Former President Jimmy Carter
Former President Jimmy CarterAFP/File

The National Council of Young Israel has called on Yeshiva University and the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law to withdraw an invitation to former United States President Jimmy Carter to attend an award ceremony at the law school on Wednesday, April 10.

Carter is slated to be the recipient of the International Advocate for Peace Award, which is an award that is given each year by the school's Journal of Conflict Resolution.

"The National Council of Young Israel strongly urges Yeshiva University, the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, and the school's Journal of Conflict Resolution to do the right thing and rescind the invitation that has been issued to former President Carter," said Farley Weiss, the president of the National Council of Young Israel. "We believe that honoring President Carter as an International Advocate for Peace Award may be consistent with this organization's past of honoring another demonizer of Israel, Bishop Desmond Tutu, but it does not mean that bad decisions should be repeated over again; rather, they should learn from the past and honor those who truly deserve to be honored.

“We would further like to hear from Yeshiva University and Cardozo Law School, which is my wife Jessica's alma mater, that steps will be taken by the university to prevent the recurrence of such honorees in the future."

"Mr. Carter's well-known animus and bias towards the State of Israel has earned him widespread condemnation from Jews and non-Jews alike, and he is certainly not deserving to have any honor bestowed upon by him by an entity that has ties to the Jewish community and the Jewish State," continued Weiss. "We hope that Yeshiva University and Cardozo will do the right thing and reconsider its decision to permit Mr. Carter on campus and not allow its students to pay honor to someone who has done much to hurt the honor of the State of Israel."

In April 2008, Carter deliberately ignored the wishes of the United States government when he traveled to Syria to meet with Khaled Mashaal, the head of Hamas. Carter has since called to make Hamas, which openly seeks Israel’s destruction, a peace partner.

In 2006, Carter wrote a book entitled "Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid." His claims in the book, which he continued to espouse even after factual errors were revealed, led the honest reporting group CAMERA to say that the ex-president “clearly has an Israel, and even a Jewish problem.”

Carter also made highly offensive statements on Jews and Judaism in the Sunday school lessons he taught in church decades ago.