The US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, has said that he would not be opposed to Tel Aviv taking over large swathes of the Middle East, reported Al-Jazeera.
Huckabee, an evangelical Christian, is a staunch pro-Israel conservative.
In an interview with conservative commentator Tucker Carlson that aired on Friday, the envoy insisted that Israel’s borders are rooted in the Bible when asked about the country’s present-day borders.
Carlson noted that the biblical verse includes the region between the Euphrates River in Iraq and the Nile in Egypt.
“It would be fine if they took it all,” said Huckabee, who was appointed by President Donald Trump last year.
Carlson, clearly surprised, questioned Huckabee on whether he truly endorsed Israel’s expansion across the entire region.
“They don’t want to take it over. They’re not asking to take it over,” the ambassador replied.
The US envoy later appeared to temper his remarks, describing them as “somewhat of a hyperbolic statement”. Nevertheless, he left open the possibility for Israeli expansionism based on his religious interpretation.
“If they end up getting attacked by all these places, and they win that war, and they take that land, OK, that’s a whole other discussion,” Huckabee said further.
The ambassador is not a stranger to controversy. In June 2025, he said he does not think an independent Palestinian state remains a US foreign policy goal, prompting the State Department to say he spoke for himself, Reuters reported.
Asked whether Huckabee’s remarks represented a change in US policy, State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce declined to comment, saying policy-making was a matter for Trump and the White House.
“Unless there are some significant things that happen that change the culture, there’s no room for it,” Huckabee was quoted as saying by Bloomberg. Those probably won’t happen “in our lifetime,” he said.
Huckabee suggested a piece of land could be carved out of a Muslim country rather than asking Israel to make room. “Does it have to be in Judea and Samaria?” Huckabee said, using the biblical name the Israeli government favors for the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where some 3 million Palestinians live.
In 2024, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories is illegal and must cease immediately.
