Tit For Tat

Mr. Peanut gets the cold shoulder in the capital of his enemies:

Former President Jimmy Carter brokered the first Israeli-Arab peace deal, but he's getting a cool reception in Israel during his latest visit to the Mideast.

Israeli leaders are shunning the globe-trotting peacemaker for planning to meet with Khaled Mashaal, the head of Israel's archenemy Hamas, and comparing the Jewish state's policies to apartheid.

A schedule released by the Atlanta-based Carter Center showed no plans for the former president to meet any of Israel's key players: Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni or Defense Minister Ehud Barak during this week's visit, which began Sunday.

The only high-ranking official on Carter's schedule was Israel's ceremonial head of state, President Shimon Peres. The 83-year-old former U.S. leader held a closed meeting with Peres shortly after arriving Sunday.

If I may translate: the Olmert regime is miffed because Carter beat him to Damasus and to the smooching of Hamas' (and Bashar Assad's) ceremonial anus.  I'd wager the Squire of Plains didn't try all that hard to accomodate Israeli officials' "scheduling conflicts," either.  So much for "listening to all sides."

But then, why bother when you do not, after all, have "an open mind"?:

"I think there's no doubt in anyone's mind that, if Israel is ever going to find peace with justice concerning the relationship with their next-door neighbors, the Palestinians, that Hamas will have to be included in the process."...

"I think that it's very important that at least someone meet with the Hamas leaders to express their views, to ascertain what flexibility they have, to try to induce them to stop all attacks against innocent civilians in Israel and to cooperate with the Fatah as a group that unites the Palestinians, maybe to get them to agree to a cease-fire - things of this kind," he said. 

Gentlebeings, there is naivete, and then there is deliberate, contemptuous deception.  Jimmy Carter is a fool.  Always has been.  But even fools are not this foolish.  Yet he gives every indication of believing that we, his self-declared moral inferiors, are that chowder-headed and more.  And if we refuse to be, well, that's just redundant proof of our moral inferiority.

"The Hamas leaders" have gone to great and repeated lengths to "express their views" - to wit, that Israel has no right to exist, Jews have no right to live, and Hamas fully intends to finish the "job" Adolph Hitler started - both with vitriolic words and serial acts of terrorist warfare.  Talking to those animals will accomplish nothing other than to add to their unmerited veneer of prestige and legitimacy as "partners" in a "peace" they will never allow and which will never be realized as long as a single one of them continues to live.

And that's exactly why Sharkboy is meeting with them - without "scheduling conflicts".

Too harsh?  Too cynical?  Shall I point out Carter's previous port of call - Nepal - "where his team of observers from the Carter Center monitored an election that appeared likely to transform rule by royal dynasty into a [']democracy['] with former Maoist rebels in a strong position, judging by incomplete returns."

Why is it every election Jimmy Carter "observes" always seems to get stolen by the commies?

Come to think of it, didn't his "center" "observe" Hamas' 2005 Palestinian election triumph as well?

If anything, I'm giving that grinning, glad-handing sack of bleep the benefit of the doubt.