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Jimmy Carter Was No Saint for Jews

Anwar Sadat, Jimmy Carter, and Menachem Begin at the Camp David Accords Signing Ceremony. Photo: wiki commons.

JNS.orgForgive me if I don’t join in the rush to canonize Jimmy Carter. He deserves respect for serving as president and for some meritorious accomplishments, but he was also one of, if not the most, anti-Israel president in history. Though hailed as a peacemaker, his actions and statements, particularly after leaving office, show a much darker side steeped in antisemitism.

Carter said in 1977 that his strong stand against the Arab League boycott “was one of the things that led to my election.” His position had been drafted by Rep. Benjamin Rosenthal’s (D-N.Y.) office to attract Jewish voters. The strategy paid off. If only one in nine New York Jews who voted for Carter had gone for Gerald Ford, the president would have been re-elected.

After his election, however, Carter backed away from his campaign commitment to fighting the boycott, undermining the trust Jews placed in him. He was more concerned with America’s dependence on Arab oil and his messianic vision of bringing peace to the Middle East. Anti-boycott legislation was seen as having the potential to upset the Arabs, and thereby endanger U.S. oil supplies and his peace efforts. Still, momentum for legislation had grown since it was introduced in the Ford administration, and the pro-Israel and business lobbies negotiated a compromise that led to its passage. The legislation outlawing cooperation by U.S. companies with the boycott is one of Carter’s enduring contributions to Israel. Still, he didn’t view it as important retrospectively, devoting just one paragraph in his memoir to expressing his outrage towards the boycott and claiming credit for the outcome.

One of his early decisions that drew the ire of Israel was linking aid to the cancellation of Ford’s sale of concussion bombs and his approval of the sale of Israeli-built Kfir jets to Ecuador. Under pressure, he agreed to allow Israel to receive arms needed for its security but refused to reverse his decision on the bombs and jets.

Far more problematic for most Jews was his attitude towards the Palestinians. He saw Palestinians as being in a similar situation to American blacks. He believed the treatment of Palestinians in the disputed territories was contrary to the moral and ethical principles of the United States and Israel.

Carter was the first president to call for a “Palestinian homeland.” He later became determined to leverage Israeli peace with Egypt to force Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin to agree to make concessions to the Palestinians, a strategy like the one unsuccessfully employed by the Biden administration to achieve Saudi normalization with Israel.

The Israel-Egypt peace treaty is rightly lauded as Carter’s greatest foreign-policy accomplishment. What is less remembered is how much he did to impede the negotiations. Carter wasn’t interested in a bilateral agreement; he had a misguided vision of a comprehensive Middle East peace that he believed could be reached at an international conference in Geneva. When Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin came to the White House, Carter told him US support for Israel would be damaged if he refused to accept the Palestine Liberation Organization’s participation and was the first president to call Israeli settlements illegal. Carter insisted that the Jewish states accept only “minor adjustments” to the 1967 borders, causing an uproar because it was inconsistent with Israel’s determination to maintain “defensible borders.” Carter pressured Israel to “accept the situation that we think is fair.” (emphasis added)

He tried to enlist the help of Syrian President Hafez Assad with the PLO. Despite finding Assad “extremely antagonistic” towards Israel, he praised the dictator as a “strong supporter in the search for peace.”

After the election of Menachem Begin, Carter said that his call for a Palestinian homeland didn’t imply the creation of a Palestinian state, which he said would be a threat to peace, but he envisioned an entity associated with Jordan. Whatever goodwill that statement gained was offset by the subsequent revelation that the administration was in contact with the PLO and that it agreed to negotiate with Yasser Arafat if he accepted either Israel’s right to exist or U.N. Security Council Resolution 242. This violated Secretary of State Henry Kissinger’s agreement with Israel that the PLO must meet both conditions.

Meanwhile, Israel and Egypt had begun secret talks in Morocco. President Anwar Sadat recognized that Carter’s idea of an international conference would allow his rivals to veto a deal with Israel and took matters into his own hands by making his historic trip to Jerusalem in November 1977. Carter and his advisers were furious that Sadat had undermined their Geneva gambit. Morton Kondracke of The New Republic wrote that Carter’s unwitting “freshman-year ineptitude scared Sadat into dramatic independent action.”

To his credit, Carter reversed course and convened the talks at Camp David. He was hardly the honest broker his supporters claim. After the 1978 congressional election, he said he was willing to sacrifice re-election because of alienating the Jewish community. Still, Carter believed it was necessary to side with Sadat and pressure the Israelis. His effort to leverage the Palestinian issue, however, failed because he recognized Sadat “did not give a damn about the West Bank.”

Carter was desperate for an agreement as his political standing deteriorated. Failure was seen as a potential death knell to his re-election. He realized he had little influence over Israel and consequently accepted an agreement that did not resolve what he considered the major issues.

Carter later used Israel to sell America’s most sophisticated fighter jets to Saudi Arabia. Israel objected because it threatened its qualitative military edge. Carter packaged the sale with jet transfers to Israel and Egypt to win approval, and said it was all or nothing. AIPAC objected: “By placing Israel in the same category as Saudi Arabia and Egypt, the administration is obviously trying to make the Arab sales more acceptable to Congress, but the administration is also abandoning America’s traditional special relations with Israel.” As would happen in subsequent arms fights, AIPAC lost. The fight added to the Jewish perception of Carter as an unreliable ally.

As the election approached, Carter was embarrassed by his U.N. ambassador, Andrew Young, who was forced to resign when it was revealed that he had arranged secret meetings with representatives of the PLO. It was the last straw.

In 1980, Jewish voters abandoned Carter—first for Sen. Edward Kennedy in the primaries, and then for Gov. Ronald Reagan and Illinois Rep. John Anderson in the general election. Carter won only 45% of the Jewish vote (compared to 66% this past November for Vice President Kamala Harris); Reagan got 39%. This was the worst showing among Jewish voters for a Democratic presidential candidate since James Cox in 1920. Jews voted against Carter for the same reasons as other Americans, but his policy towards Israel undoubtedly led to the drop in his share of the Jewish vote from 71% in 1976.

Carter’s disdain for Israel’s leaders is a recurring theme in his diary, referring to them as “obstinate and difficult,” “recalcitrant” and “intransigent.” For example, Yitzhak Rabin was “ineffective,” “timid, stubborn and also somewhat ill at ease.” Begin, who he initially believed was “congenial, dedicated, sincere and deeply religious,” became “a small man with a limited vision.” Carter wrote after one meeting at Begin’s home that he had “rarely been so disgusted in all my life.” By contrast, he found Sadat “charming,” “strong and courageous.” After the three men received the Nobel Peace Prize, Carter wrote: “Sadat deserved it; Begin did not.”

Carter partly blamed his electoral defeat on the Jews, and his animus was reflected in his post-presidency statements and writings. His attitude towards Israel was also influenced by his conviction that Begin lied to him (he didn’t) about freezing settlements.

While he is rightly lauded for his humanitarian work, his antisemitism tarnished his legacy. His book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, was filled with falsehoods and the misrepresentation of history. He even contradicts the calumny in the title when he says, “The driving purpose for the forced separation of the two peoples is unlike that in South Africa.”

Even though he helped facilitate Israel’s peace with Egypt, which included the evacuation of Sinai, Carter repeatedly asserts that Israel does not want peace, is stealing Palestinian land, and refuses to trade land for peace.

Michael Oren, former Israeli ambassador to the United States, said when he reviewed the book that he was shocked by Carter’s “not-so-subtle antisemitism.” Oren also noted that Carter was a Hamas apologist.

Professor Deborah Lipstadt criticized his insinuations about Jewish control of media and government. Carter was angry about the negative comments about his book, and even as he was making the rounds promoting the book in the press, he complained about the “tremendous intimidation in our country that has silenced” Israel’s critics.

Sadly, the former president became one more anti-Israel propagandist, demonizing the Jewish state at every opportunity and spouting the one-sided narrative of the antisemites.

As I wrote in a review of the book, few, if any, Jews realized just how nefarious Carter’s views were until he left office. In retrospect, their votes against him may have saved Israel.

The post Jimmy Carter Was No Saint for Jews first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Tourists Stranded in Israel as Sirens Sound, Missiles Fly, Planes Grounded

FILE PHOTO: A worker at Ben Gurion International Airport in Israel sits at the arrivals terminal as all flights from and to the airport are indicated cancel, following an Israeli attack on Iran. June 13, 2025 Photo: REUTERS/Tomer Appelbaum

Woken by air raid sirens, hurrying to bomb shelters, scouring travel sites for escape routes — thousands of tourists in Israel have found their holiday plans upended by the country’s conflict with Iran.

Israel launched a surprise attack on Iran in the early hours of Friday, shutting down the national airspace and telling people to remain where they were as the arch Middle East foes traded deadly blows.

The violence has left around 40,000 tourists blocked in Israel, according to the Ministry of Tourism. Airlines are cancelling flights until further notice, leaving travelers to decide whether to wait it out or seek costly detours through neighboring countries.

Justin Joyner, from California, is on holiday in Jerusalem with his father John, who lives in Nevada, and his son. They had expected some possible disruption, with Israel locked in a months-long conflict against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip.

But, like most locals, they did not foresee a whole new war.

“We didn’t expect Israel to attack Iran. That is a completely different level of escalation,” Joyner said from his hotel in East Jerusalem, which, for the past two nights, has seen Iranian ballistic missiles flash overhead like a rain of meteorites.

“It’s unsettling to feel the shockwaves of intercepted missiles above you, and to take your family down to a bomb shelter. That’s just something we don’t think about in America,” he said.

Dr. Greer Glazer, who lives in Cleveland and was in Jerusalem for a nursing training program, faces a race down 10 flights of stairs in her hotel to reach the shelter when sirens sound — as they have done regularly since Friday night.

“I feel safe,” she said, “but waking from a dead sleep and running to the safe room, that’s been the hardest. My family is scared to death … They think it’s 24/7 destruction, but it’s not like that.”

THE JORDAN ROUTE

Glazer had been due to return home on June 29, but is looking to bring forward her departure. The easiest exit route is via land crossings into neighboring Jordan and then a flight out of Amman airport which has been operating in daylight hours.

Israeli media reported that the transgender US influencer Caitlyn Jenner, who only flew into Israel on Thursday for Tel Aviv’s since-canceled Gay Pride Parade, had left through Jordan.

Hours earlier, she had been photographed drinking a glass of red wine in a bomb shelter. “What an incredible way it has been to celebrate Shabbat,” she wrote on X.

Not everyone is rushing to leave.

Karen Tuhrim is visiting from London to see her daughter, who lives in Tel Aviv. “Within two days of being here, Israel attacked Iran. So now I’m stuck,” she said.

Unlike Jerusalem, Tel Aviv has taken direct hits from the Iranian missiles and Tuhrim has had to dip in and out of her hotel’s shelter. But she said she felt safe and was happy to be near her daughter.

“For me, personally, at the moment, I feel better being here than in London, watching it all on the news, knowing my daughter is here. So, for now, we’re good.”

Israel’s Ministry of Tourism has set up a round-the-clock virtual help desk in English and Hebrew for stranded travelers.

But for anyone stuck here, all the museums are closed until further notice, entrance to the Old City of Jerusalem is barred to non-residents and many shops remain shuttered.

“The streets and shops are empty,” said Jerusalem resident Anwar Abu Lafi, who saw no quick end to the gloom.

“People are yearning for a break, to find something good in this existing darkness. We are deluding ourselves into thinking that the future will be better,” he said.

The post Tourists Stranded in Israel as Sirens Sound, Missiles Fly, Planes Grounded first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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4 Killed by Missile in Arab Town of Tamra, Including a Mother and Her Two Daughters

Illustrative: A Magen David Adom ambulance. Photo: David King via Wikimedia Commons.

i24 NewsIn the early hours of Sunday morning, the Arab town of Tamra in northern Israel was struck by an Iranian missile, tragically claiming the lives of four women from the same family, including a mother and her two daughters, aged 13 and 20.

The missile caused severe damage, nearly collapsing the three- to four-story building where they lived.

Emergency services responded quickly, evacuating 14 injured individuals and providing care for eight others suffering from shock at Rambam Hospital in Haifa.

Despite the devastation, the community and first responders showed remarkable resilience and solidarity, working tirelessly to assist those affected.

Eli Bin, director general of Magen David Adom, described the scene as one of severe destruction but praised the swift and professional response of rescue teams. Paramedic Adnan Abu Rumi, one of the first on site, emphasized the dedication of emergency personnel in managing the crisis.

Residents like Hamudi, who was injured but survived, shared heartfelt accounts of the sudden impact, underscoring the strength of families and neighbors coming together in difficult times.

The post 4 Killed by Missile in Arab Town of Tamra, Including a Mother and Her Two Daughters first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Trump Sees Peace Between Iran and Israel Soon, Eyes Putin Role

Russian President Vladimir Putin delivers a speech during a session of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. Photo: Reuters/Maxim Shemetov

Despite evidence that the conflict between Israel and Iran is escalating, US President Donald Trump expressed optimism on Sunday that peace would come soon and cited the possibility that Russia’s Vladimir Putin could help.

In a social media post, Trump said there were many unspecified meetings about the issue happening and encouraged the two countries to make a deal. And in an interview with ABC News, he said he was open to Putin, whose forces invaded Ukraine and who has resisted Trump’s attempts to broker a ceasefire with Kyiv, serving as a mediator.

Israel and Iran launched fresh attacks on each other overnight into Sunday, killing scores.

“Iran and Israel should make a deal, and will make a deal,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social site. “We will have PEACE, soon, between Israel and Iran! Many calls and meetings now taking place.”

Trump did not offer any details about the meetings or evidence of progress toward peace. His assertion contradicted comments by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who said on Saturday that Israel’s campaign against Iran would intensify.

A White House spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a request for comment on how Trump and the White House were working to de-escalate the situation in the Middle East.

Trump told ABC News that Iran wanted to make a deal and indicated something like the Israel strikes would accelerate that. “Something like this had to happen because I think even from both sides, but something like this had to happen. They want to talk, and they will be talking,” Trump said, according to ABC reporter Rachel Scott. “May have forced a deal to go quicker, actually.”

The United States has engaged in talks with Iran about its nuclear program and Trump has told reporters previously that the talks were going well. But another round of discussions scheduled for Sunday in Oman was canceled after the Israeli and Iranian strikes.

Trump said he and Putin had discussed the situation in the Middle East on Saturday in a call that focused more on that conflict than the Russian war in Ukraine.

“He is ready. He called me about it,” Trump said about Putin serving as a mediator, according to Scott. “We had a long talk about it. We talked about this more than his situation. This is something I believe is going to get resolved.”

Trump, who portrays himself as a peacemaker and has drawn criticism from his political base for not being able to prevent the Israel-Iran conflict, cited other disputes that he took responsibility for solving, including between India and Pakistan, and lamented not receiving more praise for doing so.

“I do a lot, and never get credit for anything, but that’s OK, the PEOPLE understand. MAKE THE MIDDLE EAST GREAT AGAIN!” he wrote on Truth Social.

The post Trump Sees Peace Between Iran and Israel Soon, Eyes Putin Role first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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