Israel continued to go on the offensive after the U.N. Security Council vote Friday that condemned settlements as a “flagrant violation” of international law. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu summoned the ambassadors of all U.N. Security Council members who voted in favor of the resolution to “personally reprimand” them. Initial reports said Israel summoned ambassadors from 10 of the 14 countries that voted for the resolution and operate embassies in the country—Britain, China, Russia, France, Egypt, Japan, Uruguay, Spain, Ukraine, and New Zealand. Later reports noted Netanyahu had summoned the U.S. ambassador to Israel as well.
The highly unusual move was seen as particularly aggressive considering it took place on the Christmas Day holiday. A senior diplomat talks to Haaretz and suggests there was general anger in the diplomatic community over the date of the summons: “What would they have said in Jerusalem if we summoned the Israeli ambassador on Yom Kippur.”
Netanyahu also increased his criticism of President Obama, accusing him of personally orchestrating passage of the Security Council resolution. “From the information that we have, we have no doubt that the Obama administration initiated it, stood behind it, coordinated on the wording and demanded that it be passed,” Netanyahu said at the weekly cabinet meeting. The White House has denied repeated accusations that it helped plan the Security Council vote, in which it abstained. A day earlier, the Israeli prime minister had accused Obama of a “shameful anti-Israel ambush” at the United Nations.
By refusing to veto the resolution, the Obama administration broke a long tradition, the prime minister added. “Over decades American administrations and Israeli governments disagreed about settlements, but we agreed that the Security Council was not the place to resolve this issue,” Netanyahu said. “We knew that going there would make negotiations harder and drive peace farther away. As I told John Kerry on Thursday, ‘Friends don’t take friends to the Security Council’,” he said, switching from Hebrew to English.
Even as Netanyahu has said he looks forward to working with President-elect Donald Trump, he also made it clear he’s reconsidering Israel’s relationship with the international community. “I instructed the foreign ministry to complete within a month a re-evaluation of all our contacts with the United Nations, including the Israeli funding of UN institutions and the presence of UN representatives in Israel,” Netanyahu said on Saturday. He also reportedly told all his ministers to suspend diplomatic activities with representatives of countries that voted in favor of the resolution.
President-elect Donald Trump joined Netanyahu in condemning the Security Council vote, calling it a “big loss for Israel” that “will make it much harder to negotiate peace.” But, not to worry, “we will get it done anyway!”
