Snow won't defend Bush from Carter attacks

Jimmy Carter at 2004 Democratic convent

Former President Jimmy Carter has called the United States' policy of refusing to recognize and support terrorist organizations "criminal," but White House spokesman Tony Snow has declared he won't defend President Bush in such verbal assaults.

"The president has made it a graceful point of his administration not to respond to critiques from ex-presidents. And I think I will continue to try to maintain that sense of decorum," he told Les Kinsolving, WND's White House correspondent.

Kinsolving had asked about the condemnation from Carter, who in the past has said he is convinced Democratic candidate Al Gore won the 2000 presidential election and Bush should not really be in the White House.

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"The AP in Dublin has just quoted President Jimmy Carter as saying to Ireland's 8th Annual Forum on Human Rights, 'The Bush administration's refusal to accept the 2006 election victory of Hamas was criminal.' Any my question, surely President Bush has some disagreement with this Carter crime … accusation, and Carter's support of terrorists?" Kinsolving asked.

But Snow would not be prompted into a response. "You understand that sometimes social graces are something worth demonstrating in public," he said.

Carter also had said that the conflict between the Palestinian organizations Hamas and Fatah is at least partly the fault of the United States.

Carter said the American idea of sending aid to a new government in the West Bank, but not to do the same for the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip, is no more than an "effort to divide Palestinians into two peoples."

The ex-president said Hamas won a fair and democratic mandate and it should have the opportunity to lead the Palestinian government.

In just the last week or so, Hamas fighters have ejected Fatah from the Gaza Strip.

But Carter said the U.S. has shunned Hamas and helped Fatah, an action he called "criminal."

Weblog participants were astounded at his comments. "I just don't understand what former president Carter is thinking. Hamas IS a criminal organization. … In the United States, we do not welcome terrorist organizations," wrote "Delta."

As WND has reported, Carter also recently called Bush's administration, the "worst in history."

And he has criticized the relationship between Bush and British Prime Ministry Tony Blair, calling it "abominable."

As WND also previously reported, five years after the controversial 2000 presidential election, ex-President Jimmy Carter announced he was certain Al Gore actually defeated George W. Bush.

"Well I would say that in the year 2000, the country failed abysmally in the presidential election process," Carter told a panel at American University in Washington, D.C. "There's no doubt in my mind that Al Gore was elected president."

"[Gore] received the most votes nationwide, and in my opinion, he also received the most votes in Florida," Carter continued. "And the decision was made as you know by a 5-4 vote on a highly partisan basis by the U.S. Supreme Court, so I would say in 2000, there was a failure."

Carter also has blamed the conflict in the Mideast on Israel, and has complained that a Holocaust Council had too many Jews.

 

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