I was drinking beer with my friend Baha' the other night when the US presidential election came up. Baha' is an educated, left-wing Palestinian guy who lived in the US for a while. Like a lot of Palestinians, he is sympathetic to Barack Obama, preferring him over Hilary Clinton, but is puzzled about Obama's views on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

If Obama is supposed to represent "Change", Baha' asked me, why doesn't he stand up to the Israel lobby? Why not make a complete break with the old politics?

It's a fair question, and a complex one. It's also a question that's been underlined in the last few days with Obama's repeated statements about the 60th anniversary of the founding of Israel.