An open letter to the scores of world leaders who came to Israel today for the funeral of Shimon Peres. Alas, the love expressed for Peres is largely a love for the Israel of Oslo, the Israel that makes broad concessions and takes risks for peace, etc; almost as if Israel can be loved only if it follows in Peres’ footsteps.

Beyond the bullying rhetoric, bigoted swagger and chauvinist bravado, does Donald Trump have a strategic worldview? A new adviser says so: Trump will work with Russia to check China and radical Islam; and he will maintain Israel’s qualitative military edge. Interesting… but I remain skeptical.

Pray that US Vice President Biden doesn’t use his upcoming visit to Israel to pour more fuel on false fires regarding settlements. The administration has time and again perfidiously blamed “rampant” settlement construction – fictional epidemic construction – for the failures of its peace process diplomacy.

Sadly, the Obama administration seems to have signed-on to Abbas’ game plan: Dodge true talks where the Palestinians would have to compromise with Israel, and instead compel unilateral Israeli concessions via international pressure.

My selection of the best essays of the past year on Israel, the Mideast, Obama and Iran, the conflict with the Palestinians, Jewish life, and anti-Semitism.

The use of Yitzhak Rabin’s name to support a galloping-forward two-state-solution peace process – is left-wing historical revisionism. Netanyahu should stick to his policy principles, and not be wedged off-course in search of ersatz, temporary relief from Obama’s pressures.

John Kerry carries a badly broken American moral compass. There is no need for him to fly here with admonitions for Israel or rewards for Palestinian extremism.

Obama’s nuclear agreement with Iran is meant to redirect the entire vector of American Middle East policy: To retreat from Pax Americana and allow Iran to take its place as a major regional power. That’s why Netanyahu won’t scale back his opposition. Obama’s retreat must be stopped, and the Iran deal must be made politically toxic.

The moralizing American president is going to muscle Israel back to the “true” moral values of Judaism and Zionism on which he is so expert. And if not, at least he will have driven a wedge between American Jews and Israel.

Netanyahu is completely within the consensual tradition of all Israeli leaders in insisting on a performance-based peace process, where Palestinian statehood is a contingent, not definite, result.