Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas released a statement on Monday mourning the death of former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, whom he praised for acknowledging the “realities of Israeli apartheid.”
In the statement, which Abbas’s office posted on social media, the P.A. chief called Carter, who died on Dec. 29 at the age of 100, an “extraordinary statesman and global peacemaker” and “the first American president who recognized the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination.”
The statement continued, “He spoke boldly against injustice, including addressing the realities of Israeli apartheid. A man of courage, moral integrity, humanity and diplomacy, President Carter was an inspiration to generations and a beacon of hope for all who believed in the power of justice and compassion.”
This public message was in contrast to the private letter that Abbas sent in 2018 to the family of former U.S. President George H.W. Bush upon his passing. Reports about it in the Palestinian media featured a laconic synopsis, saying only that the missive expressed “sincere sympathy and condolences.”
Carter, who brokered the Camp David Accords that led to the 1979 peace treaty between Israel and Egypt, was an advocate of Palestinian statehood. In 2006, he published the controversial book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid.
In 2015, he said in an interview with Israeli Channel 2 that Hamas politburo chief Khaled Mashaal was not a terrorist. Mashaal “is strongly in favor of the peace process,” Carter asserted, while claiming that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was not “in favor of a two-state solution.”
