Strategic or financial considerations also fail to explain the ridiculously overwrought concentration on Israel and its enemies. Neither Israel nor the Palestinians control any oil resources, yet a titanic struggle between two of the world's three leading petro-powers (the Iran-Iraq War of 1980-88) killed 1.3 million soldiers and civilians and drew distinctly limited attention from global media.

The history of displacement among Palestinians hardly makes them unique among the peoples of the world, though they've seized on the term "refugee" as the very essence of their identity. At most 750,000 Palestinian Arabs became refugees after five Arab states simultaneously attacked Israel in 1948, but within the next ten years an even greater number of Jews (800,000) became refugees from persecution in Islamic nations in North Africa in the Middle East and resettled in the Jewish state. At precisely the same moment that Israel won world recognition in 1948, the partition of India and Pakistan led to 14.5 million refugees (and at least 500,000 deaths in the "Independence Riots"). The Lebanon Civil War of 1975-1990 produced 900,000 refugees (according to that tormented nation's own government) and an estimated 200,000 to 250,000 deaths in horrific clashes between Arab Muslims and Arab Christians.

Jew-haters (who feel inevitably energized and encouraged by any conflict involving Israel) explain the inappropriate obsession with conflicts like the current confrontation in Gaza as a reflection of the unsavory influence of Jewish interests. According to this logic, the 2% of Americans who identify as Jews want special attention to these battles because of their tribal identification with cousins in Israel. This may account for some portion of the U.S. fascination with the Middle East, together with concern of committed Christians regarding the "Holy Land" where Jesus spent all his years on earth. But such explanations hardly account for the European fixation on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The nations of the Old World identify as famously, stubbornly secular rather than Christian, and among the 500 million citizens in the E.U., Jews account for less than one-fourth of one-percent (Hitler took care of the rest).

Unfortunately, an absence of Jews doesn't mean an absence of paranoid, anti-Jewish conspiracy theories. The Japanese, for instance, seem fascinated with accounts of "Jewish Power" and eagerly scoop up frequent bestsellers about Hebraic control of the world financial system, despite a nationwide Jewish population of less than 4,000. Even for nations that remain altogether "Judenrein" ("Pure of Jews") the fascination with the Children of Israel seems to remain a factor, directing an illogical (and unwanted) focus toward their modern-day descendants in the Middle East. As the old-saying goes, "Jews are News," and remain newsworthy even in parts of the world where they haven't lived for centuries. In this sense, the Palestinians receive disproportionate notice not because of any distinctive quality of their own nationhood or history, but because their purported oppressors remain the most controversial, compelling, loathed, admired and polarizing people on the planet.

Another factor serves to explain the blinding spotlight on all conflicts involving Israel and her neighbors: the deep engagement in the region of the United States of America. Domestic critics of recent U.S. policy suggest that much of the world (especially among Islamic nations) hates America because of our connection to Israel. In fact, the evidence actually suggests that the nations of the earth despise Israel because of its close attachment with the United States.

Early in Israel's history, before the U.S. emerged as the nation's leading supporter and ally, the struggling Jewish state attracted far more world-wide support (in the U.N. and elsewhere) than it does today. The U.S. only began serious military cooperation with Israel in the 1970's, in response to Soviet sponsorship of Israel's Arab enemies. Before that switch, France, not America, sold Israel most of its high-tech weapons, leading the IDF to rely heavily on French Mirage fighters, for instance, in the key aerial engagements of the 1967 war.

As American involvement with Israel deepened, world hatred and resentment toward the Jewish state correspondingly intensified. The government in Jerusalem became a convenient outlet for the hatred of the United States that seemed to seethe and bubble-up everywhere, even among our European allies. Bashing the U.S. could only go so far among nations of Europe, Asia and Latin America because they realized on some level that they might someday need America's help or support. No such compunction stood in the way of cruelly irresponsible attacks on Israel (like the ludicrous yet ubiquitous claims that the Zionists have perpetrated a Nazi-like "Holocaust" against the Palestinians – despite the undeniable evidence of rapidly growing, not declining, Palestinian populations).

In a very real sense, Anti-Americanism has helped to fuel anti-Israelism, far more than anti-Semitism has shaped or encouraged anti-Americanism.

Understanding the irrational nature of America-hatred (see THE 10 BIG LIES ABOUT AMERICA, my new bestseller) won't put an end to it any more than understanding the unjustified concentration on Israeli-Palestinian disputes will reign in that groundless obsession.

The unfolding events in Gaza do, in fact, matter deeply and will help to determine the future course of the worldwide war against Islamo-Nazi terror. Inevitably, the world will continue to apply ferocious focus on Israel's struggles, even though they claim a few hundred civilian casualties at a time when other conflicts produce such victims in the thousands or tens of thousands. No one can deny the fascinating and dramatic nature of the recent battle against Hamas, but responsible observers should at least make some serious attempts to place their concerns and compassion in a more appropriate and balanced global perspective.