18/04/2008 Former US president Jimmy Carter is due in the Syrian capital Friday for talks with Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal. Carter is expected to meet with Meshaal in the afternoon and deliver him a message from Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Eli Yishai who would like to meet with Hamas leader, Israeli Haaretz daily reported. Before meeting with Meshaal, Carter is said to hold talks with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
  
On the eve of his trip to Damascus, Carter met in Cairo with top Gaza-based Hamas leaders Mahmud Zahar and Said Siam after Israel barred the former president from visiting the Palestinian territory. Israel has snubbed Carter, winner of the 2002 Nobel Peace prize, over his plans to talk with Hamas. Washington has said Carter is acting in a personal capacity.
  
But he insists he is not acting as a mediator and has been urging talks with Hamas and Syria, saying a Middle East settlement accord cannot be reached without them. "I think it's absolutely crucial that in a final dreamed-about and prayed-for peace agreement for this region that Hamas be involved and that Syria be involved," he said in Israel on Monday.
 
In a message from Israel to Hamas, Eli Yishai asked Carter to tell Hamas leaders, including Khaled Meshal, that he would like to meet in order to expedite a prisoner exchange that would bring home Israeli prisoner Gilad Shalit. Yishai told Haaretz that in order to redeem prisoners; he was prepared to meet with anyone who could help move things ahead, including Hamas leaders. During the meeting, he told Carter that he opposed the former president's use of the term "apartheid" in his book about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
 
In Cairo on Thursday, the former U.S. President called the blockade of Gaza a crime and an atrocity and said U.S. attempts to undermine Hamas movement had been counterproductive. Speaking at the American University in Cairo after talks with Hamas leaders from Gaza, Carter said Palestinians in Gaza were being "starved to death", receiving fewer calories a day than people in the poorest parts of Africa.
 
"It's an atrocity what is being perpetrated as punishment on the people in Gaza. It's a crime... I think it is an abomination that this continues to go on," Carter said. Carter's nine-day tour, which has already taken him to Israel and Egypt, will also include Saudi Arabia and Jordan.