American conservatives rightly condemn Hamas for being an antisemitic “kill the Jew behind the tree” death cult, for its use of Palestinian civilians as human shields, and for its use of their bodies as propaganda props. They rightly support Israel’s right to find and kill these terrorists sensibly. Unfortunately, however, too many American conservatives ignore lesser but still significant instances of immorality on the part of the Israeli government.

This dynamic was again on display on Thursday, when right-wing Israeli minister Bezalel Smotrich approved a plan to build more than 3,000 homes in the West Bank.

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Smotrich proudly declared that his proposal to approve the so-called “E1” project “buries the idea of a Palestinian state.” The ambition of a two-state Israeli-Palestinian solution was supported by successive United States administrations, including that of George W. Bush, until the Trump administration. The Times of Israel explains that the “E1 zone has long been cause for alarm in the international community. It would divide the West Bank into northern and southern regions and prevent the development of a Palestinian metropolis that connects East Jerusalem to Bethlehem and Ramallah, which the Palestinians have long hoped would serve as the foundation of their future state.”

Smotrich says President Donald Trump and U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee fully support him. Considering the silence from the White House and U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem, he appears to be correct. The announcement follows other recent steps by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government to establish a new, unilateral status quo in the West Bank.

But this Israeli action is anathema to America First foreign policy. As I noted recently, unrestrained settlement construction in the West Bank fosters “anti-American Islamist extremist recruitment, and further complicates relations between Israel and the U.S.’s Arab allies.” This point requires emphasizing. While Israel faces a serious threat from Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hamas terrorists, its settlement expansion aims to obliterate both Palestinian settlements and the prospect of Palestinian statehood. As Israel’s closest ally and diplomatic-military guardian, the U.S. suffers direct diplomatic blame from its allies and from Muslims globally over this activity. It fuels the ability of groups such as Al Qaeda and ISIS to recruit disillusioned young Muslims to take up arms against Americans. It also complicates Trump’s ambition of deeper cooperation between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia.

Of course, Smotrich doesn’t care about that. He is a fanatic through and through. In March 2023, for example, following a brutal terrorist attack that killed two Israelis, extremist Israeli settlers attacked the Palestinian settlement of Huwara in the West Bank, burning the cars and homes of innocent people. Smotrich happily told Israeli media that Huwara should be “erased.” Other settler supremacist parliamentarians echoed this rhetoric, with one explaining that “we need burning villages.”

Netanyahu tolerates this activity to the detriment of Israel’s moral standing and American security interests. He does so in order to maintain his fragile coalition hold on power. That’s his prerogative as Israel’s democratically elected leader.

But why Trump and Huckabee support this malfeasance is far less apparent. Indeed, it is absurd.