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Last week, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that the settlement activities “set back the cause of a negotiated peace.”

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Mahmoud Abbas scored two victories at the United Nations last week.

The first and most obvious was securing Palestinian status as a nonmember observer state at the UN — with the support of not only the usual rogue’s gallery of human-rights abusers, but also a majority of OECD nations, including some that otherwise stand up for Israel’s fight against Palestinian terrorism and militancy.

Abbas’ second prize came a few days later: His UN victory goaded Benjamin Netanyahu’s Israeli government into a reckless and overly aggressive counter-attack gesture in the West Bank, a move that threatens to poison the Israeli Prime Minister’s relationship with his allies, including the United States.

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The U.S.’s statements come after five European nations summoned Israeli ambassadors on Monday to denounce the latest settlement construction push, deepening the rift between the Jewish state and European allies over the Palestinians’ successful UN statehood bid.

Although Europe considers all Israeli settlement construction illegal, the summoning of ambassadors in France, Britain, Sweden, Spain and Denmark to accuse Israel of undermining already troubled peace efforts was an unusually strong expression of displeasure. It came at a time when Israel was already smarting over Europe’s failure to back the Jewish state in its campaign against the statehood move.