I believe President Jimmy Carter wrote a strong letter below.
Stop the Band-Aid Treatment
By Jimmy Carter
The Washington Post
Tuesday 01 August 2006
We need policies for a real, lasting Middle East peace.
The Middle East is a tinderbox, with some key players on all sides waiting for every opportunity to destroy their enemies with bullets, bombs and missiles. One of the special vulnerabilities of Israel, and a repetitive cause of violence, is the holding of prisoners. Militant Palestinians and Lebanese know that a captured Israeli soldier or civilian is either a cause of conflict or a valuable bargaining chip for prisoner exchange. This assumption is based on a number of such trades, including 1,150 Arabs, mostly Palestinians, for three Israeli soldiers in 1985; 123 Lebanese for the remains of two Israeli soldiers in 1996; and 433 Palestinians and others for an Israeli businessman and the bodies of three soldiers in 2004.
This stratagem precipitated the renewed violence that erupted in June when Palestinians dug a tunnel under the barrier that surrounds Gaza and assaulted some Israeli soldiers, killing two and capturing one. They offered to exchange the soldier for the release of 95 women and 313 children who are among almost 10,000 Arabs in Israeli prisons, but this time Israel rejected a swap and attacked Gaza in an attempt to free the soldier and stop rocket fire into Israel. The resulting destruction brought reconciliation between warring Palestinian factions and support for them throughout the Arab world.
Hezbollah militants then killed three Israeli soldiers and captured two others, and insisted on Israel’s withdrawal from disputed territory and an exchange for some of the several thousand incarcerated Lebanese. With American backing, Israeli bombs and missiles rained down on Lebanon. Hezbollah rockets from Syria and Iran struck northern Israel.
It is inarguable that Israel has a right to defend itself against attacks on its citizens, but it is inhumane and counterproductive to punish civilian populations in the illogical hope that somehow they will blame Hamas and Hezbollah for provoking the devastating response. The result instead has been that broad Arab and worldwide support has been rallied for these groups, while condemnation of both Israel and the United States has intensified.
Israel belatedly announced, but did not carry out, a two-day cessation in bombing Lebanon, responding to the global condemnation of an air attack on the Lebanese village of Qana, where 57 civilians were killed this past weekend and where 106 died from the same cause 10 years ago. As before there were expressions of “deep regret,” a promise of “immediate investigation” and the explanation that dropped leaflets had warned families in the region to leave their homes. The urgent need in Lebanon is that Israeli attacks stop, the nation’s regular military forces control the southern region, Hezbollah cease as a separate fighting force, and future attacks against Israel be prevented. Israel should withdraw from all Lebanese territory, including Shebaa Farms, and release the Lebanese prisoners. Yet yesterday, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert rejected a cease-fire.
These are ambitious hopes, but even if the U.N. Security Council adopts and implements a resolution that would lead to such an eventual solution, it will provide just another band-aid and temporary relief. Tragically, the current conflict is part of the inevitably repetitive cycle of violence that results from the absence of a comprehensive settlement in the Middle East, exacerbated by the almost unprecedented six-year absence of any real effort to achieve such a goal.
Leaders on both sides ignore strong majorities that crave peace, allowing extremist-led violence to preempt all opportunities for building a political consensus. Traumatized Israelis cling to the false hope that their lives will be made safer by incremental unilateral withdrawals from occupied areas, while Palestinians see their remnant territories reduced to little more than human dumping grounds surrounded by a provocative “security barrier” that embarrasses Israel’s friends and that fails to bring safety or stability.
The general parameters of a long-term, two-state agreement are well known. There will be no substantive and permanent peace for any peoples in this troubled region as long as Israel is violating key U.N. resolutions, official American policy and the international “road map” for peace by occupying Arab lands and oppressing the Palestinians. Except for mutually agreeable negotiated modifications, Israel’s official pre-1967 borders must be honored. As were all previous administrations since the founding of Israel, U.S. government leaders must be in the forefront of achieving this long-delayed goal.
A major impediment to progress is Washington’s strange policy that dialogue on controversial issues will be extended only as a reward for subservient behavior and will be withheld from those who reject U.S. assertions. Direct engagement with the Palestine Liberation Organization or the Palestinian Authority and the government in Damascus will be necessary if secure negotiated settlements are to be achieved. Failure to address the issues and leaders involved risks the creation of an arc of even greater instability running from Jerusalem through Beirut, Damascus, Baghdad and Tehran.
The people of the Middle East deserve peace and justice, and we in the international community owe them our strong leadership and support.
By Former president Carter is the founder of the nonprofit Carter Center in Atlanta.
Here are my thoughts:
I would like to express my support for this letter and the call for US leadership in the region. I whole heartedly agree with President Carter’s statement “The people of the Middle East deserve peace and justice, and we in the international community owe them our strong leadership and support.” I believe we Christians also need to critically think about the one-sided support of Israel because of so called blessing promised if we support Israel. I have heard this statement too many times and I would like to condemn this false teaching. I do not believe that the current state of Israel represents God’s people of the Hebrew Scriptures. Just because a nation has the name Israel does not mean that they are God’ chosen people. I believe that Jesus did not come to create a political nation to control a geographic location nor did he ever support this type of narrow theology of land. When he talked about inheriting eternal life he spoke about the love of neighbor and God that save people. He did not talk about land rights or military strategy to set up an earthly kingdom. One of the saddest days in church for me happened in Washington, DC where a preacher told my wife and I that the Palestinians were just “collateral damage” to God setting up his kingdom.
Also I would like to oppose any violent means to liberate the Arab people, especially the Palestinians. I went to a march a few weeks ago to support the Palestinian people and the main speaker decried the nonviolent activists who oppose violent means. I would like to say that I do no support violence in achieving political goals.
Lastly, I would like to challenge my friends who do not know Arab Christians to take some time build relationships in these cultures. It is a poverty to only receive one side of the story. I feel like many Christians flock to the Messianic Jewish churches, but the Arab churches are left alone. I hope that this blog may encourage a few of my friends to think about the Arab Christians caught in the middle of warring sides. I think it is a well written letter describing the events that are taking place. I hope that it makes a difference in the war raging in the Middle East.
Twin Island
Wandering Thoughts 2 