Jimmy Carter unveils truth about Israel

Video Transcript:

Welcome back to Hardball. We're back with a 39th president of the United States, Jimmy Carter. His new book is called Palestine. Peace, not apartheid. And President Carter, why did you use the word apartheid in the book's title? Well, let's look at the entire title, if you don't mind. The first word is Palestine, which involves the land it belongs to the Palestinians, not the Israelis. I didn't refer to Israel because there's no semblance of anything relating to apartheid within the nation of Israel. And also, emphasize the word not, that is peace and not apartheid. That's what I hope to accomplish with this book is some move toward that goal. But there's no doubt that within the occupied territory is Palestinian land, that there is a horrendous example of apartheid. The occupation of Palestinian land, the confiscation of that land it does belong to Israel, the building of settlements on it, the colonization of that land, and then the connection of those isolated but multiple settlements, more than 200 of them, with each other by highways, on which Palestinians can't travel, and quite often where Palestinians cannot even cross. So, the persecution of the Palestinians now into the occupied territories under the occupation forces is one of the worst examples of human rights depravation that I know. And I think it's... Even worse though than a place like Rwanda? Yes, I think, yes. You mean, you know? Yes, yes. I think the oppression now of the Israelis, of the Palestinians by the Israelis, is worse than a situation in Africa like the oppression of Rwanda and the civil war. I'm not going back into ancient history about Rwanda, but right now, the persecution of the Palestinians is one of the worst examples of human rights abuse. I know, because of Rwanda. You're talking about right now. You're not talking about saying it about ancient history. No. Rwanda wasn't ancient history, it was just a few years ago. You could talk about Rwanda if you want to. I want to talk about Palestine. What is being done to the Palestinians now is horrendous in their own territory by the occupying powers, which is Israel. They've taken away all the basic human rights of the Palestinians as was done in South Africa against the Blacks. And I make it very plain in this book that the apartheid is not based on racism as it was in South Africa, but it's based on the desire of a minority of Israelis to acquire land that belongs to the Palestinians and to retain that land. And then to exclude the Palestinians from their own property and subjugate them so that they can arouse and demonstrate that disapproval of being robbed of their own property. That's what's happening in the West Bank and the people in this country, in America. Never know about this. They never discussed this. There's no debate about it. There's no criticism of Israel in this country. And in Israel, there's an intense debate about the issues in this book. In this country, no. I agree. I wish we had that sort of debate that they're having in Israel. I wish we had that in the United States, but give us a sort of sense. How much of the responsibility for the conflict, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, do you think belongs to the Israelis for their tactics like seizing land and occupying territory that didn't belong to them? How much of it is responsible to the Palestinians for their suicide terror attacks and their bombings within Israel proper? Well, as a matter of fact, the basic cause of the conflict is a sustained occupation of other people's land by the Israelis. And this is a direct violation of the United Nations resolutions. It's a direct violation of the International Quartet road map. It's a direct violation of the commitments that leaders of Israel have made in the past that can't David when I was president and in Oslo promising that Israel would withdraw from occupied territories. They have failed to do so. In response to that, and I'm not excusing them, there have been acts of violence. As a matter of fact, though, Hamas, the number one accused persons of violence, have not committed an act of suicide bombing that caused an Israel in life now since the August 2004. And I hope that they won't do that anymore. Other participants are the Palestinian society, smaller ones have committed so much atrocities. But the loss of life in the entire occupied territories has been horrendous.