The Resuscitated Carter Becomes a Burden

He was deemed one of the worst presidents in history. Then, multiplying peace initiatives and pocketing the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002, he obtained the official title of “Best Ex-President” of the United States. Today, at 83 years old, Jimmy Carter is at the center of controversy. This week he stood in silence at Yasser Arafat’s grave in Ramallah. He met with chief Palestinian Hamas leaders, one of which, Khaled Machaal, is currently in exile in Syria. He also caught up with the Syrian President Bachar el-Assad. It was too much: people are demanding his skin.

Struck down by the Republican Ronald Regan, Jimmy Carter saw himself obligated to leave the White House in 1981, a unique four year term that Americans considered disastrous. He left the economy on its knees with two figure inflation. In the face of Iran and the hostage crises, he proved “softness” and indecision that he was not forgiven for.

At 56 years old, becoming one of the youngest ex-Presidents in history, Jimmy Carter found himself miserable, returning to his home in the small town of Plains with 600 inhabitants in the middle of Georgia. His party turned its back on him. They only asked that he disappeared. “Coming back home I realized that I still had at least 25 years left to live”, he later explained. “What was I going to do with 25 more years?”

Creating the Carter Foundation in Atlanta, the ex-President refused to disappear. Bible in hand and a smile on his lips, he traveled the world to promote democracy, aiding in development and conflict resolution. His missions led him everywhere: Panama, Nicaragua, Indonesia, Ethiopia… In 1994, President Bill Clinton gave him another chance: his intervention in Haiti convinced the military junta to clean itself up in order to avoid an American invasion. In Cuba, 2002, he asked the United States to lift the trade embargo. Already the Republicans accused him of bowing before all of the dictators and terrorists on the planet. Even if he couldn’t silence his critics, the Nobel Prize crowns his efforts.

Irony: it is the Near-East that will break this Lazarus’ teeth. However, it is the terrain that his success was undeniable. Negotiations in Camp David in 1978: Jimmy Carter brought together the Egyptian Anouar el-Sadate and Israeli Menahem Begin. Since then, the region has never experienced calm. But between these two countries, peace still holds.

Does Jimmy Carter still settle these old scores? Is he feeling unaccomplished? “One of the principal goals of my life… was to help guarantee peace between the Israelis and other Middle Eastern countries”, he wrote in his book published in 2006. This book, however, strikes nerves. Its title alone shows which side the ex-President leans towards: Palestine. Peace, not apartheid, proclaims the cover, which also features a photo of a concrete wall erected by the Israelis and a picture of Jimmy Carter with a worried look. “I was treated as a liar. I was treated as an anti-Semite; I was treated as a bigot. They accused me of plagiary and of being a coward. Perhaps they had touched me personally, but these accusations did not affect the factual and necessary character of my book”, he justified.

On the eve of his Near-East tour, dozens of politicians, Republicans and Democrats, addressed a letter to the ex-President in order to change his mind. The White House overtly expressed its anger. On Fox News, the conservative network, they demanded that Jimmy Carter’s passport be revoked to stop him from leaving the country. In Israel, no one besides Shimon Peres deigned to meet with the American. Contrary to all customs, the Hebrew state even refused to offer him a security escort. In the eyes of the Israelis as well, Jimmy Carter could disappear without regret.

Was this meeting with proclaimed Hamas terrorist leaders useless? An absurd initiative and purposeless mission that he admitted himself was not the slightest bit official? The whim of the old man has embarrassed him to the highest point with his political friends. Barack Obama pointed out a “fundamental conflict” with Carter. He who proclaimed he is willing to speak with the enemies of America assured that he “cannot negotiate with a terrorist group whose objective is the destruction of Israel”.

De facto, an electoral year is the worst time for undertaking this type of initiative. Like the Blacks’ vote, the womens’ or the workers’, the Jewish vote is up for grabs. And in this context Jimmy Carter, whose role as one of his party’s superdelegates, who play an important role in the nomination of a Democratic candidate, has made himself a burden.