Disinformation: Jimmy Carter Interview
Bonus Post: A very misleading clip of a 2007 interview is explained
Is the news about Israel so horrifying that you are wondering what to believe? Have you already decided that Israel must be at fault? Here’s some information that the mainstream media, YouTube and TikTok have not told you. As a way of passing it on, I’ll critique a “short” that appeared in an on-line feed.
This was an interview with former U.S. President Jimmy Carter. Everything out of his mouth was either a lie or a truth that sounded terrible simply because while it was true, Carter ignored the context, which was critical for understanding.
First, a few things about Carter, who was president between 1977 and 1981.
At 99 years of age, Carter is the longest-living president in American history. He has been living in a hospice for over a year.[i]
While he helped broker peace between Israel and Egypt, he also brought Yassir Arafat out of the shadows and positioned him to gain power.[ii] Arafat, who “diverted nearly $1 billion in public funds to insure his political survival,”[iii] was outspoken in his goal of destroying Israel.”[iv]
Until very recently, he was known as the worst U.S. president in modern history.
The video is part of an interview between the former president and an organization called Democracy Now!. This video was filmed in 2007. In it, Carter uses two examples of why calling Israel “apartheid” is accurate. One is true but only part of the story; the other is false.
Israel built roads that Palestinians are not allowed to use
This is true. The question, however, is why.
The roads the Palestinians use go through Arab villages. Cars from Israel that travel on that road are subject to being pelted with stones the size of standard bricks or even American footballs, with being shot at, or, if they have to stop for any reason, being mobbed, pulled out of their cars, and beaten or stabbed.
Example: Lucy Dee and two of her daughters were killed in 2023 by terrorists as they were on a side road necessary to get where they were going. The number of Jews killed on those roads has been huge, so the government built bypass roads to avoid Palestinian towns. Palestinians are forbidden to use these roads. So you tell me: are these roads an example of an apartheid government? Yes they are: the ones practicing the necessity for separation of the groups is the Palestinian Authority, not Israel.
By the way: when you read of “settler violence,” it is almost always retaliation for attacks of this kind, either on cars, on property, or on Israeli civilians.
Why no Israelis are in Palestinian territory
Carter also says, “The Israelis never see a Palestinian except at a distance, except for soldiers, and the Palestinians never see Israelis, except at a distance, except soldiers, so within Palestinian territory they are absolutely separated, much worse than they were in South Africa.”[v] This is also true. Israelis take their lives in their hands if they enter Palestinian-controlled territory.
One of many, many examples: “Israeli father and son killed in West Bank shooting.”[vi] The father and son were shot dead at a car wash. The article continues, “A suspected shooting attack was carried out at a number of Israeli civilians in the area of the town of Huwara…”
That article ends with the sentence, “Israel has occupied the West Bank since the Six-Day War of 1967.” This is technically accurate, but the Palestinian areas of the West Bank are under civil control of the Palestinian Authority (PA). The citizens vote for their leaders and the PA controls all civil matters. The so-called refugees run businesses, build homes, import goods and export produce, all with the oversight of the PA.
The Israeli government is concerned with security for Israelis and the Israeli sections of the West Bank. It is worth noting that the West Bank is comprised of Judea and Samaria, names that appear in the Bible. It has had Jewish residents for about 3000 years. Americans occupy the United States, Scots occupy Scotland, and Jews occupy Judea and Samaria.
Do Palestinians and Israelis ever see each other?
Thousands of Palestinians have worked in Israeli businesses. In 2016, when the Boycott, Divest and Sanction movement (BDS) succeeded in forcing SodaStream to close its West Bank factory, hundreds of Palestinians lost their jobs. They had been paid more than the average wages they could have received at Palestinian jobs, and relations between the Palestinian and Israeli workers were reported to be cordial.
One major reason the October 7 Hamas attacks on the communities near Gaza were so successful was that Hamas had detailed information about those communities. Some of the most far-left Israelis lived there. One retired couple who were murdered had been volunteer drivers for Gazans who had medical appointments at hospitals within Israel. Many Israelis had employed the same people for twenty or more years in the fields of their farms or in their homes. These employees gave Hamas detailed descriptions of the people, floorplans of their homes, names and ages of the residents, and even information about household pets.
On one kibbutz, a long-term resident who was, like virtually everyone else in the community, a secular Jew, had married in mid-life a religiously observant Jewish woman. Their habit was to go to a nearby city for Sabbaths and holidays because there was no synagogue in the community. However, that particular week they had decided at the last moment to stay home. On October 7, terrorists destroyed the homes around them but left their home alone—because their employees had reported that the home was always vacant on the Sabbath.
Do Palestinians still work for Israelis and Israeli companies?
Since October 7, hundreds if not thousands of Palestinians have lost their jobs within Israel. Jews are rightfully concerned that, like the dependable, long-term employees near Gaza, Palestinian employees cannot be trusted. The Jews are unwilling to hire people who might betray or attack them if ordered by their imam (religious leader), Hamas, or another anti-Israel group.
Conclusion
When you read or hear something that sounds extremely negative about Israel, please do not believe it until you have done some research.
Check the source. I found something published by Naharnet. I googled the name and immediately found the organization’s website. Checking the “About” tab, I saw it comes out of Lebanon, home of Hezbollah.
The majority of NGOs—non-governmental social service organizations such as Oxfam, International Red Cross, and Save the Children—receive millions of dollars from left-wing foundations such as George Soros’s Open Society Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation as well as individual contributions from social justice warriors. As such, they are obligated to toe the political line set out by their funders or risk losing the money that is their lifeblood.
If you do not have time or inclination to research, just take the message with a rather large grain of salt and do not pass on the information. We Jews are about 15,000,000 world-wide. Muslims are about 2,000,000,000. We have neither the money nor the manpower to combat their disinformation.
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[i] Shen, Michelle, Grandson Says Carter is “coming to the end’ in brief update about former president’s health, CNN, updated May 14, 2024, https://edition.cnn.com/2024/05/14/politics/jimmy-carter-health-update/index.html , accessed May 30, 2024.
[ii] This Day In History: Sept. 13, 1993. Israel-Palestine peace accord signed. History.com, https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/israel-palestine-peace-accord-signed , accessed May 30, 2024.
[iii] McDermott, Tricia, 60 Minutes/CBS News, November 7, 2003, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/arafats-billions/ , accessed May 30, 2024.
[iv] Karsh, Efraim, Arafat’s Grand Strategy, Middle East Quarterly, Spring 2004, https://www.meforum.org/605/arafats-grand-strategy , accessed May 30, 2024.
[vi] Article in France24, Huwara, Palestinian Territories, August 19, 2023, https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20230819-two-israeli-civilians-killed-in-west-bank-shooting , accessed May 30, 2024.
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