I was a little hesitant to choose a controversial book, but after I read President Carter’s new book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, I felt the ideas were too important not to share. I also feel that anyone who reads the book for themselves will agree that Jewish Americans are being unfair when they accuse President Carter of taking sides. It is true that he highlights the plight of the Palestinians in the occupied territories, but this hardly makes him biased.
This podcast is only an introduction to the book. You will have to read it yourself to make your own decision.
Here are some links you might find interesting:
CNN’s coverage of the resignation of the Jewish members of the Carter Center
Some information about the Wall Israel is building around its settlements
Filed under: Books, Podcast Show Notes, history | Tagged: Jimmy Carter, Palestine
I entered your world of Books and Ideas for the first time today with your pod cast on President Carter’s Book. I found the pod cast very informative and the subject an excellent choice.
We had watched a PBS special sometime ago about how the Israelis were taking land to build this awful wall and listened to several interviews with the President about the book.
In a visit last year to Jordan we stayed with a Christian Palestinian family for five days who fled to Jordan in the 60’s. During this visit we also had an opportunity to visit a Palestinian refuge camp. The visit afforded us an opportunity to see with our own eyes what you reported in your pod cast about the book is true.
Mahalo for your continuous efforts to bring to light subjects that are not often commented on.
Thank you for the first hand feedback on this important topic.
You start this podcast by saying you know very little about the Israel/Palestine problems, that you have a “pretty poor understanding of the issues”. How could you possibly know then that Carter’s view is “balanced”? In order to make such a judgement about any issue, you have to be familiar with the sides of the debate. You say this is a very important issue for peace, yet you have not taken the time to learn anything. You are in no position therefore to judge the accuracy of this book.
You say this is a very important issue for peace, yet you have not taken the time to learn anything.
One of the problems in this world is people with strong opinions and few facts. I can tell you that reading one book, any book, will not make you competent to pontificate as you do.
If you read more you may find that Carter’s history is rather superficial and one-sided.
I’m not going to argue with you. If you are really interested in this issue, you ought to learn something before you start lecturing people. It’s annoying. But you seem to be a sincere person. Here are a few points/questions to maybe stimulate some thoughts:
1. Israel pulled out of Gaza, so why are they still being attacked from there? Notice how this has been reported in the last few days — Hamas fires dozens o rockets at Israel, and Israel finally attacks those firing the rockets, and the headlines all say “Israel attacks Hamas, 2 Palestinians killed.” You must read deep into the article to find out why they attacked.
2. As you know, the West Bank and Gaza were in Arab hands up to 1967 (specifically in Jordanian and Egyptian hands), so why wasn’t there a Palestinian state created during that time? Not only that, but why was there no outcry from the rest of the world for Egypt and Jordan to not occupy the land? In fact, why was there no (or almost no) movement for a Palestinian state at all during that period? I am sure that you know from your extensive research in this issue that prior to 1949, the word “Palestinian” referred to Palestinian Jews living there. The Arabs were called “Arabs” or Arabs of Palestine or even Syrians. What does it all mean?
3. Did you know that more Jews were kicked out of Arab countries after the state of Israel was formed than Arabs out of Palestine? Yet they were all settled. In the whole 20th Century, the Palestinians constituted less than %1 of all refugees, yet the other %99+ all somehow managed to get resettled and move on with their lives.
4. Did you know that the UN has one definition for “refugee” for every other place in the world and one special definition just for Palestinians? They even have their own special UN agency. don’t you find it odd? Why would this happen?
5. Here is one “fact” you can easily verify, if you have a mind to: (a) You say that Israel ended up with 77% of Palestine. the Palestinian side loves to quote this figure. But as you can easily check — British Mandate Palestine also included what became the Kingdom of Jordan; that is what gets ignored. Therefore Israel ended up with much less than half.
Since you are obviously so passionate about this issue, then you really owe it to yourself to learn something. Read, learn, Make up your own mind, whether you end up on one side or the other. Don’t get all your information from one source.
regards
Paul
I appreciate you taking the time to post such a detailed comment about my discussion of Jimmy Carter’s book.
It is clear that you too are passionate about the subject, and that you have more extensive knowledge of the Israeli side of the argument.
The points you make emphasize that the issues in the area of very complex. To me it seems that the US media tend to give a one-sided pro-Israel coverage even though you clearly feel otherwise.
The recent events in Gaza are painful reminder how stuck the current situation is. The people is Gaza are not really free and they are so isolated they are essentially in a ghetto, which makes easy prey for Hamas and other terrorist organizations. Just as with the years of bloodshed in Northern Ireland, as long as both sides see violence as the only option, it is difficult for real progress to occur.
From what I have read about Jordan I don’t think it is valid to consider it as part of the Palestinian territory, since most Jordanians seem to regard the Palestinians as refugees in their country. These divisions seem arbitrary to Westerners, but I think the mistake of lumping all Arabs (Moslem and non-Moslem) or all Moslems (Sunni and Shia) together is one reason why US foreign policy in the region has turned into such a disaster.
The point you make about the Palestinians failing to be resettled despite their relatively small number brings up very complex questions about their own leadership and perhaps the difference in the cultures. For good or ill, the Jews do have over least 2000 years of experience with emigration (often forced) and adapting to new homelands. One might easily argue that the Palestinians would have been better off to adapt and move on, and one does meet immigrants in the US who did just that, but they are clearly the minority.
I agree that is weird that the Palestinians seem to be treated differently from other refugees, but it certainly doesn’t seem to be to their benefit.
One last point I would like to make is that I was not trying to take sides, but rather to point out that President Carter brings attention to the blight of average Palestinians, many of whom are Christians. I think it should be acknowledged that such desperate conditions are bound to breed more violence and that trying to build a wall around Israeli settlers is a prescription for war, not peace.