Posted on 04/18/2008 7:06:40 PM PDT by kellynla
Former President Jimmy Carter is scheduled to meet this week with Khaled Meshaal, the leader of the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement, known as Hamas. I deplore his decision to meet with a group that has been identified by the United States, European Union, and Israel as a terrorist organization. Hamas deliberately targets innocent Israeli civilians on a daily basis by indiscriminately firing rockets into their cities. Mr. Carter should know better than this.
I respect President Carter’s desire for peace in the Middle East. He helped broker the 1979 Egypt-Israel peace treaty, but this situation is different. The Egyptian and Israeli Governments were seeking a peace deal; Hamas is not seeking peace. Since Hamas won the Palestinian elections in 2006, it has refused to recognize Israel’s right to exist. We are not talking about borders, but the fundamental right for a country to exist in the world. The Israeli Government has agreed upon a two-state solution that would create a state of Palestine, but Hamas refuses even this basic framework. The long term goal of Hamas has always been, and remains, to annihilate Israel.
While efforts to reach a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority are laudable, Mr. Carter is misguided to believe that he can do so when one party is opposed to his participation. The Israeli Government has refused to meet with Mr. Carter on his trip and has voiced their opposition to his planned meeting with Hamas.
Mr. Carter’s decision to act unilaterally and meet with Hamas’s top political leader sends the wrong message. It says to Hamas that killing innocent civilians and consistently planning and conducting terrorist attacks will lead to reward and recognition by the international community. This will not bring about peace, but will set back any chance of reaching a peace agreement. Hamas must understand that there are certain rules that you must follow if you are going to be recognized by the international community. The targeting of civilians through the use of terrorist attacks is not one of those rules.
On top of all this, Mr. Carter, as a former President, has a Secret Service detail that is being paid out of our hard earned money. If Mr. Carter is going to travel to Syria, a country on the United States State Department’s list of state sponsors of terrorism and meet with the leader of a terrorist organization, the American people should not pay a penny for his security.
And one other thing, someone needs to remind Mr. Carter that he is a former President. Whether you agree with the policies of President Bush or not, he is the current President of the United States and he has the Constitutional authority to conduct foreign policy. That power does not continue when the President leaves office. Mr. Carter is showing brazen disrespect for the Office of the Presidency by refusing the wishes of the President and the State Department when they have asked him not to meet with Hamas.
That is why I am calling on Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to revoke former President Jimmy Carter’s passport. He needs to understand that the international community has spoken and he should respect their will and wisdom to deal with a terrorist organization that seeks to destroy a democratic ally of the United States. Mr. Carter has a lot of influence as a peace negotiator and his decision will undermine his credibility with peaceful, democratic states, while additionally undermining the credibility of the International Community when dealing with rogue, terrorist organizations.
jimmah al-carter should have more than just his passport revoked.
AS rush said today-—Revoke it BEFORE he comes home
Yea, right. She probably set the meeting up. As Rush said today, if they're going to revoke his passport, do it while he's still overseas!
Carter’s citizenship should be revoked. Period.
It will be interesting to see if the ‘Rats allow Carter to speak at the convention...
He sure doesn’t help the ‘Rats’ relations with the Jewish vote.
Jimmy Carter’s Actions Reprehensible
In meeting with Hammas, Jimmy Carter advocated including dedication to exterminating levels of murder within the norm of political behavior. His actions opposed those holding the principle some activities are beyond the pale, and not just harsher forms of civil disobedience.
Those in opposition include the parents and grandparents of the “Greatest Generation” who wrote the Geneva Conventions. People whose words expressed a durable wisdom, morality and leadership earned in finding peace through victory in the ultimate bloody deluge of the 20th century.
For them terrorist organizations such as Hammas, al Qaida, and Hezbollah were not insurgents, freedom fighters, militias, volunteer corps, or members of any organized resistance movement or authority. By the most expansive interpretation of Geneva Conventions, these people would offer terrorists no protections. Terrorists would be eligible for tribunals and executions, only if they survived every overwhelming fury needed to crush their abominations. They repudiated terrorists for regarding “Protected Persons” as the unrelenting focus of murder, when not used as biodegradable sandbags to sustain sanctuaries and operations, or as bloody theatrical props duping gullible people in public relations campaigns.
Jimmy Carter’s actions promote a new level of depravity for inclusive human behavior. For basic human rights to survive, one must instead repudiate the sophistry that goodness will abound by fabricating a moral high ground inclusive of terrorist actions. Carter’s actions are so internationally damaging, they must be repudiated by at least a condemning resolution, if not a call to revoke his passport.
Politicians don't care...the first thing they think about is “whats in it for me...me me me me...”
I always thought that Jimmy was a nice guy and a rotten President. He thinks the President should function as a coffee clatch consensus seeker and not as a leader. We have all heard of non-educated people that are inherently street smart. Jimmy is a well educated man that is both dumber than a bag of hammers and foolish enough to think he is a genius.
No, his air supply.
It has been determined by sources that “Liberalism is a Mental Disorder”. Jimmuh Cahtah is a prime example of that diagnosis.
He should be committed rather than permitted to run amok.
Who has the net?
He betrayed the Shah of Iran, losing America a valuable ally and setting up the the Iranian Revolution.
He gave away the Panama Canal - now in the hands of the Chi-coms.
He let America be humilated by the hostage crisis.
He Supported Castro.
He supported Chavez.
He supported Arafat.
He's a traitor to this country.
Thanks for posting this. This whole thing has been bugging me for some time now. Just how big of a jerk can former Pres Carter be??? He keeps surpassing himself.
Let him keep his passport. Just mark it “Not Good for Re-entry into the United States.”
Prosecute him under the Logan act.
It’s treason in black and white. I can not for the life of me understand why he is not arrested. it’s treason, plain and simple.What’s going on in this country?
She’s got more stones than the rest of the pathetic Republican Party combined.
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