JERUSALEM -- In a speech Saturday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attacked President Barack Obama and the United Nations for the passage a day before of a resolution that criticized Israel's settlement activity in the West Bank and east Jerusalem.
Netanyahu said the resolution was part of the "swan song of old world bias against Israel," and he compared Obama to former President Jimmy Carter, whom the prime minister called the worst president for Israel and the last to break with a traditional U.S. commitment to support Israel. Carter frequently criticizes Israel's activities in the West Bank and more recently urged Obama to extend diplomatic recognition to the Palestinian territories.
"The resolution is absurd. It states that the Jewish quarter and the Western Wall are occupied," said Netanyahu, referring to holy Jewish sites that sit within the Old City in east Jerusalem.
But Netanyahu said he was optimistic because the world order was about to change, especially with President-elect Donald Trump about to enter the White House. He said Israel would fight to cancel the resolution.
Israeli leaders on Saturday seemed to be counting down the days to Trump's Jan. 20 inauguration, hopeful that he will offer a more sympathetic approach to Israel and bring an end to what one senior minister called Obama's support for "Palestinian intransigence, incitement, violence and terror."
The resolution, which was voted upon Friday in the U.N. Security Council, declares settlements built on land Israel has occupied since the 1967 war as having "no legal validity" and a threat to the possibility of creating two states, one for Israelis and one for Palestinians.
The resolution passed 14-0, with the United States, in a break with practice, abstaining rather than vetoing. It was the first resolution adopted by the council on Israel and the Palestinians in nearly eight years.
In a statement after the vote, Netanyahu said the Obama administration had "not only failed to protect Israel against this gang-up at the U.N., it has colluded with it behind the scenes."
He called the resolution "shameful" and said Israel would not abide by its terms.
For the first time since the U.S. election, Netanyahu stated clearly that he looked forward to working with Trump, "to negate the harmful effects of this absurd resolution."
Netanyahu and his ministers have generally refrained from making public statements about Trump, but subtle words and gestures have suggested that the Israeli leadership is buoyed by the new administration.
They now seem eager to see the back of Obama, who has clashed regularly with Netanyahu over numerous issues, especially the settlements.
Roughly 400,000 Jewish settlers live on 125 settlements and 100 outposts in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Over the past six months, Israel has announced plans to add hundreds of units to existing settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, each time drawing rebuke from the White House.
More recently, right-wing voices in Netanyahu's government have been pushing legislation to legalize settlements built on privately owned Palestinian land, a step also frowned upon by the Obama administration.
Trump, on the other hand, has indicated that he might bring a fresh approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Earlier this month, he nominated his close adviser, New York lawyer David Friedman, an outspoken supporter of Israel's settlements, as the ambassador to Israel. And on Thursday he tweeted that "The resolution being considered ... should be vetoed."
A White House official, speaking on condition of anonymity about the sensitive internal discussions, said the Security Council vote was preceded by months of back-and-forth discussions about numerous draft resolutions in circulation.
The official said the White House would not back any measure that delegitimized Israel or imposed a solution on the two parties, and would veto a resolution that omitted mention of incitement to violence and terrorism.
After the vote, Netanyahu ordered a series of diplomatic steps against the countries that had originated the resolution and with whom Israel has diplomatic relations.
For instance, he instructed Israel's ambassadors in New Zealand and Senegal to immediately return to Israel and canceled a planned visit to Israel by the Senegalese foreign minister scheduled for next month. He also suspended Israeli aid programs in Senegal.
On Saturday, Netanyahu also said he would cancel Israel's financial contributions to five U.N. agencies.
Information for this article was contributed by Kareem Fahim, Heba Farouk Mahfouz and Carol Morello of The Washington Post.
A Section on 12/25/2016