Jimmy Carter lays a wreath at late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s grave in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Tuesday, April 15, 2008.
Jerusalem
CNSNews.com
Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter laid a wreath of red roses at the grave of Palestinian Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat during a visit to the West Bank City of Ramallah on Tuesday.
“He and Mrs. Carter and his son Jeff wanted to pay their respects to President Arafat,” Carter’s trip director Rick Jasculca told Cybercast News Service. But the former president didn’t make any comments there, he said.
Dubbed the “godfather of terrorism,” Arafat was linked to the deaths of two American diplomats in the Sudan in 1973 — one of many terror acts laid at his feet.
On Tuesday, the Israeli government refused Carter’s request to visit Hamas-controlled Gaza. The former U.S. leader has angered the Israeli government over plans to meet Hamas’s top leader, Khaled Mashaal, in Syria on Friday.
Most visiting American dignitaries — including President Bush — have avoided Arafat’s tomb. Michaela Schweitzer-Bluhm, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Consulate in Jerusalem that handles Palestinian affairs, told Cybercast News Service that no active U.S. Executive Branch member had ever laid a wreath on Arafat’s grave.
Carter first met Arafat in 1990, when Arafat was leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization. According to a New York Times report, Carter praised Arafat as a peacemaker.
Years later, Carter led an international team in observing the first Palestinian Authority elections that gave Arafat the presidency. (Carter also observed the 2006 elections that brought Hamas an overwhelming parliamentary majority.)
Arafat was the most frequent visitor to President Bill Clinton’s White House. President Bush also dealt with Arafat at the beginning of his presidency, but after the Palestinian leader lied to Bush in early 2002 about a huge shipment of Iranian weapons bound for the P.A., he was shunned until his death in November 2004.
On Tuesday, Carter also had lunch with a dozen or so Palestinian civil society leaders and had what was described as a “wonderful round table” discussion with Palestinian youths that he and his wife enjoyed immensely, said Jasculca.
Wild Thing’s comment……..
Revoke his passport NOW ! The guy is SICK!! This is disgusting. Actions speak louder than words … if no one has the balls to pull his passport, then they ought to at least pull his Secret Service detail, paid for by the taxpayers, when this traitor is engaged in activities clearly against America’s interests and in support of terrorists.
The Carter Center
The Carter Center
One Copenhill
453 Freedom Parkway
Atlanta, GA 30307
Phone:
(404) 420-5100 or (800) 550-3560
I called the Carter Center, I asked the girl why on earth would Carter do this., put a wreath at Arafat’s Tomb.
She said she knew nothing about it.
I told her no you work at the Carter Center, you work FOR Jimmy Carter and you have to give me a reason for this disgusting thing Jimmy Carter has done.
She said, I don’t see that is a bad thing.
I told her Carter is a traitor to America, a disgusting human being and should not be allowed back into the United States of America.
She hung up on me.
Not quite sure what you could have been expecting, WT, having a conversation with someone who WORKS for the Carter Center. You’d have gotten a much more educated response from someone working the counter at McDonald’s or at your local Store 24.
I agree, this man NEEDS to have his security detail that WE taxpayer’s are footing the bill for – and his passport revoked. Isn’t there anyone in Washington who has even a small pair of balls looking into this for us?
Hi BT in SA, I pretty much figured whoever answered would hang up on me. But it sure felt good to at least say to someone there how I felt. haha
I have been trying to find an AP or reuters report because they just said on the news on TV that there are many in Washington D.C. that have spoken out this morning about what Carter is doing.
It is great to soee you BT in SA.
He has got to be senile with dementia. Is this a power trip with him? Make amends for America and all her bad faults with our enemies?
Poor Roslyn. Poor Lillian–not only did she have Billy, the family drunk but Jimmy too.
I wonder when was the last time he laid a reef on the grave on an American Soldier? I wonder when was the last time he visited the grave or families of any of the military personnel he left on the Iranian desert?
The girl at the Carter Center is a lier. First she said she didn’t know about him laying the reef and then she says she doesn’t see that as a bad thing.
You know what they say!! once an A-hole always
an A-hole..
Jimmy Carter should be sent to the Federal Supermax Prison in Florence, Colorado and placed in 23 1/2 hour per day isolation with an endless recording of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton campaign speeches piped into his cell for the rest of his life.
Treasonous bastard! Think it’s time my reps and Senators hear from me again. I don’t want any of my money paying for this jerk’s protection.(Who’d hurt him? The terrorists LIKE him.) this is absolutely vile and sickening.
Lynn, yes it is some really sick kind of power trip for sure.
Bob good point about the woman that was on the phone.
Your right too about Carter and when has he paid respects to our fallen soldiers.
Tincan Sailor, and yes and they are right about that too.
Les, oh my gosh I love it.
hahaha
PeteSuj, yes this kind of this really crosses the line.
And this SCUMBAG is a former LIVING U.S. President and U.S. Naval Officer… and doing this treasonous action during a time of war on islamofascism? No different than a NAZI that hung at Nuremberg in 1946….! My fellow Georgia Bulldog patriots are embarrassed, big time!