected of involvement in any violent act against Israel, even throwing stones. So severe and inhuman the oppression and the abuses are.
State hegemony
The book argues that Israel's hegemonic rule, worse than the South African apartheid, is the reason for the continuing cycle of violence. Until Carter, an American by all counts, vividly and boldly brought it out, the American media, through their agenda setting strategy, kept the rest of the world blind to the harsh and despicable realities that the Palestinians daily face in this ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict, through selective presentation and demonising the Palestinians and hallowing the Israelis.
Not alone
Michael Jacob, managing editor of the Atlanta Jewish Times, worries about the negative impact the book can create in people about Israel and the American Jewish community. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution quoted him as saying: "My worry, more than anything, is that people outside the Jewish community, who don't know much about Israel will read this book and believe what it says and get the wrong impression about Israel and the American Jewish community." But, it is hard and next to impossible to imagine that a man like Carter would ever want or even make any attempt to create false and negative impressions in people across the globe about an issue that is so sensitive and explosive.
Carter is not alone in this journey of historic and unprecedented fact-revealing mission. A former Israeli cabinet minister, Shulamit Aloni, is forthright in his views of the Jewish domination. Aloni severely criticises the U.S. Jewish establishment for its onslaught on Carter for daring to tell the truth. In a column published in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Aloni said: "Through its army, the government of Israel practises a brutal form of apartheid in the territory it occupies." With heartfelt sympathy for his ill-treated Palestinian brethren, Aloni added: "Its (Israeli) army has turned every Palestinian village and town into a fenced-in, or blocked-in, detention camp."
As if to prove Carter's statement, of the existence to two Israels, Aloni comes out with an example: "Wonderful roads, wide roads, well paved roads, brightly lit at night — all that on stolen land. When a Palestinian drives on such a road, his vehicle is confiscated, and he is sent on his way." Such roads are meant for Israelis only.
Aloni describes his own experience of witnessing such an encounter between a Palestinian driver and an Israeli soldier on such a road. When Aloni intervened the soldier responded: "It is his (Palestinian's) responsibility to know it, and besides, what do you want us to do, put up a sign here, and let some anti-Semitic reporter or journalist take a photo, so he then can show the world that apartheid exists here?"
Must-read
What more does the world need to justify the book's fact-based title, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid? The book is a must-read for all those who would like to have a candid look into this sacred heartland that claims the origin of the world's three monotheistic religions — Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The irony and paradox is that instead of being an abode of peace and unity, the Holy Land is a cauldron of hatred and terrorism.
For the comfort of those critics who see Carter's book as nothing but "errors" and "misstatements", he admits to one major error. On page 213 is the following passage: "It is imperative that the general Arab community and all significant Palestinian groups make it clear that they will end the suicide bombings and other acts of terrorism when international laws and the ultimate goals of the Roadmap for Peace are accepted by Israel." Carter says the phrasing is improper and stupid and has already made arrangements to change it in later editions.
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