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So it's near the end of his time in office and President Barack Obama decides to put forever-threatened Israel at more of a disadvantage in maintaining its survival. Interestingly, the move could also weaken a United Nations that indeed needs weakening, but that was hardly the president's intent.
The US House of Representatives passed a scathing rebuke Thursday night to a United Nations Security Council resolution the Obama administration allowed through last month that condemned Israeli settlements as illegal. House Resolution 11 declared the UN motion a "one-sided" effort that is an obstacle to peace, placing disproportionate blame on Israel for the continuation of the conflict and encouraging Palestinians from engaging in direct, bilateral negotiations.
After a pair of diplomatic victories, the Palestinians are now setting their sights on a Mideast peace conference in France next month in a bid to rally support as they prepare for the uncertainty of the Trump administration. The Palestinians are hopeful that a strong international endorsement in Paris will insulate them from what they fear will be a close alliance between President-elect Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Housing Minister Yoav Galant and Education Minister Naftali Bennett at the cabinet meeting at PM Netanyahu's office in Jerusalem on June 7, 2015. Housing Minister Yoav Galant, from the center-right Kulanu party, rebuffed a call this week by Education Minister Naftali Bennett, who leads the pro-settler Jewish Home party, to annex the West Bank in the wake of a Security Council resolution last week denouncing settlements on territory claimed by the Palestinians for a future state, including East Jerusalem.
It took eight years of backbiting and pretending they got along for relations between President Barack Obama's administration and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government to finally hit rock bottom. Though they've clashed bitterly before, mostly notably over Iran, the two governments seemed farther apart than ever after a speech Wednesday by Secretary of State John Kerry and last week's United Nations resolution.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Wednesday said Israel's building of settlements on occupied land was jeopardizing Middle East peace, voicing unusually frank frustration with America's longtime ally weeks before he is due to leave office. In a swiftly issued statement, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Kerry of bias.
The White House vehemently denied a report Wednesday morning claiming Secretary of State John Kerry and National Security Adviser Susan Rice discussed the controversial U.N. resolution condemning Israeli settlements with a top Palestinian official days before Friday's Security Council vote. An Egyptian news site first published what it claimed to be details of the meeting with Palestinian official Saeb Erekat and others.
CNN's correspondent in Israel, Oren Liebermann , reported Wednesday that U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry's speech at the State Department had "missed the mark" if Kerry's intent had been to reach Israeli viewers and convince them that lame duck President Barack Obama was serious about peace. Libermann reported from Jerusalem that none of the Israeli television networks had carried the speech live, though it was held during prime viewing time.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office is denouncing Secretary of State John Kerry's Mideast policy speech, saying it was "skewed against Israel" and "obsessively" focuses on Israeli settlements. In a statement, Netanyahu's office says the speech "barely touched upon the root of the conflict - Palestinian opposition to a Jewish state in any boundaries."
A senior leader ... . Secretary of State John Kerry speaks about Israeli-Palestinian policy, Wednesday, Dec. 28, 2016, at the State Department in Washington.
This Oct. 22, 2016 file photo, shows a general view of housing in the Israeli settlement of Revava, near the West Bank city of Nablus. JERUSALEM -- Doubling down on its public break with the Obama administration, the Israeli government said Tuesday that it had received "ironclad" information from Arab sources that the United States actively helped craft last week's U.N. resolution declaring Israeli settlements in occupied territories illegal.
President Barack Obama speaks to members of the media as he meets with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Monday, Nov. 9, 2015. The president and prime minister sought to mend their fractured relationship during their meeting, the first time they have talked face to face in more than a year.
U.S. President Barack Obama, left, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu talk Sept. 30 during the funeral of former Israeli President and Prime minister Shimon Peres in Jerusalem.
United States Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power, left, Secretary of State John Kerry, second from right, and National Advisor Susan Rice, right, listen while US President Barack Obama speaks during the 68th session of the General Assembly at United Nations headquarters. Israel expects more US-led maneuvers at the United Nations critical of the Jewish state, similar to the UN Security Council resolution condemning Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem which passed on Friday when the US refused to wield its veto power to nix it, and which Israel says the Obama administration orchestrated alongside the Palestinians.
Secretary of State John Kerry will lay out his vision for ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in a speech on Wednesday, days after the United States cleared the way for a U.N. resolution demanding an end to Israeli settlements. The speech, less than a month before President Barack Obama leaves office, is expected to be the administration's last word on a decades-old dispute that Kerry had hoped to resolve during his four years as America's top diplomat.
The Palestinian president said Tuesday that he hopes an upcoming Mideast conference in France will set a timetable for independence after the U.N. delivered a harsh rebuke over the construction of Israeli settlements in lands claimed by the Palestinians. Israel is meanwhile advancing plans for thousands of new homes in east Jerusalem despite the U.N. Security Council resolution.
A Palestinian shepherd poses for a picture as he stands on the back of his donkey, near the Israeli settlement of Argaman, in the Jordan Valley, a strip of West Bank land along the border with Jordan, Monday, Dec. 26, 2016. less A Palestinian shepherd poses for a picture as he stands on the back of his donkey, near the Israeli settlement of Argaman, in the Jordan Valley, a strip of West Bank land along the border with Jordan, Monday, ... more Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu holds a doughnut during the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem, Sunday, Dec. 25, 2016.
Some Senate Democrats have issued scathing statements against President Barack Obama and his administration's decision to break with longstanding tradition to veto anti-Israel resolutions, choosing, instead, to abstain from voting in a United Nations Security Council vote. The vote called for a halt to Israeli construction in the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu talks with US President Barack Obama at Jerusalem's Mount Herzl national cemetery during the funeral of former president Shimon Peres on September 30, 2016. The snowballing diplomatic dispute between Israel, the United States and just about every other state in the world is the topic du jour in Monday's Hebrew papers after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spearheaded a diplomatic offensive against countries that voted for Friday's UN Security Council resolution against Israeli settlements.
In this Dec. 11, 2016, file photo, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends the weekly cabinet meeting at his office in Jerusalem. Netanyahu lashed out at President Barack Obama on Saturday, Dec. 24, accusing him of a "shameful ambush" at the United Nations over West Bank settlements and saying he is looking forward to working with his "friend" President-elect Donald Trump.