unmistakably sounded as Washington shifts radically rightward in step with the Israeli government.

Not without reason, hardline Israeli Education Minister Naftali Bennett declared that with Trump's victory, "the era of a Palestinian state is over." Trump's nominee for ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, has raised millions of dollars for Israeli settlements, and his pick to lead international negotiations, including Israeli-Palestinian talks, Jason Greenblatt (a contributor to The Hill), volunteered in the past to pull guard duty at an Israeli settlement.

The incoming Trump administration appears ideologically intent on upending Washington's long-maintained, bipartisan opposition to Israeli settlements.

Kerry reasoned that if the Obama administration had vetoed the U.N. Security Council resolution, "the United States would have been giving license to further unfettered settlement construction that we fundamentally oppose."

A congressional vote to opposethe Obama administration's vote, combined with the incoming administration's fervent identification with Israel's settlement project, will finally provide Israel with what it has long sought from the United States: A license to colonize Palestinian land at will, bringing about the eventual emergence of the unitary state the Obama administration has tried to prevent.

Josh Ruebner is the policy director of the U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights and author of "Shattered Hopes: Obama's Failure to Broker Israeli-Palestinian Peace."

The views expressed by contributors are their own and not the views of The Hill.