The Famous Global Elders in the Holy Land

The Elders, a group that has drawn together important political and cultural figures, from former presidents and prime ministers to Nobel Peace Prize laureates, travels to the “hot spots” of the world in order in attempt to put out the fires, so to speak, by resolving conflicts and addressing political and social differences. Nelson Mandela formed “The Elders” in 2007, on the day the former South African President celebrated his 89th birthday.

Among the Elders who visited Jerusalem were former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu, former Brazilian President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, former President of Ireland and United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson, former Norwegian Prime Minister Gro Brundtland, Indian women’s rights activist Ela Bhatt, and businessmen Richard Brandon and Jeff Skoll. They met Israeli President Shimon Peres, as well as the leaders of the National Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) and Prime Minister Salam Fayyed.

As for the reasons why Jimmy Carter and the Elders came to the Holy Land, they said: “[We come to the Middle East] to promote peace and try to encourage people to participate, and to engage people in the peace process…. So we go not to teach but to learn.”

It is almost touching to see that Jimmy Carter, in his naiveté and pathos, actually believes that peace can be established between Jews and Arabs, that the Israelis will take his advice and that the Palestinians will accept his help. The man who was president of the United States from 1977 to 1981 cried when he saw the ruins in Gaza and the destroyed dwellings in the Israeli towns of Sderot and Ashkeon, which had been damaged by rockets fired by hateful Palestinians.

Carter did not shed crocodile tears. Nevertheless, he remains a pragmatic, big-hearted American, who oversimplifies things. For instance, he summarizes the war in Gaza in January 2009 thus: “rudimentary rockets had been launched from Gaza toward nearby Jewish communities, and Israel had wreaked havoc with bombs, missiles, and ground invading forces.” According to the “Goldstone Report,” both parties were guilty of “war crimes,” and, as expected, both the Israelis and the Palestinians denied the accusations. Carter agrees with the report and strongly emphasizes the fact that the South African judge Richard Goldstone, one of the world’s most respected jurists, is an honest and deeply religious Jewish man.

A year after the unfortunate conflicts, Carter is filled with compassion towards the residents of Gaza, who are forced to live in a ghetto surrounded by an impenetrable wall. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, whose houses had been destroyed “on purpose,” are forced to live in makeshift tents.

Everything the American president committed to paper is true; however, there is one thing Carter forgets to mention: the terrorist regime of the fundamentalist Hamas members in Gaza. A group of extremist criminals have taken over Gaza in an armed coup, separating 1.5 million Palestinians from the rest of the Palestinian Authority. The former U.S. president chastises the Israelis, the Americans, the U.N. and the European Union, as well as the filthy-rich oil sheiks, for ignoring the suffering of the Palestinians.

The famous global Elders, led by Carter, demand that the rebuilding of Gaza be started. In the appeal that was also published by Hebrew daily newspaper Yedioth Ahronot, the most famous Elder writes: “The cries of homeless and freezing people demand relief.”