Obama’s Anti-Israel Tantrum - WSJ

The decision by the United States to abstain from a United Nations
Security Council resolution condemning Israel over its settlements on
the West Bank is one of the most significant, defining moments of the Obama Presidency.

It
defines this President’s extraordinary ability to transform matters of
public policy into personal pique at adversaries. And it defines the
reality of the international left’s implacable opposition to the Israeli
state.

Earlier in the week, Egypt withdrew the Security Council resolution under pressure from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. President-elect Donald Trump also intervened, speaking with Egypt’s government and, via Twitter, urging Mr. Obama to block the resolution, as have past U.S. Administrations and Mr. Obama himself in 2011.

As
was widely reported Friday after the U.N. vote, the White House decided
to abstain—thereby allowing the pro-Palestinian resolution to pass—in
retaliation against the intervention by Messrs. Netanyahu and Trump.

Mr.
Obama’s animus toward Prime Minister Netanyahu is well known.
Apparently Mr. Obama took it as an affront that the President-elect
would express an opinion about this week’s U.N. resolution.

It
is important, though, to see this U.S. abstention as more significant
than merely Mr. Obama’s petulance. What it reveals clearly is the Obama
Administration’s animus against the state of Israel itself. No longer
needing Jewish votes, Mr. Obama was free, finally, to punish the Jewish
state in a way no previous President has done.

No effort to
rescind the resolution, which calls the settlements a violation of
“international law,” will succeed because of Russia’s and China’s
vetoes.

Instead, the resolution will live on as Barack Obama’s
cat’s paw, offering support in every European capital, international
institution and U.S. university campus to bully Israel with the Boycott,
Divestment and Sanctions movement.



Obama’s Anti-Israel Tantrum - WSJ