Former US President Jimmy Carter says some Israeli restrictions imposed on Palestinians in the West Bank are worse than apartheid-era South Africa.
In an interview broadcast on Israel Radio, Mr Carter focused on roads built exclusively for Jewish settlements.
In South Africa, blacks were not prevented from "using or even crossing" roads, as in the West Bank, he said.
Mr Carter is promoting his latest book on the Middle East conflict, which has been condemned by pro-Israeli groups.
Correspondents say the book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, blames all sides for not seizing the opportunity of the Camp David peace process in the late 1970s.
But Mr Carter is most critical of Israeli policies, and the book has provoked an outcry among pro-Israeli groups in the US.
Peace broker
"Israel does occupy this territory deep within the West Bank, and connects 200-or-so settlements... with a road, and then prohibits the Palestinians from using that road, or in many cases even crossing the road.
The greatest commitment in my life has been trying to bring peace to Israel
Jimmy Carter
"This perpetrates even worse instances of apartness, or apartheid, than we witnessed even in South Africa," Mr Carter said.
He added that the book was intended to stimulate debate in the US - Israel's closest political ally - where he said Israeli policies are seldom questioned.
Jewish groups in the US have petitioned against his use of the word "apartheid" - the system which underpinned white minority rule - to describe Israel's treatment of Palestinians.
In other interviews, Mr Carter - whose Camp David summits helped end the decades-old conflict between Egypt and Israel - has rejected accusations of anti-Semitism which some critics have levelled at him.
"The greatest commitment in my life has been trying to bring peace to Israel," Mr Carter said last week.
But he said Israel would never have peace until it withdrew from the territories which it has occupied since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
There have been many issues made of the historical accuracy, or lack of, in his book. I also think the use of the word "apartheid" isn't a good one in this context. I'm going to read the book anyway and see how he justifies that description.
"Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not, and a sense of humor was provided to console him for what he is."
Would the Palestinians be in the prediciment that they are in, if it was not for Arab agression in the first place. If the Arabs do not attack Israel in 1967, the Palestinians are then just striped of their rights in an Arab nation, and you would not care about them, instead of the situation they are in now.
Have you ever seen Palestinians are treated in Jordan? Why does the Islamic world not condemn that to the same degree?
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