Is Jimmy Carter's Persistent Anti-Semitism Funded by Arabs?
Published Tue, Dec 19 2006 8:49 AM
Technorati Tags: News and Politics, Israel and Palestine
That's the question being asked, or rather answered, by Frontpage Magazine and Yid with LID...
Often the Peanut President tells us that among the reasons for writing his new book of anti semitic lies is that a true debate about the middle east is impossible because of the " Jewish Lobby," as if the Jews in America were some sort of secret society that controlled foreign policy (guys if its true will someone teach me the secret handshake). Apparently Carter is not interested in a debate as he turned down the opportunity to discuss Israel with Alan Dershowitz in a public forum at Brandies University.
He goes on to quote extensiviely from this FrontPage Magazine Article.
Bluster aside, Carter’s chief complaint seems to be that anyone who identifies with Israel, whether in the form of individual support or in a more organized capacity, is incapable of grappling honestly with the issues in the Arab-Israeli conflict. But Carter is poorly placed to make this claim. If such connections alone are sufficient to discredit his critics, then by his own logic Carter is undeserving of a hearing. After all, the Carter Center, the combination research and activist project he founded at Emory University in 1982, has for years prospered from the largesse of assorted Arab financiers.
Especially lucrative have been Carter’s ties to Saudi Arabia. Before his death in 2005, King Fahd was a longtime contributor to the Carter Center and on more than one occasion contributed million-dollar donations. In 1993 alone, the king presented Carter with a gift of $7.6 million. And the king was not the only Saudi royal to commit funds to Carter’s cause. As of 2005, the king’s high-living nephew, Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal, has donated at least $5 million to the Carter Center.
Meanwhile the Saudi Fund for Development, the kingdom’s leading loan organization, turns up repeatedly on the center’s list of supporters. Carter has also found moneyed allies in the Bin Laden family, and in 2000 he secured a promise from ten of Osama bin Laden's brothers for a $1 million contribution to his center. To be sure, there is no evidence that the Bin Ladens maintain any contact with their terrorist relation. But applying Carter’s own standard, his extensive contacts with the Saudi elite must make his views on the Middle East suspect.
High praise for Carter’s work -- and not inconsiderable financial support -- also comes from the United Arab Emirates. In 2001, Carter even traveled to the country to accept the Zayed International Prize for the Environment, named for Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan al-Nahyan, the late UAE potentate and former president-for-life. Having claimed his $500,000 purse, Carter enthused that the “award has special significance for me because it is named for my personal friend, Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan al-Nahyan.” Carter also hailed the UAE as an “almost completely open and free society” -- a surreal depiction of a rigidly authoritarian country where the government handpicks a select group of citizens to vote and strictly controls the editorial content of the newspapers and where Islamic Shari’a courts judge “sodomy” punishable by death. (To appreciate the depth of Carter’s cynicism, one need only compare his gushing encomia to the emirates with his likening of Israel, the most modern and democratic country in the entire Middle East, with the racist “apartheid” of South Africa.)
On top of these official honors, Carter was offered a forum at the Abu Dhabi-based Zayed Center for Coordination and Follow Up, the country’s official “think-tank.” For his part, Carter declared his intention to forge a “partnership” with the center; in a 2002 letter, Carter praised its efforts to “promote peace, health, and human rights around the world.” Inconveniently for Carter, the center has since become famous for a different reason: It has repeatedly played host to anti-Semitic speakers who have denied the Holocaust, supported terrorism, and alleged an international conspiracy of Jews and Zionists to dominate the world. (Harvard University, in contrast to Carter’s enthusiasm for Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan al-Nahyan, rejected a $2.5 million from the ruler in 2004 due to his ties to the Zayed Center.)
Nor does this exhaust the list of Carter’s backers in the Arab world. Still other supporters include Sultan Qaboos bin Said, who sits atop Oman’s absolute monarchy. An occasional host to Carter, the sultan has also made generous contributions to his center. Prior to inviting Carter for a “personal visit” in 1998, the sultan pledged $1 million to the Carter Center, promising additional support in the future. Similarly, Morocco’s Prince Moulay Hicham Ben Abdallah, the second in line to the kingdom’s throne, has in the past partnered with Carter on the center’s initiatives.
...
With its relentless disparagement of Israel and its reckless abuse of the historical record, Carter’s latest book may fairly be seen as the logical culmination of his many years of anti-Israel incitement. There was of course no shortage of clues about Carter’s sympathies in his earlier books. In his 2004 memoir Sharing Good Times, for instance, Carter recalled the trips he has taken over the years to Arab dictatorships in Syria and Saudi Arabia and noted with evident satisfaction that he was “always greeted with smiles and friendship.”
Readers may be forgiven for finding nothing shocking in this admission. Carter may still harbor illusions of grandeur, seeing himself as an instrument of peace in the Middle East. But an altogether different element explains his enduring popularity in Arab capitals: Not for all the millions they have sunk into the Carter Center over the years could Arab elites have hoped to purchase such a prominent and willing propaganda tool.
Yes indeed. Jimmy Carter's apparent hatred of Israel certainly seems to be funded by Arab money. The only question that remains for me is which came first, the anti-Semitism or the money.
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