Israel as an Extension of American Empire

I'd always tended to feel that Muslim talk of Israel as a crusader state was a piece of hyperbole driven by a historical allusion. After reading Jeff Halpern's article in Adbusters adapted from this article from Counterpunch, I'm not so sure that there is so much room for hyperbole.

Israel is able to pursue its Occupation only because of its willingness to serve Western (mainly US) imperial interests including acting as a galvanizing center for global neo-con forces.

There follows a lot of analysis including a good bit on Christian dispensationalism and Zionism.
The extent of the Israel's being the USA's Outremer is illustrated by this.

Israel provided key support for the US in Iraq, including the construction of mock Iraqi neighborhoods and villages in the Negev where American troops could train. The American military government in Iraq, the "Civil Administration," was patterned after the Israeli Civil Administration that rules the Occupied Territories. Israeli involvement in the defense-related economies in the districts of most members of Congress explains to a great degree why Israel enjoys the uncritical support it does. The Israeli astronaut who died in the Challenger accident testifies to the intimate involvement of Israel in the most guarded parts of the American military, where even European countries are excluded. In fact, Israel has just taken delivery of advanced F-16s and helicopter gunships that have been denied Europe.

I myself used to be pretty pro Isreal, I'm not certain that it is what I thought it was.
The tragedy of it all is that it maybe could have been otherwise and the otherwise tells you why I used to be pro-Israeli.

Israel always talked of democracy, even extending citizenship to its Arab population in 1948, even though the underlying concept of a "Jewish democracy," coupled with a deep-based fear of demographics only exacerbated by the Occupation, has emptied that of much of its content. It constituted itself as a welfare state, only to see that largely dismantled as the Israel-Palestine conflict gave dominance to the right whose agenda, together with expansion, was anti-socialist and pro-privatization. Israel became a member of the Socialist International and engaged in constructive development work in Africa, Asia and Latin America,

But what went wrong? It's a familiar story:

but its need for military strength, coupled with a self-serving "alliance" with the US, has led to become a major arms dealer on a global scale, a subverter of progressive civil society elements throughout the developing world.

Power corrupts, or rather power accelerates temptations to which we eventually and inevitably fall.
The article is worth reading.
Jeff Halper: Israel as an Extension of American Empire:
Filed in: Israel, Palestine, Crusader, USA, geopolitics, neocons