People seem to think I have been imagining a contemptuous attitude toward the US by the Israeli government, or that my concerns about its "Go Cheney Yourself" policy on the peace process are somehow a function of obsessiveness or something that isn't anti-Semitism but is somehow even "darker". But I am not imagining these things. They are real and they are dangerous:

Hours after Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. vowed unyielding American support for Israel’s security here on Tuesday, Israel’s Interior Ministry announced 1,600 new housing units for Jews in East Jerusalem. Mr. Biden condemned the move as “precisely the kind of step that undermines the trust we need right now.” ...

[Biden] began the day on a note of support, asserting the Obama administration’s “absolute, total, unvarnished commitment to Israel’s security.” But by the end of the day, Mr. Biden’s tone had a very different quality. He issued a statement condemning “the substance and timing of the announcement” of the housing, and added, “Unilateral action taken by either party cannot prejudge the outcome of negotiations on permanent status issues.”

It appears Netanyahu was blindsided by this as well. As I have pointed out, Netanyahu is now the Israeli center, but Netanyahu still openly backs new settlements in East Jerusalem for Israeli Jews and Israeli Jews alone. And he would not be prime minister without the support of his religious right. And they believe that the West Bank is God's land - for them alone. And in that, they have the full backing of the Christianist right in the US:

PALIN: I believe that the Jewish settlements should be allowed to be expanded upon, because that population of Israel is, is going to grow. More and more Jewish people will be flocking to Israel in the days and weeks and months ahead. And I don’t think that the Obama administration has any right to tell Israel that the Jewish settlements cannot expand.

WALTERS: Even if it’s [in] Palestinian areas?

PALIN: I believe that the Jewish settlements should be allowed to be expand.