Jimmy Got Conned

I was absolutely appalled by Jimmy Carter's column in today's edition of the Washington Post, in which he deemed Israel's war in Gaza "unnecessary" and generally blasting the Israelis for attacking Hamas.

It doesn't particularly surprise me that the man is trying to play the role of the "peacenik" -- or that he is siding against Israel (which, by the way, he almost always does). However, his total and utter refusal to acknowledge certain facts is stunning.

From reading Carter's piece, one would get the assumption that Hamas wants peace more than Israel -- and that they are totally willing to negotiate.

It also seems that Carter is more than willing to accept Hamas as the legitimate government of Gaza. This is beyond ridiculous. Hamas is a hard-line terrorist group devoted to the total destruction of Israel, and they gained power in Gaza by forcibly throwing out the legitimate Palestinian Authority (PA) government. I would understand if Carter tried to dismiss either of these points as unimportant -- but instead, he just ignores them and pretends that the terrorists are actually nice people! (Actually, he won't even use the word "terrorist".)

Even more laughable is the fact that he states that, "Hamas wanted a comprehensive cease fire in both the West Bank and Gaza, and the Israelis refused to discuss anything other the Gaza."

... But Hamas has no authority over the West Bank, which is under the control of the legitimate, internationally recognized, Palestinian Authority government.

In reality, Hamas is holding the citizens of Gaza hostage, using them as human shields, and then showing off the corpses in an attempt to make the Israelis look like the bad guys. It's a pretty good con, and gullible people like Jimmy Carter are falling for it hook, line, and sinker. Unfortunately, while Carter is off in la-la land fantasizing about peace and bunny rabbit attacks, the rest of us are stuck in the real world dealing with the death and destruction in both Israel and Gaza.

Things will only get better in that part of the world when Hamas is forced to end its illegitimate reign of terror. Carter's ignorant blathering actually makes it harder to achieve that goal – which is truly a sad commentary...