{"id":201243,"date":"2026-02-22T13:39:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-22T13:39:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/us-envoy-mike-huckabee-says-it-would-be-fine-if-israel-took-all-middle-east-land-the-guardian\/"},"modified":"2026-02-22T13:39:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-22T13:39:10","slug":"us-envoy-mike-huckabee-says-it-would-be-fine-if-israel-took-all-middle-east-land-the-guardian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/us-envoy-mike-huckabee-says-it-would-be-fine-if-israel-took-all-middle-east-land-the-guardian\/","title":{"rendered":"US envoy Mike Huckabee says it would be \u2018fine\u2019 if Israel took all Middle East land &#8211; The Guardian"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Rightwing Trump ally tells Tucker Carlson Israel has biblical right to land from \u2018wadi of Egypt to the great river\u2019<br \/>The US\u2019s ambassador to Israel, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/mikehuckabee\" data-link-name=\"in body link\">Mike Huckabee<\/a>, has contended to the podcaster <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/tucker-carlson\" data-link-name=\"in body link\">Tucker Carlson<\/a> that Israel has a biblical right to take over the entire Middle East \u2013 or at least the lion\u2019s share of it.<br \/>\u201cIt would be fine if they took it all,\u201d Huckabee said to Carlson during an interview posted on Friday. The Trump administration appointee and former Arkansas governor discussed with Carlson interpretations of Old Testament scripture within the US Christian nationalist movement.<br \/>Carlson \u2013 who recently made disputed claims that he was detained at Tel Aviv airport in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/israel\" data-link-name=\"in body link\">Israel<\/a> \u2013 asked Huckabee about a biblical verse in which God promises Abraham that his descendants will receive land \u201cfrom the wadi of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates \u2013 the land of the Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites,<strong><sup class=\"dcr-130mj7b\"> <\/sup><\/strong>Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaites,<strong><sup class=\"dcr-130mj7b\"> <\/sup><\/strong>Amorites, Canaanites, Girgashites and Jebusites\u201d.<br \/>Carlson pointed out that this area in modern geography would include \u201clike, basically the entire Middle East\u201d.<br \/>\u201cThe Levant \u2026 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/israel\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" data-component=\"auto-linked-tag\">Israel<\/a>, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon \u2013 it\u2019d also be big parts of Saudi Arabia and Iraq,\u201d Carlson said.<br \/>Huckabee said: \u201cI\u2019m not sure it would go that far, but it would be a big piece of land.\u201d<br \/>He continued: \u201cIsrael is a land that God gave, through Abraham, to a people that he chose. It was a people, a place and a purpose.\u201d<br \/>Pressed by Carlson on whether Israel has the right to that land, Huckabee responded: \u201cIt would be fine if they took it all.\u201d<br \/>The interview with Huckabee was conducted in Israel on a trip that generated headlines when Carlson <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jpost.com\/israel-news\/article-887171\" data-link-name=\"in body link\">claimed he had<\/a> experienced \u201cbizarre\u201d treatment at the Ben Gurion airport. But Israeli and US officials said he underwent routine security questioning.<br \/>Huckabee responded to another aspect of the Carlson interview on Saturday in which, <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/GovMikeHuckabee\/status\/2025203824370090473\" data-link-name=\"in body link\">Huckabee wrote on X<\/a>, Carlson \u201cseemed to be insinuating that the Jews of today aren\u2019t really same people as the Jews of the Bible\u201d.<br \/>Huckabee said he had not encountered the theory previously \u201cbecause it comes from some of the darkest realms of the Internet and social media\u201d and described it as a \u201cdangerous conspiracy theory\u201d that has been \u201cweaponized by very bad people to delegitimize Jews and strip them of their history\u201d.<br \/>The ambassador noted that it is \u201can idea that gained traction in the \u201980s and \u201990s with David Duke and other Klansmen and neo-Nazis\u201d.<br \/>But he went on to question Carlson\u2019s overall approach and motive for seeking an interview with him.<br \/>\u201cI was expecting a thoughtful conversation and that he would ask questions and give me the opportunity to actually respond \u2013 just like he did with the little Nazi sympathizer Nick Fuentes or the guy who thought Hitler was the good guy and Churchill the bad guy.<br \/>\u201cWhat I wasn\u2019t anticipating was a lengthy series of questions where he seemed to be insinuating that the Jews of today aren\u2019t really same people as the Jews of the Bible,\u201d he added.<br \/>Carlson has increasingly questioned US support of Israel, moving him from the center to the fringe of the Make America Great Again movement.<br \/>Huckabee represents a more traditional pro-Israel conservative position.<br \/>After Carlson\u2019s aired his claims of unusual treatment in Tel Aviv, former Israeli prime minister Naftali Bennett said the former Fox News host was being \u201cchickenshit\u201d.<br \/>\u201cNext time he talks about Israel as if he\u2019s some expert, just remember this guy is a phony!\u201d Bennett said in an <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/naftalibennett\/status\/2024235033855144139\" data-link-name=\"in body link\">X post on Wednesday<\/a>.<br \/>Huckabee, in <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/GovMikeHuckabee\/status\/2024222628748083478\" data-link-name=\"in body link\">his own post on<\/a> X, said: \u201cEVERYONE who comes in\/out of Israel (every country for that matter) has passports checked &amp; routinely asked security questions.\u201d<br \/>The Israel Airports Authority said in a <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/IsraelMFA\/status\/2024229550205653457\" data-link-name=\"in body link\">statement posted to X<\/a> on Wednesday: \u201cTucker Carlson and his entourage were not detained, delayed, or interrogated.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/news.google.com\/rss\/articles\/CBMimwFBVV95cUxPbWlSaEVMNU9fQ0pSeFdsTGVBYllRTHlyNFB3OU16NmtsTV9xOVM4clJ1Z0hTLTlKUDdTaVduczRpOUlGR0F4akxDa3dpOFhqaWxSeTB1d3JCNE5EYjllV1NscThyNTBOTUFWRjQ3Q3NkWFVPZy1YaDNZWmw3SkRiNHpXZXh3UGVUdUlwODZCTW5wMmxOWm1NeWFXbw?oc=5\">source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Rightwing Trump ally tells Tucker Carlson Israel has biblical right to land from \u2018wadi of Egypt to the great river\u2019The US\u2019s ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, has contended to the podcaster Tucker Carlson that Israel has a biblical right to take over the entire Middle East \u2013 or at least the lion\u2019s share of it.\u201cIt [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":201244,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-201243","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-us","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201243"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201243\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/201244"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}