Cogito, I take strong exception to your depiction of the Camp David Accords as a "mirage". To the contrary, the Camp David Accords represent one of the very few lasting significant peace agreements in the Middle East!

Egypt and Israel were at each others throats for almost 30 years, yet since the accords in 1978 (1979? can't recall) there have been no hostilities between the two countries....especially beneficial because Egypt has/had one of the most fearsome armies in the entire Middle East.

On a broader scale, the lasting peace between Israel and Egypt has shown other countries in the Middle East that it CAN be done, removing the "BPR response" from their list of excuses ("it can't be done, so why even try").

About the ONLY negative thing I can think of regarding the Camp David Accords is that it allowed Israel to remove huge amounts of troops from the Israel/Egypt border to allow them to go adventuring in other places like Lebanon and Gaza.

I'm not sure how history will judge President Carter's recent trip to Hamas, but you do the man a great disservice by belittling the lasting impact of the Camp David Accords!
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Diagnosing Denise

The Camp David Accords certainly were no mirage, and Mr Carter expended substantial political capital just getting Mr's Begin and Sadat to formally agree. It was a particularly harrowing week for the former president as I'm confident that his son will agree.

You imply that a primary reason that the peace has lasted is, in part, due to the "fearsome" army possessed by Egypt. I remind you that is was not only Egypt that attacked Israel in 1967 (the conflict that Gaza reverted to Israeli control) but by Syria and Jordan as well. Egypt's president at the time (Nasser) thought by a surprise and coordinated multipronged offensive would destroy the Israeli state. His error cost him dearly, in fact after Egyptian forces crossed the Suez they were chased back across and humiliated on their own soil. Fearsome--NOT.

You degrade your credibility with personal innuendo by including off hand remarks such as the inference to huge amounts of Israeli soldiers to go adventuring elsewhere (Gaza & Lebanon).

As to another downside to the Accords, consider Mr Carter's ofference of replacing the oil production acquired by Israel in the 1967 War with US resources.

The 6 Day War in 1967 started when Israel conducted a preemptive air strike against the Egyptian Air force. Egypt, by the way, was already in the Sinai as it was their territory. Israel did push that army back across the Suez. Are you getting 1967 and 1973 confused?

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why Egypt has observed the independent state of Israel. Of course those dollars don't buy much anymore.

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Pretty soon you are talking about 4 days of war.

Mike, I am well aware of the outcome of the 1967 Yom Kippur war. On paper, Egypt had an enormous strategic advantage with regard to men and material, I believe it was something like a 3:1 advantage, so yes, before they fought they were indeed "fearsome".

With the luxury and benefit of 20/20 hindsight, historians have been able to figure out exactly what went wrong for the Egyptians, and how it went wrong so quickly: in a nutshell, the high command of the Egyptian army consisted of feckless yes-men political hacks (not unlike George Bush's weak politically-minded commanders of today...i.e. Gen. Richard Myers, Gen. Peter Pace and Gen. David Petraeus).

Egypt fought poorly, and they lost. I know Syria and Jordan fought alongside Egypt, they did even worse (I believe the Syrian army was totally annihilated). Israel executed very well, knocking out Egyptian air forces very early in the war and then used infantry and armor to route the egyptian ground forces, textbook conventional warfare tactics executed to perfection.

So yes, with the benefit of hindsight, the Egyptian army was not nearly as good as advertised, but we had no way of knowing at the time.

Insofar as your commentary about "degrading my credibility", I stand by my comments. In the absence of a clear and present danger, large armies have traditionally de-mobilized following the cessation of hostilities (see: U.S. Army post-WWII and U.S. Army post-Cold War). Israel did NOT do that, although roughly 50% of their border was now "safe". Two years after the Camp David accords, Israel pulled back all but a token level of troops from the Egyptian border and created an expeditionary force to unilaterally invade Lebanon. Originally they planned to push out Palestinian forces back beyond rocket range of Israel, but then opted to take over the entire country.

I don't know if you recall the Palestinian refugee camp massacres of the 1980s: The Israeli army surrounded defenseless Palestinian refugee camps, allowing no one to enter or leave. Then the Israelis sent in their armed allies, the Christian Phalangists into the camp, who in turn slaughtered every man woman and child in the camps.

So yes, my characterization of the Israeli Army as "adventuring" was a bit glib....a more accurate description might have been "freeing the Israeli Army to invade other countries and commit war crimes against unarmed civilians".
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Diagnosing Denise

Israel pretty much wiped-out the entire Egyptian airforce of a few hundred planes in one afternoon. Egypt had no air defenses capable of stopping low flying planes and their planes and airstrips were completely unprotected. Pretty much the same happened to the "Royal Jordanian Air Force" in a matter of a few hours. Syrian troops on the ground simply deserted and ran away when the battles started getting tough.

There's a good chunk of extreme humiliation on the part of some in the Arab world about how poorly that war turned out and some of the circumstances like troop desertion and even some Jordanians pilots defecting and flying bombing raids on Jordanian troops. The US and Britain were even accused for a while of taking part in the actual air raids for a while because they didn't want to admit that the Israeli's had destroyed them so easily. That kind of humiliation is more fuel to the fire in the Middle East. Since the US arms Israel and lets Israel act as a surrogate to do things the USA would like to have happen like blowing up Iraq's ill-fated nuclear reactor in the 80's and seemingly doing the same recently in Syria, the US takes it lumps in the Arab world along with the Israelis. No one is innocent in the Middle East. A fine mess, Stanley!

Yom Kippur war was in 1973.
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67 was the six-day war, 73 was the Yom Kippur war. My face is red.
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Diagnosing Denise

is not his concern. Carter actually wants to make a difference, and bring peace to the region. He is not overly concerned with image. Bush on the other hand is nothing but image.

in some thirty years hence we may have yet another expresident doing all he can to cast a better light for the lens of history toward his administration.

Carter has turned out to be our greatest ex-president. He isn't about "politics" in the sense of spin doctoring/image/polls/etc. He is a man of integrity and faith who wants to leave this world a better place. All this talk of "being a terrorist's best friend" is just the sound-bite garbage the media throws at us and many people latch onto. True peace can only be achieved through communication and understanding - with ALL parties involved.

On a side note - I was amused by the recent news stories where Rice claimed that the Bush administration told Carter NOT to go on this trip, and Carter said that there were no such explicit instructions. Hmmmmm - who to believe, who to believe? An administration who STILL likes to claim we are not in a recession (can they really say that with a straight face? Or does Bush think that his words are so powerful that whatever he says becomes true?), that Iraq was hording WMD, etc., or a man who largely answers to his own conscience? Call me crazy, but I'll side with Carter on this one.

Thank you, Jeff, for your insider's perspective of your trip (how refreshing not to have the media version!), and thank you to your father for all his efforts!

The hard facts are that Carter is a legend and a true humanitarian. As a Christian, he walks the walk.

On the other hand, Dubya is a fool, but not as big a fool as his supporters.