Trump appoints hardliner Mike Huckabee as ambassador to Israel

President-elect Donald Trump has named Mike Huckabee, a former Arkansas governor, as his ambassador to Israel, putting a figure who rejects the existence of the Palestinian people at the center of U.S. diplomacy with Israel amid its wars on Gaza and Lebanon.

Huckabee is a prominent leader of the pro-Israel evangelical Christian movement.

He served as governor of Arkansas from 1996 to 2007 and ran twice for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008 and 2016.

“Mike was a great public servant, governor and faith leader for many years,” Trump said in a statement. “He loves Israel and the people of Israel, and the people of Israel love him in the same way. Mike will work tirelessly to bring peace to the Middle East!”

It’s unclear how Huckabee would advance Trump’s promise to end the war in Gaza. “There is no good reason for a ceasefire with Hamas,” Huckabee said in June.

Huckabee has also advocated for the violent expulsion of Palestinians during Israel’s war on Gaza.

“If the so-called Palestinians are so loved by the Muslim nations of the world, then why do none of these nations offer at least temporary refuge to their brothers and sisters in Gaza,” Huckabee said in October 2023.

Followers of Christian Zionism believe that the modern state of Israel is a manifestation of Bible prophecy; The fate of the United States is implicitly tied to that of Israel.

Trump breaks with the nomination of a Jewish ambassador

Huckabee is the first non-Jewish American to be appointed ambassador to Israel in nearly twenty years.

The last was Ambassador James Cunningham, a career diplomat nominated by President George W. Bush in 2008.

Huckabee’s nomination underscores the growing influence of evangelical Christians on the Republican Party’s relationship with Israel.

Huckabee has fallen somewhat out of the political spotlight. In recent years, he has focused on offering all-inclusive evangelical Christian tours of Israel for $5,850 per trip. The tours marketed to seniors combine travel with a dash of politics.

“You will learn about Israel’s heritage from a biblical and historical perspective. You will hear from senior Israeli officials about Israel’s strategic position today and why America is such a valuable ally to the country,” says the advertisement for the Huckabee-led tours.

When he ran for the Republican presidential nomination, Huckabee claimed, “There really is no such thing as a Palestinian,” adding that national identity was created as a “political tool to try to take land away from Israel.”

Huckabee was an outspoken supporter of Israel’s annexation of the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip. “I think Israel has a title deed to Judea and Samaria,” he told Politico in 2017, using the Hebrew terms for the occupied West Bank.

“There are certain words I don’t want to use. There is no West Bank. They are Judea and Samaria. There is no such thing as an agreement. They are communities, they are neighborhoods, they are cities. There is no such thing as a job.”

Huckabee was an evangelical pastor before rising to the top of Arkansas politics. However, his interest in Israel and the Middle East stemmed from a trip to the region when he traveled to Greece, Syria and Israel at the age of 17.

In an interview, Huckabee fondly recounted how, upon arriving at Jordan, he saw “great-looking Israeli girls in bikinis, just showing off and flirting.”

He has strongly rejected the two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian question, stating that there should be an “aggressive interest in bringing Jews from around the world to their homeland” to prevent Israeli Jews from living in one state represent a minority.