Israel's Nutty Right

Is it just me, or is the really crazy part of Israel's right more vocal than usual? I base this only on the fact the past few months have seen a serious uptick in the number of people bringing up the most extreme pro-Zionist views I'm aware of. According to some, Israel was largely uninhabited before Zionist immigration. The West Bank settlers are courageous heroes for braving Palestinian terror to reclaim their ancestral land. Israel has ceded a great deal to the Palestinians and gotten nothing in return.

For some reason, even though I was already in a bad mood, I wandered over to Arutz Sheva, where I read an opinion piece arguing that American foreign policy is driven by anti-Semitism, and compares the Annapolis conference to Auschwitz. This piece by two Hebron settlers contains a view of history shared by an important slice of Israelis even though it's as much theologically driven insanity as what Hamas cooks up. Also, while I agree with Jonathan Dresner's comment on this post, the dominant impression was left by a commenter who also sees Annapolis as equivalent to Auschwitz and alleges that the U.S. Department of State is anti-Semitic. I think all these crazy views circulate in some fora where I simply don't pay much attention, away from the newspaper editorial pages and comments of leading politicians.

However, I can't resist bringing up the reported reluctance of many Arabs in East Jerusalem to become part of a Palestinian state. Far be it from me to throw a wrench into negotiations, but has any Israeli government ever considered making the status of Jerusalem's neighborhoods subject to popular vote within those neighborhoods?