Actually he left out the part where Hamas bragged about unilaterally violating the ceasefire. And the part where they mocked Israel for not retaliating. And the parts where they spend months shooting at Israeli civilians and Israeli soldiers. Plus he flat lied about how Hamas expressed willingness to give up their unending jihad against Israel. But he definitely remembered to criticize Israeli self-defense in between publishing this nonsense:

After extended discussions with those from Gaza, these Hamas leaders also agreed to accept any peace agreement that might be negotiated between the Israelis and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, who also heads the PLO, provided it was approved by a majority vote of Palestinians in a referendum or by an elected unity government... We were unable to confirm this in Jerusalem because of Israel's unwillingness to admit to any negotiations with Hamas, but rocket firing was soon stopped and there was an increase in supplies of food, water, medicine and fuel. Yet the increase was to an average of about 20 percent of normal levels. And this fragile truce was partially broken on Nov. 4, when Israel launched an attack in Gaza to destroy a defensive tunnel being dug by Hamas inside the wall that encloses Gaza.

Israel destroyed that "defensive tunnel" - which was actually going to be used to "offensively attack Israel" - on the night of Nov. 4th. On the afternoon of Nov. 4th Hamas leaders explicitly said that they never accept a peace deal between the Palestinians and Israel. So Carter is exactly right, except by "right" I mean "lying through his teeth in a vicious attempt to scapegoat Israel for his two decades' worth of spectacularly incompetent Middle East diplomacy." Those two are roughly the same though, so no worries.

Hamas is controlled ideologically and operationally by genocidal fanatics. This isn't really a topic that rational people can disagree about:

Their political echelon has in recent days called for genocide against every Jewish child on the planet. Their military echelon is now hitting babies with missiles and gearing up for mass suicide bombings. They're giddy about expanding the reach of their shelling to new Israeli civilian centers. And since their new rockets are extremely accurate you can be quite sure that they're hitting schools and hospitals on purpose.

But Israel's inability to strike a deal with these pathological fanatics is Israel's fault. Because if the Israelis would only give Gazans more fruits and vegetables then the Palestinians would become as placid as the Swiss.

References and previously after the jump...