By The Daily Caller (U.S.) | Created at 2026-09-09 19:58:13 | Updated at 2026-09-25 04:48:52
2 weeks ago
President Donald Trump doesn’t seem to be on the same page as his U.S. ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, on the issue of Israeli settler violence in the West Bank, according to a report published Tuesday.
Huckabee appeared on a BBC show Tuesday criticizing the United Kingdom for its new sanctions against West Bank settlements, equating the policy to an act of antisemitism. U.K. Prime Minister Andy Burnham briefed Trump on the sanctions before announcing them, and the president neither opposed nor offered any pushback, Axios reported. (RELATED: Senate To Decide If Trump Admin Must Provide Public Details About Increasing West Bank Violence)
In response to the Israeli government’s approval of new settlements in the EI area of the West Bank, the U.K. announced it was sanctioning individuals and entities involved in building settlements, as well as banning imported goods from Israeli settlements. Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Iceland, Ireland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain and Sweden joined the U.K.
Huckabee on Tuesday called the sanctions “discrimination against the Jewish people.”
“This is an irrational action … if the UK is really interested in dealing with issues they feel like are wrong, where are the sanctions against North Korea, China, Russia?” Huckabee said.
X users pointed out that the U.K. has imposed numerous sanctions on Russia, North Korea and China.
A White House official told Axios that Huckabee’s statements “were not coordinated with the White House” or the State Department.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio also did not directly condemn the sanctions.
“The President hasn’t commented on this and neither have I. We were made aware that they are gonna make this decision. We heard their arguments as to why,” Rubio told reporters Tuesday. “We share the goal of stability. We don’t want to see an uptick in violence or tensions in the West Bank in a tenuous time in the region.”
The Israeli government responded Tuesday by closing the British consulate in East Jerusalem, ending British involvement in the training of Palestinian security forces in the West Bank and excluding the U.K. from a Gaza coordination mission led by the United States. They also announced entry bans for several left-wing British Members of Parliament.
Huckabee recently described settler attacks on Palestinians in the West Bank as acts of terrorism during a visit to the village of Turmus Ayya, where he met with 10 Palestinian Americans. (RELATED: EXCLUSIVE: Foreign Policy Experts Diagnose Mike Huckabee With A Bad Case Of ‘Localitis’)
“If there are squatters that come in and put up their own flags and take possession of something that does not belong to them, if they burn a car, if they torch a mosque, if they go into someone’s home and vandalize it, paint graffiti on the walls, that’s a criminal act. But it extends beyond a criminal act. It’s an act of terror,” the ambassador said. “Our clear message is that crime is crime, terror is terror. When people do it, they should have an expectation that they will have severe consequences.”
