On December 29, former President Jimmy Carter died at the age of 100. As the 39th President of the United States and a private citizen, Carter was an advocate for peace among nations, democracy, and various humanitarian and environmental causes. But in the Middle East, he will be remembered as the father of Arab-Israeli normalization.
Sworn in as president in 1977, Carter was given the opportunity by Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to be the architect of the first normalization agreement between an Arab country and the Zionist state. He helped Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin conclude the 1978 Camp David Accords and negotiate the 1979 Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty that officially ended the conflict between the two countries.
As the events of the past four decades have shown, neither the accords nor the treaty have led to peace and justice in the Middle East. Israel continues its occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem and has launched a genocidal war in the Gaza Strip; the Palestinians still do not have an independent state with Jerusalem as its capital; and an overwhelming majority of Arab public opinion refuses to recognize Israel or agree to normalize relations with it.
Looking at the agreements negotiated by Carter, it is clear that they marked the beginning of a slow and gradual, although not publicly acknowledged, abandonment of the Palestinian cause by Arab authorities, and of a US campaign to bury Palestinian national aspirations.
The legacy of Camp David
The Camp David Accords were, above all, a road map to full peace between Egypt and Israel, Egypt’s full recognition of Israel, and an end to Egypt’s participation in the Arab economic boycott of Israel. . Of course, these agreements were only a simple framework for negotiations between the two countries which would lead a few months later to the signing of a peace treaty.
But they also included provisions relating to the Palestinian people, the wording of which was indicative of the ultimate goal of the agreements. The document spoke of a plan to give “autonomy” to the “inhabitants” of the occupied territory, as if Palestinians were foreigners squatting in the West Bank and Gaza.
At the time, the United States had not yet recognized the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people. Thus, the agreements provided for the election of an “autonomous authority” for the occupied territory. But this autonomy and elected authority were to be overseen by Israel, Egypt and Jordan, in clear violation of the Palestinians’ right to form an independent national government.
Throughout the 1980s, and due to US-backed Israeli objections, Palestinians were absent and prevented from playing a role in developing peace plans for the Arab-Israeli and Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But the outbreak of the first Intifada in December 1987 and Jordan’s abandonment of its claims to the West Bank in 1988 made it clear that the Palestinians could no longer be ignored in peace negotiations.
However, in 1991, Palestinians participating in the Madrid Conference were only present as part of a Jordanian delegation, once again denying their national belonging.
Like other iterations of the US-led and sponsored “peace process”, the Madrid path has led to a stalemate, as Israel continues to ignore the national rights of the Palestinians and reject any discussions aimed at end its occupation. After the 1992 Israeli elections that brought the Labor Party to power, the United States led the Oslo Accords between the PLO and Israel that created the Palestinian National Authority (PA). As the government constituted for the Palestinians, the PA was required to recognize Israel’s right to exist before obtaining official Israeli recognition of Palestinian grievances and national aspirations.
Jordan, for its part, had to sign a peace treaty with Israel, becoming the second Arab state after Egypt to recognize the Zionist state. All that Amman has been able to preserve from its relations with Palestine is the custody of religious sites in Jerusalem, a status which is today constantly questioned by the Israeli authorities.
The Abraham Accords
Throughout the so-called “peace process” launched by the Camp David Accords, the United States has been keen to encourage Arab states to consider their interests separately from those of the Palestinians. This encouragement has become a full-fledged campaign under the presidency of Donald Trump, who, along with his administration lieutenants, has demonstrated more than the usual American bias in favor of the Zionist state.
In 2020, Trump presided over the signing of the so-called Abraham Accords that normalized relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco. Sudan joined the following year.
While all relevant Arab states have insisted that normalizing relations with Israel would help improve the lives of Palestinians and should not be seen as abandoning them, the truth is that they all got something in exchange for recognition of Israel without regard to Palestinian interests.
The UAE’s normalization with Israel appears to be the fastest and deepest. The two countries have rapidly developed and expanded their military and economic relations. Bahrain sought to use its relations with Israel as a hedge against an aggressive Iran. Morocco has received the much-anticipated recognition by the United States of its sovereignty over Western Sahara. And Sudan was able to get removed from the American list of state sponsors of terrorism.
Certainly, the Abraham Accords were nothing more than transactions that advanced the interests of the signatories at the expense of the Palestinian cause, thereby allowing Israel to deepen its policy of apartheid and consolidate its occupation of Palestinian lands. .
And it is not difficult to observe in the next Trump administration a strong desire to expand the map of Arab normalization with Israel, including Saudi Arabia, for example. As was the case with previous normalization agreements, the Palestinians will be the last to count on the dividends of greater Arab openness towards Israel.
A welcome change of heart
After his presidential term ended, Carter continued to pursue his efforts for peace between Palestinians and Israelis. But the more he observed the situation on the ground, the more he became convinced that the American policy of unwavering support for Israel was wrong and counterproductive.
Thus, in 2007, he published a book entitled Palestine: Peace, Not Apartheid in which he declared that Israeli policy in the occupied Palestinian territories amounted to the crime of apartheid. This is a welcome reversal from a long-held belief among many American politicians and opinion makers. Carter remains the only prominent American politician brave enough to call Israeli policies and practices by their proper name.
As Americans mourn his death and remember his legacy, it is important to reflect on the United States’ disastrous policies in Palestine. Over the past four decades, the Israeli occupation has become increasingly violent, thanks in large part to unconditional support from the United States.
It is time for Washington to revise its position on the Israeli-Palestinian relationship. A reversal of U.S. policy toward Palestine – one that recognizes Palestinian rights and holds Israel accountable for its crimes – is something Jimmy Carter probably would have liked to see in his lifetime.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Tel Aviv Tribune.
