Openly demanding that the U.S. abandon talks with Iran, Israeli PM Naftali Bennett has just violated his deal with Biden that differences are to be worked out behind closed doors. He does so because the “special relationship” between the countries gives him power: the Israel lobby works inside the U.S. to make sure there is no daylight between the White House and Israel and to immunize apartheid. But the American people want distance.

On the sidelines of COP26, Israel’s Prime Minister met with Bill Gates to discuss forming working group to study potential cooperation around combating climate change. Gates’ obsession with ‘innovation’, however, might have blinded him from addressing other issues that Israel is also ‘known for’ – namely, being the world’s leading human rights violator and the destruction of the Palestinian environment.

The Biden administration will continue to issue “strong” condemnations of Israeli settlements but do nothing to confront Israel because it does not want to make Palestine a political issue in the U.S. and it does not want to bring down Naftali Bennett’s fragile government, says Tal Shalev of Walla News speaking to an Israel lobby organization.

The new Israeli government this week moved forward on plans to build 3000 more settlement units in the West Bank; and yesterday the State Department issued its strongest opposition to the plans since Joe Biden took office, calling the plans “unacceptable.” The State Department spokesperson said yesterday the U.S. “strongly” opposes the expansion of settlements.

The Democratic Majority for Israel group has been celebrated by Biden and Pelosi though it spreads a vicious lie with a tweet saying that Rep. Rashida Tlaib is complicit in terrorism because she is appearing with Mohammed El-Kurd, the face of resistance to the expulsions of Palestinians from Jerusalem.

There are more than two settler attacks on Palestinians a day this year on average. According to two Israeli human rights experts, the violent settlers are working with the cooperation of the army and the Israeli government to take over more and more land for Jewish settlement in a policy of pushing Palestinians out of Area C. This is a traditional use by the army of Israeli settlers.

Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid visited Washington and Democratic leaders embraced him and offered empty statements about the Palestinian future. Nancy Pelosi and the Israel lobby group Democratic Majority for Israel were thrilled by the restoration of bipartisan support for Israel that Trump and Netanyahu threatened.

Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett gave a speech to the U.N. General Assembly Monday in which he said that Israel has a diverse democracy “in the toughest neighborhood on earth,” and Iran is trying to destroy Israel through its “terror” proxies.

The media cannot look at the causes of the 9/11 attacks even 20 years later. But Al Qaeda perpetrated the bombings because the U.S. was an occupying military force in Saudi Arabia. A 1998 declaration of war by Osama bin Laden cites two other issues: the “devastation” of Iraq by U.S. sanctions including the alleged deaths of 1 million Iraqis, and the effort by the U.S. to “fragment” Arab nations and leave them as “paper statelets” so as to insure the survival of Israel.

Mondoweiss founder and senior editor Phil Weiss speaks to Khaled Elgindy about the first meeting between President Joe Biden and newly installed Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett.