Carter to speak at Dems’ convention

By · August 21, 2008

Jimmy Carter will speak at the Democratic National Convention, but he won’t discuss Israel or foreign policy.

The former president will be in Denver and be recognized before a video is shown of his speech in New Orleans, presumptive nominee Barack Obama’s convention spokeswoman, Jenny Backus, told JTA.

The Republican Jewish Coalition has called for Carter’s removal from the schedule because of his “troubling anti-Israel bias.”

Carter also spoke at the 2004 convention, but that was before he upset many in the Jewish community in 2006 with the publication of his controversial book “Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid,” and his subsequent claims that pro-Israel activists were trying to silence him and any efforts to debate U.S. support for the Jewish state.

Abraham Foxman, the national president of the Anti-Defamation League, told JTA he wished Carter wasn’t speaking, but “I don’t think there’s an option not to provide a platform for a former president.”

Foxman said he hoped the Democratic leadership would use the opportunity of Carter’s appearance “to distance themselves” from the former president’s “biased view of the Arab-Israeli conflict.”