Due in part to the anomalous legal status of eastern Jerusalem’s Arab residents, the area has its own internal politics. Hamas, Fatah, and two Islamist parties—the Israeli-Arab Islamic Movement and Hizb ut-Tahrir—all vie for influence, while both Jordan and Turkey attempt to flex their muscles from abroad. In a detailed analysis, Pinhas Inbari explains:

Because no political force [in eastern Jerusalem] is strong enough to mobilize rallies and demonstrations in the streets or is interested in doing so, most of the public activity occurs at the plaza of the mosques on the Temple Mount where the dynamic political forces are the Islamist movements. Specifically, the Islamic force that can muster impressive rallies under its flag and symbols is an international movement known as the Islamic Liberation Party, or Hizb ut-Tahrir, which to a large extent is the most significant actor on the Mount. . . .

From Jordan’s standpoint, its status in the mosque plaza remains essential because the Hashemite dynasty’s prestige lies in its role as protector of the mosques. . . . Israel has a great interest in preserving the status quo and safeguarding Jordan’s status as embodied in the peace agreements with it. Hence, the Waqf administration [responsible for the Islamic holy sites on the Temple Mount], which is linked with Jordan, is the only address Israel recognizes in the east of the city.

A special danger looms for Jordan, however, because of Turkey’s involvement, which, in turn, is made possible by the aggressive involvement in east Jerusalem of Raed Salah’s Islamic Movement. . . . Salah and [his fellow Islamist] Akrima Sabri were the conduit through which Turkey penetrated east Jerusalem and the al-Aqsa plaza. . . . The Turkish activity ignores Israel but is mainly anti-Jordanian. . . .

This situation has posed a crisis between Jordan and the PA. . . . Jordanian sources say that the PA is promoting Tahrir, [which has also taken a pro-Turkish stance] in order to weaken Hamas.

Two extraordinary events demonstrate something important about Israel’s most fervent adversaries. One was a speech given at something called The People’s Forum (funded generously by Goldman Sachs), which stated, “When the state of Israel is finally destroyed and erased from history, that will be the single most important blow we can give to destroying capitalism and imperialism.”

The suggestion that this tiny state is the linchpin of a global, centuries-old phenomenon like capitalism goes well beyond anything resembling rational criticism. Even if Israel were guilty of genocide, apartheid, and oppression—which of course it is not—it would not follow that its destruction would help end capitalism or imperialism.

The other was an anti-Israel protest that took place in front of New York City’s Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, deemed “complicit” in Israel’s evils. At organizers’ urging, participants shouted their slogans at kids in the cancer ward, who were watching from the windows. Given Hamas’s indifference toward the lives of Gazan children, such callousness toward non-Palestinian children from Hamas’s Western allies shouldn’t be surprising. The protest—like the abovementioned speech—deliberately conveyed the message that Israel is the ultimate evil and its destruction the ultimate good, cancer patients be damned.

The fact that Israel’s adversaries are almost comically perverse does not mean that they can be dismissed. If its allies fail to understand the obsessive and irrational hatred that it faces, they cannot effectively help it defend itself.