“Evangelical Christians from South Carolina paid for the huge billboard on Israel’s Ayalon highway declaring ‘There’s no land for peace.’ TV evangelist Pat Robertson last week reprimanded Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom, saying ‘Who do you think you are, handing Jerusalem over to Arafat?’ With Christian friends like these close to the president’s ear, the right-wing government in Israel does not need Jewish friends to rebuff political initiatives like the road map.” Haaretz’s Akiva Eldar charts the growing — and troubling — influence of Christian Evangelical Zionists in Washington, DC. Read more about Pro-Israeli lobby forges unholy alliance with the Christian right 

The Israeli voter has a rare opportunity to find out how the right-wing government looks to the world when the rouge provided by Shimon Peres and Benjamin Ben-Eliezer has been wiped off. Israel’s image in December 2002 is beginning to be reminiscent of Michael Jackson’s after he took off his mask. Akiva Eldar writes in Ha’aretz. Read more about A right-wing government without makeup