US holds deep doubts about Palestinian state, Washington’s envoy to Israel says

The US no longer wholeheartedly endorses an independent state for Palestinians, Washington’s ambassador to Israel said, adding that if one were to be formed it could be elsewhere in the region rather than the West Bank.

“Unless there are some significant things that happen that change the culture, there’s no room for it,” Mike Huckabee, an appointee of US President Donald Trump, said in an interview with Bloomberg in Jerusalem. Those probably won’t happen “in our lifetime,” he added.

When asked if a Palestinian state remains a goal of US policy, as it has been for the past two decades, he said: “I don’t think so.”

Regarding location, 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, 69, said, using the biblical name the Israeli government favors for the West Bank, where some 3 million Palestinians live under occupation.

Palestinians argue that Israel has made a formation of a state nearly impossible by building more and bigger Jewish settlements in the West Bank and undermining Palestinian authorities, while doing little to stop settler violence against Palestinians.

European and Arab countries have been working to promote the creation of a Palestinian state led by the Palestinian Authority, which controls parts of the West Bank, as part of a process to end the 20-month war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.

A conference in New York next week, sponsored by France and Saudi Arabia, will be focused on such a state with the idea that the PA lead a multilateral effort to drive Hamas from Gaza and rebuild the coastal strip.

Asked how the war could be brought to a conclusion, Huckabee placed the blame solely on Hamas, designated a terrorist organization by the US and European Union, saying the Iran-backed group must free its remaining hostages for the conflict to end.

The war was triggered when thousands of Hamas operatives crossed into Israel from Gaza on Oct. 7, 2023, killing about 1,200 people and abducting 250, of which about 50 — many believed to be dead — remain in captivity.

Some 54,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s subsequent military campaign, according to the health ministry, and much of the territory has been destroyed, leaving the population mostly displaced and living under unsafe and unhealthy conditions.

Concern is building among international governments that Gaza’s 2 million inhabitants are facing starvation after Israel barred aid for several weeks from early in March to put pressure on Hamas. A US-Israeli group, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, has been working to deliver supplies in recent days but its work has been marred by chaos and violence.

Huckabee endorsed the group’s operations, saying it feeds Gazans while preventing aid from being seized by Hamas.

Religious Divide

Huckabee is a former governor of Arkansas and Baptist minister who has previously been an advocate of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, considered illegal by many states and international agencies.

He gets along well with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the right wing and religious ministers in his government.

In recent days, ultra-Orthodox members of the ruling coalition have threatened to bring down the administration if it doesn’t pass a law cementing a longstanding exemption for religious men from military conscription.

A bill to dissolve parliament is due to be voted on Wednesday — the first of four required votes in a process that could take weeks or months— and the ultra-Orthodox parties say they’ll support it.

Huckabee confirmed reports that he met with leaders of the religious parties, known collectively as the Haredim, and told them that if Netanyahu’s government fell, it would be viewed poorly in the US.

“Americans won’t understand a collapse of a government,” Huckabee said. “That, to Americans, signals instability.”

Opposition politicians eager for early elections to remove Netanyahu, bring back the hostages and end the Gaza war, had reacted angrily to reports of Huckabee’s meeting, viewing it as interference in domestic politics. Huckabee said the conversations didn’t constitute interference.

Asked about the negotiations between the US and Iran over Tehran’s nuclear program, Huckabee said Trump has made clear the Islamic Republic shouldn’t be able to enrich uranium at all — a position Iran has rejected out of hand.

“The president has made clear that there’s a limit to his patience with Iran,” Huckabee said. “He doesn’t want there to be carnage. But he also has been even more clear that Iran’s not going to have a nuclear weapon, they aren’t going to enrich and they’re going to have total dismantlement.”

On whether the US might attack Iran militarily if the talks fail, he said, “Nothing’s off the table.”