Amid reports that Israel and Hamas are moving towards a deal that includes releasing dozens of hostages, Mike Huckabee, President-elect Donald Trump's appointee for U.S. ambassador to Israel, said Wednesday that it has taken too long to free those abducted by the Palestinian terror group on Oct. 7, 2023.
"Let's hope that's true," Huckabee told Newsmax's "Wake Up America." "That's what we've all been praying for. It shouldn't have taken this long. We're now past the time that the Iranians held our hostages back in 1979. This has gone on ridiculously long. Hamas can't be trusted. Whatever deal there is, I hope that there are many, many guardrails that provide for an intervention if Hamas fails to keep it.
"Let's keep in mind, it's not just Hamas," he continued. "The Iranians have backed this whole thing, and one of the hopes I have is that President Trump will immediately restore the maximum pressure back on the Iranian regime. Let's stop this threat to the state of Israel once and for all. They have a right to security, peace, and there never can be a moment in which we forget what Hamas did to innocent civilians on Oct. 7."
Hamas has reportedly accepted the draft of a deal that includes a ceasefire and the release of dozens of hostages, with mediators for the United States and Qatar saying the two sides are at the closest point yet to an agreement.
With only five days left in President Joe Biden's White House residency, Huckabee said that the one-term Democrat leaves behind him a legacy of "confusion."
"There's never been a clear policy, even as it relates to Israel," Huckabee said. "One day he talks about how they don't have a better friend, there's no daylight between them, and then he'll turn around and say they're going to withhold even selling arms to Israel so that Israel can prosecute its war against these savages. That makes no sense. It's been almost an administration with a schizophrenic kind of approach to policy, particularly in the Middle East."
The former Arkansas governor said his home state has had "a bunch of snow" in recent days, receiving "a foot of it last week."
"The only thing I want to see melt faster than the snow is Joe Biden's presidency," Huckabee said. "And it can't come too soon."
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Nicole Weatherholtz ✉
Nicole Weatherholtz, a Newsmax general assignment reporter covers news, politics, and culture. She is a National Newspaper Association award-winning journalist.
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