Jimmy Carter

Damnit. Sometimes I think I need to pay MORE attention to the news. And that is saying something for a guy who reads three to four news sources over the course of the day (not to mention the subscriptions to the weeklies). At any rate I have to point one little thing out about the big flap about former President Carter's new Book, Palestine Peace not apartheid. I can't (or won't) get into his book or his ideas or potential factual errors. And I can't get into some of the criticisms being labled against him about why he wrote this book. But I can say that his use and application of the word 'apartheid' to Israel and the perspective it entails is not wholly unique or new.

Some (most prominently the Anti-Defemation Leauge) have criticised President Carter for comparaing the Israeli government's policies to the former South African government's policies of segregation (to put it mildly). Abraham Foxman, of the ADL, stated: “The title is to de-legitimize Israel, because if Israel is like South Africa, it doesn’t really deserve to be a democratic state. He’s provoking, he’s outrageous, and he’s bigoted.” The title is definately provoking but he isn't the first to accuse Israel of apartheid like policies. And the first to apply the term is far more immune to accusations of conceptual and linguistic abuse for political purposes. Archbishop Desmond Tutu, a man who knows all too well what the term 'apartheid' means used it back in 2002 in an article for the Guardian to describe how he felt while visiting the West Bank (search for desmond tutu + Israel and it comes up. The date was April 29th, 2002). Desmond Tutu, another Nobel Laureate like President Carter, clearly argued that while the policies of apartheid were much worse than the policies of the Israeli government, being in the West Bank reminded him very much of apartheid South Africa.

So let's at least stop saying the comparison is unfair. Judge the book on its merits and its arguments. But don't judge it based on its title or on its subject.