Peter Beinart is a long-time friend of the Dish and author of the critically needed book, The Crisis of Zionism. From one of my many defenses of the book against its knee-jerk critics: The notion that Beinart ignores the standard and fair criticisms of past Palestinian leaders is simply wrong, as any reader will see. Yes, he presses the case that the Israelis and their American patrons have recently led the Jewish state into a dead end - but his book is an argument, not a history. He lacerates one side - persuasively, I might add - but doesn't excuse the other. ... The real shift in US policy toward Israel has been the embrace of the settlements by the Christianist base of the GOP over the last decade and their continuing power. The real development is the fusion of Jewish and Christian fundamentalism around the cause of Greater Israel. Which means to say that a democratic Israel is living on borrowed time. And Peter's book will one day be seen as one lone protest, a marker that not everyone acquiesced in Israel's degeneration, not everyone put blinders on. Just most.]]>