And so the year draws to a close just as it dawned — with Canada walking on eggshells around Donald Trump.

Thursday at the United Nations, the Liberal government had two choices. It could poke Trump but stand on principle, or continue a pattern of voting with the U.S. on the Middle East.

With the world watching, it did neither.

It abstained.

It moved to the sidelines and let the rest of the world take a position.

Mostly, it didn’t want to rattle Trump’s cage with the future of NAFTA very much in doubt.

A vote to declare Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel “null and void,’’ passed 128 to nine with 35 abstentions.

The U.S. won the support of key allies like Togo, Palau, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, Honduras, Guatemala and, of course, Israel.

Take Israel out of the equation and the entire population of those backing the U.S. is less than the population of Canada.

Canada, on the other hand, was the only G7 nation beside the United States that did not vote to condemn the move by Trump.

An abstention, at first glance, does seem to be a craven move, especially in light of the crass threats and bullying delivered by the American ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley.

Haley was defending Trump’s right to make an unnecessary, provocative move in the Middle East for strictly domestic political reasons.

Oh, she was going to take names. She wasn’t going to forget this vote.

She was going to remember when nations come calling for America’s financial help or its global influence.

It was an appalling performance, coming on the heels of Trump’s flat-out threat to cut off aid to anyone who voted against him.

Don’t disrespect us, Haley warned.

The Americans were going to take their ball and go home if others were mean to them.

In short, it was the type of speech that should have sent nations on the fence into the “screw you’’ camp against Washington.

Canada stayed quiet.

In Canada’s case, an abstention does send a message, because the Trudeau government, like the Stephen Harper government before it, has slavishly backed the U.S. in voting against UN resolutions perceived to be anti-Israel.

But overwhelmingly the message sent by an abstention was that Ottawa didn’t want to be there, didn’t want to take a stand, wished that this would just go away.

It was in keeping with Ottawa’s initial non-reaction reaction to the Trump move, a statement that did not mention the U.S. or the president, but merely affirmed Canada’s support of a two-state solution that includes agreement on the status of Jerusalem.

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By abstaining, we did not support Trump, nor did we poke him, but, of course, Washington immediately spun the results to indicate those who had abstained had backed them.

It’s been a long year for a government dealing with Trump as a neighbour and with NAFTA talks resuming next month, 2018 could be tougher.

We have been “disappointed” by his decision to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement, and have “disagreed vehemently” with ridiculous tariffs his commerce department slapped on Bombardier.

Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland skilfully vowed Canada would take on a greater global leadership role as the U.S. turns inward (without mentioning Trump) and, with U.S. trade representative Robert Lighthizer at her side, she delivered the message that a “winner-take-all” mindset cannot lead to a satisfactory renegotiation of NAFTA.

In Ottawa’s defence, no one sitting at the General Assembly Thursday, with the exception of Mexico, was living cheek-by-jowl with a president whose next move might jolt this country. Mexico also abstained Thursday.

Canada has bilateral interests with the U.S. that compel it to be careful, certainly more careful in condemnation of Washington than countries separated from the U.S. by an ocean.

In its most important bilateral relationship, the Liberal government has been dealing with a man in the White House who stands against virtually everything this country stands for.

And it is doing it with its most important trilateral trade relationship hanging in the balance.

This country has lost its voice on the Middle East so as not to upset the U.S. president.

Thursday, Canada could not even vote for a resolution that reflected its official policy.

Ottawa sat on its hands to appease a leader who has toyed with us during NAFTA negotiations.

They could find that tiptoeing on eggshells and losing our international voice may make no difference because if Trump wants to walk away from NAFTA, he will.

A year of playing nice and biting our tongue could still count for nothing.

Tim Harper writes on national affairsTjharper77@gmail.comTwitter: @nutgraf1

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