Former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett visited Washington this week, dropping in at the White House, meeting with national security adviser Jake Sullivan and top administration officials, and providing his assessments of political developments in Israel. Mostly, he listened, hearing grave concern that he was unable to allay.

Bennett’s visit took place on a difficult bilateral backdrop. The government that will soon assume power in Israel is shaping up as the most right-wing, radical, conservative and pyromaniacal ever. Friction with the Biden administration, bolstered by this week’s Democratic Georgia Senate win, will undoubtedly focus on Israeli policy in the West Bank, specifically the planned transfer of authority over its Palestinian population to designated hard-line Ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich. Other irritants, not necessarily in that order, are the threat posed by these hard-liners to the Temple Mount status quo and human rights violations.

From Israel’s point of view, it has largely avoided serious sanctions or legal repercussions over its occupation of the West Bank since 1967. Its endeavors have been aided by the protective umbrella provided by successive US administrations and the unique form of hybrid control it introduced over the territory populated by over 2 million disenfranchised Palestinians living alongside hundreds of thousands of Israeli Jews enjoying full rights.

Israel has stopped short of annexing this territory de jure, insisting for 55 years that this situation was temporary. De facto, the international community has reluctantly accepted this “temporary” arrangement, tacitly approving the governance of Palestinians by Israeli military law under the sovereignty of a military command, and the jurisdiction of civil Israeli law over residents of the Jewish settlements in the disputed territory.