MELVILLE, New York — President Jimmy Carter died at the age of 100. Carter was a strong advocate for the right of Soviet Jews to emigrate, and he established the President’s Commission on the Holocaust, leading to the opening of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 1993.
In 1978 Carter worked with Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to negotiate what became known as the Camp David Accords, leading to the signing of a peace treaty between Israel and Egypt a year later. While Carter was central to this significant agreement, he later was criticized by many for his book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, which was seen by many as inaccurate and unfair to Israel. Carter later apologized for some of his messaging, writing that “we must not permit criticisms for improvement to stigmatize Israel,” and he went on to “offer an Al Het for any words or deeds of mine that may have done so.”
The Camp David negotiations had gone on for 13 days, but had reached a dead end, leading Prime Minister Begin to tell Carter that his bags were packed and he was going home. What did President Carter bring to Menachem Begin in his cabin at Camp David, which led Begin to agree to remain and finalize the Camp David Accords?
Mark D. Zimmerman is the author of a series of Jewish trivia books, under the title RASHI, RAMBAM and RAMALAMADINGDONG: A Quizbook of Jewish Trivia Facts & Fun.