NORMAN, Okla. (ABP) — Former President Jimmy Carter said Aug. 7 he is planning a return trip to Gaza in an effort to focus international attention on what he describes as a humanitarian crisis.
Carter, who sparked controversy in June after calling Israel's 2-year-old blockade of Gaza an "atrocity" and saying people there are being treated like animals, told an audience at the Aug. 6-7 Midwest Region New Baptist Covenant celebration in Norman, Okla., that he is returning later this month "to try to let the world know what's happening to the people there."
Carter will travel as part of a delegation of the Elders — a group of eminent global leaders brought together by Nelson Mandela — visiting Israel, the West Bank and Gaza at the end of August.
The delegation, led by former Brazilian President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, also includes Desmond Tutu — along with Carter a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize — and billionaire Richard Branson, who helped establish and bankroll the Elders, an independent group of influential personalities dedicated to peacemaking and alleviating human suffering.
Touring the Middle East after monitoring elections in Lebanon June 7, Carter said in remarks at Cairo University that Palestinians in Gaza are being "starved to death" and living on fewer calories per day than people living in the poorest parts of Africa.
A group called Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America criticized media outlets including Associated Baptist Press for repeating Carter's comments without rebuttal. They acknowledge that Palestinians are suffering in the Gaza Strip, but they say it is because of Hamas, an Islamic group the United States has classified as a terrorist organization, and not the fault of Israel.
Carter, the driving force behind the New Baptist Covenant movement aimed at uniting North American Baptists around common concerns including peace, justice and poverty, told the Oklahoma gathering that Christianity has competed well with other religions during the last 2,000 years
"We have had very great success, because we have put forward Jesus' standards that appeal to human beings — peace, justice, humility, service, compassion, forgiveness, love and the alleviation of suffering," he said. "Our effectiveness, though, has depended on our working together, cooperating with each other, as Christians."
Bob Allen is senior writer for Associated Baptist Press.