HE COMES IN PEACE?

Michael Smerconish

January 18, 2007

EVERY DAY when my radio gig ends, I meet with my producers, critique that day's show and plan the next.

 

One recent meeting was interrupted by a call. "Amber" was on the line, but I didn't have a clue who she was or what she wanted. Amber? Sounds like someone you'd meet at a gentleman's club and steak house.

 

Actually, she had ex-President Jimmy Carter on the line, available for an interview on his new book, "Palestine: Peace, Not Apartheid." I pride myself on reading every book for authors I interview, but this took me by surprise. I hadn't even seen the book.

 

But I took the call and rolled tape, determined to be deferential to a former commander-in-chief and hoping to get a few sound bites about the day's news, the release of the Iraq Study Commission report.

 

As Carter spoke, I accessed a blog at HuffingtonPost.com where professor Alan Dershowitz had taken issue with the use of the word "apartheid" in the title of Carter's book.

 

Dershowitz wrote: "His bias against Israel shows by his selection of the book's title... The suggestion that without peace Israel is an apartheid state analogous to South Africa is simply wrong. The basic evil of South African apartheid, against which I and so many other Jews fought, was the absolute control over a majority of blacks by a small minority of whites. It was the opposite of democracy."

 

My mere mention of Dershowitz caused the ex-president to audibly blanch. The interview suddenly turned very interesting.

 

President Carter responded, "Well, he obviously didn't even read the title, do you see 'Israel' in the title? No, it's about Palestine, it's not about Israel. It's about the land that Israel is occupying that belongs to the Palestinians, and that's the only place that apartheid applies."

 

I shared with him my impression that no amount of negotiation on borders would ever appease the Palestinians, that they want it all. I told him I knew that Yasser Arafat used to parade around in a uniform with a patch featuring the Middle East as he envisioned it - containing no Israel whatsoever.

 

And I told him, "The concern that I have in handing back the West Bank and Gaza is that's not enough to appease these folks... I think they want it all, and they don't want any Israel."

 

To which Carter testily responded, "Well, and you're mistaken, I think, but thanks a lot."

 

When the call ended, I was stunned by the change in his demeanor. So I called Dershowitz, and played him the tape. He was not surprised.

 

He said, "Jimmy Carter has refused to be on the same program with anybody who has a different point of view and who knows the facts, because he's spewing nonsense. His facts are all wrong and his information is all skewed.

 

"He makes it seem as if Israel doesn't want peace, and Hamas and the PLO and Arafat want peace. He forgets to mention that in 1967 when Israel, in response to an attack by Jordan, captured the West Bank, it offered it back immediately if the Palestinians would accept 242, the resolution he talks about. The Palestinians and Arabs went to Khartoum and issued their three famous 'no's': 'No peace, no recognition, no negotiation.' "

 

He continued, "Israel said we accept it, and we'll give it back. They gave back the Gaza, they offered to give back the West Bank and end the occupation in 2000-2001. Jimmy Carter believes Yasser Arafat's account of 2000 and 2001 over Bill Clinton's, and that speaks volumes.

 

"He essentially calls the president of the United States a liar because Bill Clinton says it was Arafat who turned down the opportunity for a Palestinian state in 2000-2001, and Jimmy Carter says, 'No, no, no, it was the Israelis who turned it down, it was the Israelis' fault...'

 

"Carter chooses to believe what Arafat says, what Hamas says. He just doesn't like Israel."

 

Not long after, I heard from Real Peace Productions, which is producing a documentary directed by Jonathan Demme titled, "He Comes in Peace," about the release of Carter's book. Demme was apparently filming Carter's end of our conversation. My off-the-cuff interview now has a chance to go Hollywood.

 

And the controversy continues. Last week, 14 members of the Carter Center's advisory board resigned. Among other things, I suspect, as highlighted in the New York Post, they were dismayed by what they read on Page 213 of Carter's book:

 

"It is imperative that the general Arab community and all significant Palestinian groups make it clear 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." In other words, it's OK to keep killing innocent folks until then.

Michael Smerconish can be heard weekdays 5:30-9 a.m. on the Big Talker, 1210/AM. Contact him via the Web at www.mastalk.com.