Israel's latest assertions

Setting aside the friction between U.S. president Barack Obama and Israeli president Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel and the United States are friends, allies, chums, etc. Generously, there are something less than 6 million Jews in the United States, a country of 318 million. But we're allies, I guess.

And yet the evidence mounts and mounts and mounts some more and it is sickening how Israel applies its apartheid to the Palestinians. In the United States, anyone calling the Israelis out is likely to be branded anti-Semitic, another enemy of tiny Israel that is beset by the Goliath 'terrorists.' And I have no doubt that the Palestinians can be pretty nasty, given half a chance. But where the Palestinians bring rocks and knives to the battle, Israel unleashes U.S.-weaponized responses to violence. Every body count seems to be about the same -- three Palestinians for every Israeli. Someone is in the military catbird seat.

It is hard not to feel the complicity of my country. We support this self-referential Woody Allen with bloodied brass knuckles ... so kind, so religious, so spat upon through history that somehow spitting on others deserves to be overlooked. The means to a livelihood, an ancestral home to inhabit, access to water and medical treatment ... how much bullshit is anyone supposed to swallow before they say "enough?!"

And there was this latest story today. Somebody else to bulldoze.

In the end, I suppose, the U.S. will decide to support Syria's dictator, Bashar al-Assad, as a means of ending the slaughter that has displaced and maimed millions in Syria and neighboring communities. And if the U.S. can do it for Assad, lending Israel a hand would be chump change.