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Ambassador Huckabee: "It Would Be Fine If They Took It All"

Mike Huckabee is a former governor of Arkansas, a Baptist minister, and, since 2025, the United States ambassador to Israel. In February 2026, as American forces were massing in the Persian Gulf ahead of the war on Iran, he sat down with the journalist Tucker Carlson for a long interview at Ben Gurion Airport, outside Tel Aviv. Carlson asked him about the land promised to Abraham's descendants in the Bible. Huckabee's answer became the single most-watched statement by an American official on Greater Israel.

Evidence rating: CONFIRMED. The words are on video and quoted identically by Mediaite, The National, Middle East Eye, The New Arab, Al Jazeera, TRT World, Anadolu, and the Indian Express.

The exchange​

The fullest transcript comes from Mediaite. Carlson said: "You have said it three times that God gave this land to this people and so it is entirely fair for me with respect to ask what land are you talking about because I just read Genesis 15, as I have many times, and that land I think it says from the Nile to the Euphrates, which is once again basically the entire Middle East" (Mediaite, 20 February 2026).

The Indian Express and The New Arab record Huckabee's first reply: "Not sure it would go that far. I mean, it would be a big piece of land. Here's the point…this particular area that we're talking about now – Israel – is a land that God gave through Abraham to a people that he chose. It was a people, a place and a purpose" (Indian Express, 21 February 2026; The New Arab, 21 February 2026).

Then Carlson pressed: does Israel have the right to that land? Huckabee: "It would be fine if they took it all."

He continued: "But I don't think that's what we're talking about here today." Carlson: "You think it would be fine if the state of Israel took over all of Jordan –" Huckabee: "They don't want to take it. They're not asking to take it over." Carlson then put the logic to him directly: "So if God gave them that land, then they have a right to take it now by your definition. Unless I'm missing something" (Mediaite).

The National's version records the rest of Huckabee's answer: "They're not asking to go back to take all of that. But they are asking to at least take the land that they now occupy, they now live in, they now own legitimately, and it is a safe haven for them" (The National, 20 February 2026). TRT World reported he called the biblical grant the "original deed" to the land (TRT World, 21 February 2026).

What the second half says​

Huckabee's defenders pointed to the second half of his answer as a walk-back. Read it closely and it is not a retreat. It says the United States ambassador considers the land Israel "now occupies" (the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights) to be land Israel owns "legitimately." That is the narrow Greater Israel map, the one written into the Likud platform and the government's guidelines (see The Likud Charter and the Jordan River). And his reason is the same one he gave for the wide map: God's grant through Abraham. Middle East Eye's summary put it bluntly: Huckabee "walked back his statement, but only because it was likely an unrealistic venture for Israel" (Middle East Eye, 20 February 2026).

Türkiye Today reported that when Carlson asked whether Israel would be justified in claiming "all of Lebanon, all of Syria, all the way up to Iraq," Huckabee "initially said yes," and that he later called his remark "somewhat of a hyperbolic statement" (Türkiye Today, 21 February 2026). He also said in the interview, "No one from Israel wants that." The commentator JD answered with a list: the finance minister, the national security minister, the settler leader Daniella Weiss, and the prime minister himself (JD on X, 21 February 2026). Within days the opposition leader, Yair Lapid, said he wants the biblical borders "as broad as possible" (Al Jazeera, 24 February 2026). See Yair Lapid: "As Broad as Possible".

Iran in the same interview​

The same interview turned to Iran. Anadolu's account, as reposted, has Huckabee declining to deny that Israel has nuclear weapons while arguing that Iran must never have one: "What are the costs if they were to get a nuclear bomb? They've said for 47 years, 'Death to America.' They've targeted us. They've targeted President Trump specifically" (TRUTH AND SOLIDARITY MOVEMENT on X, 21 February 2026). The ambassador who said it would be fine for Israel to take the land to the Euphrates was, in the same conversation, making the case for the war on the country just east of it. Eight days later, on 28 February 2026, the United States and Israel attacked Iran.

How big it was​

The Tucker Carlson Network clip was viewed more than 11 million times (TCN on X, 20 February 2026). Middle East Eye's short video of the exchange passed 946,000 views on YouTube (Middle East Eye on YouTube). Shibley Telhami, a University of Maryland professor and Brookings senior fellow, posted one word: "Speechless!" (Shibley Telhami on X, 20 February 2026). The New York Sun headlined: "Huckabee Declares Israel Has Biblical Right to Middle East From Nile to Euphrates" (New York Sun, 21 February 2026). Al Jazeera wrote that "Recent comments by United States and Israeli officials supporting the concept of a 'Greater Israel' have raised alarm bells across the region," and that Huckabee "would not disavow the belief that the Bible promised that land to Israel" (Al Jazeera, 26 February 2026).

Carlson himself framed the stakes for American Christians in a later interview with the New York Times: "The second you start telling me as a Christian I'm obligated to support the government of this country, then I have a right to ask what you're talking about" (as quoted by Andromeda11711 on X, 4 May 2026).

Go deeper: Fourteen Governments Answer the Ambassador

The ambassador's record since​

Huckabee has kept to the narrow map. After Canada, Britain, Australia, and Portugal recognized a Palestinian state in September 2025, he suggested Israel respond by "declaring sovereignty over parts of Judea and Samaria" (Globe and Mail, 24 April 2026). In September 2026, after a town hall with American citizens in the West Bank town of Turmusayya whose homes had been vandalized, he wrote: "I support Israelis living in Judea/Samaria where they have right to be, but NO student of Bible supports lawlessness" (Mike Huckabee on X, 5 September 2026). Hooman Majd answered that under international law Israelis have no such right, and that a Greater Israel encompassing the West Bank "is not what the U.S. government's position is" (Hooman Majd on X, 5 September 2026). The ambassador, in other words, speaks for a policy the United States has never formally adopted.

Status: Mike Huckabee is alive. Tucker Carlson is alive. Yair Lapid, Shibley Telhami, and Hooman Majd are alive. Nothing on this page states that any of them committed a crime.

Sources​

Research captures: twitter/t19__v217.md, twitter/t19__v221.md, twitter/t19__v223.md, twitter/t19__v224.md, twitter/t19__v225.md, twitter/t22__v260.md, twitter/t29__v342.md

Last Updated: 2026-09-26

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