Trump nominates hardliner Mike Huckabee as ambassador to Israel

President-elect Donald Trump has picked Mike Huckabee, a former governor of Arkansas, to be his ambassador to Israel, putting a figure who has rejected the existence of the Palestinian people at the centre of US diplomacy with Israel amid its wars on Gaza and Lebanon. 

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

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

“Mike has been a great public servant, Governor, and Leader in Faith for many years,” Trump said in a statement. “He loves Israel, and the people of Israel, and likewise, the people of Israel love him. Mike will work tirelessly to bring about Peace in the Middle East!”

It’s unclear how Huckabee would advance Trump’s pledge to end the war in Gaza. "There’s no valid reason to have a cease-fire with Hamas," Huckabee said in June.   

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

“If the so-called Palestinians are so loved by the Muslim nations of the world, why wont any of those nations at least offer to give temporary refuge to their brothers and sisters in Gaza,” Huckabee said in October 2023. 

Trump breaks with nominating a Jewish ambassador 

Huckabee is the first non-Jewish American to be named ambassador to Israel in almost 20 years.

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

Huckabee’s nomination underscores the growing sway of evangelical Christians in the Republican Party’s ties to Israel. Followers of Christian Zionism believe that modern Israel is a manifestation of biblical prophecies and that the US's fate is linked to it.

Huckabee has fallen somewhat from 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 towards senior citizens, combine travel with a dose of politics.

'There are certain words I refuse to use. There is no such thing as a West Bank. It’s Judea and Samaria. There’s no such thing as a settlement.... There’s no such thing as an occupation'

- Mike Huckabee

“You’ll learn about Israel’s heritage from both a biblical and a historical perspective. You’ll hear from top Israeli officials about the strategic place Israel holds today and why America is such a valuable ally to her,” the advertisement for the Huckabee-led tours says. 

When he was running for the Republican presidential nomination, Huckabee claimed, “There’s really no such thing as a Palestinian,” adding that the national identity had been created as “a political tool to try to force land away from Israel”. 

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

“There are certain words I refuse to use. There is no such thing as a West Bank. It’s Judea and Samaria. There’s no such thing as a settlement. They’re communities, they’re neighborhoods, they’re cities. There’s no such thing as an occupation.”

Huckabee was an evangelical pastor before he rose to the top of Arkansas politics. However, his interest in Israel and the Middle East stemmed from a trip to the region when he was 17 years old, travelling across Greece, Syria and Israel. 

In one interview, Huckabee fondly recounted seeing “great-looking Israeli girls in bikinis, just showing off and flirting” when he arrived at the Jordan River. 

He has rejected the two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine question outright, saying that to prevent Israeli Jews from being a minority in one state, there should be an “aggressive interest in bringing Jews from around the world to the homeland”.