Why Is There A Middle Eastern Double Standard?

Robert Wright makes a good point:

The genius of using religious scripture for political purposes is its resistance to criticism. After all, in the week when the book of Esther figures in a sacred Jewish ritual, who would be foolish enough to challenge Netanyahu's invocation of it?
Me, apparently. And no doubt some commenters will illustrate my foolishness in the space below, accusing me of insensitivity, making dark insinuations about my motives, etc. So let me try to be clear about what I'm saying. I'm basically just asking two questions:
Why is it routine to talk about Iranian religious fanatics who are leading us toward war and so rare to acknowledge the role that religious tribalism in America--among both conservative Jews and conservative Christians--is playing in leading us to war? And why is it that when Muslim radicals use religious scripture in a way that foments belligerence we consider it primitive and vile, whereas when Bibi Netanyahu does the same thing (more subtly, I grant you) we nod politely and smile?

Seriously, why are paranoid people the first ones we listen to when talking about "existential threats."  Iran is not an existential threat to Israel because Israel is a much more realistic existential threat to Iran.  Nobody is an existential threat to the United States but the United States itself.  So, please, shut the hell up about a war with Iran.