Obama says Netanyahu ignored him 'countless times' over settlements

President Barack Obama says that he decided not to veto the UN Security Council resolution condemning Israeli settlements because Israel has repeatedly ignored “countless” warnings from the US over the issue.

Obama vetoed a similar resolution in 2011 because “I thought the prospects of some sort of negotiations were still alive,” he tells Channel 2 in an interview.

“Since that time I vetoed it in 20011 what has happened, since that time you have seen continued settlement construction and approvals unabated,” he says.

“John Kerry has talked to Bibi and I have personally talked to Bibi countless times and it was ignored,” Obama says, adding that Israeli settlements continue to grow “going deeper and deeper into the “West Bank.

Obama noted that every US administration had opposed settlement construction since 1967.