RAMALLAH, West Bank, 16 April 2008 — Former US President Jimmy Carter yesterday warmly embraced a leading Hamas figure in the West Bank and laid a wreath at the grave of Yasser Arafat, further antagonizing Israel as he pushed forward with his latest Middle East peace mission.
Israel and the West Bank are the first stops on a visit that is also to include Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and Syria — where the Hamas movement is headquartered. Shunned by his Israeli hosts and criticized by the White House for his willingness to meet Hamas, Carter has urged that both stop isolating the group.
“Since Syria and Hamas will have to be involved in a final peace agreement, they have to be involved in discussions that lead to final peace,” Carter said yesterday.
At a reception in the West Bank town of Ramallah organized by Carter’s office, the former president hugged Nasser Shaer, a senior Hamas politician, participants said. “He gave me a hug. We hugged each other, and it was a warm reception,” Shaer said. “Carter asked what he could do to achieve peace between the Palestinians and Israel... and I told him the possibility for peace is high.”
Shaer, who served as deputy prime minister and education minister in the Hamas-led Palestinian government that unraveled last year, is considered a leading member of the group’s pragmatic wing.
In another break with US policy, Carter placed a wreath at Arafat’s grave. The Bush administration has snubbed Arafat, the iconic Palestinian leader who died in 2004, blaming him for the breakdown of peace talks seven years ago and the violence that followed.
President George W. Bush did not visit Arafat’s mausoleum in Ramallah during his visit earlier this year.
Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said Carter’s meetings with Hamas “dignified” a group committed to Israel’s destruction. “One cannot but wonder how this attitude is supposed to promote peace and understanding,” he said. Both the US and Israeli governments have expressed displeasure at Carter’s overtures to Hamas. Carter is to meet Khaled Meshaal, the group’s exiled leader, in Damascus, Syria, on Friday.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is not meeting Carter during his visit, and the only Israeli leader to host him, President Shimon Peres, scolded him for his planned meeting with Meshaal.
Critics also say engaging Hamas will undermine moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas as he tries to make peace with the Jewish state. Abbas is in a bitter rivalry with Hamas, which routed his forces in the Gaza Strip last year and seized control of the area.
The Israeli daily Haaretz yesterday criticized the government for giving Carter a cool reception. “The boycott will not be remembered as a glorious moment in this government’s history,” the newspaper said.
“Jimmy Carter has dedicated his life to humanitarian missions, to peace, to promoting democratic elections and to better understanding between enemies throughout the world.”
