President Barack Obama sprang his much-anticipated “December surprise” on Israel at the United Nations, capping off 2016 with a bang as it relates to the Gregorian calendar year’s major events surrounding the Jewish state.
JNS.org recaps 10 Israel news storylines that defined this past year.
The following are 10 Israel news storylines that defined this past year.
U.N. woes
The Obama administration chose to abstain from a Dec. 23 vote on a United Nations Security Council resolution condemning Israeli settlement construction beyond the 1967 lines, rather than exercising its veto power to block the resolution. In allowing the passage of the measure—which demands that Israel “immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the ‘occupied’ Palestinian territory, including east Jerusalem”—Obama broke with the longstanding American policy of defending Israel against one-sided resolutions criticizing the Jewish state in the world body. America’s U.N. abstention came in the waning days of a tenuous and sometimes hostile eight-year relationship between Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.