'God Will Do Great Things In This Holy City': Mike Huckabee Delivers Remarks At Jerusalem's Wester Wall

Forbes Breaking News

U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee delivers remarks during a visit to the Western Wall.

Transcript

00:00All right. It's a pleasure. Thank you. I'm going to lower this a little bit. There we go.

00:07Everybody in place.

00:13Well, as you heard from being at the wall a moment ago on this, my very first day as the

00:18ambassador to the state of Israel, it was such an honor and an incredible privilege

00:23to place on behalf of the president of the United States, President Donald J. Trump,

00:28a prayer that he wrote in his own hand and initialed, handed to me in person last Thursday

00:35at the White House with the hope that I would bring it and place it in the wall with the best

00:40wishes and the prayers of the American people for the peace of Jerusalem and for the return of the

00:47hostages. So I have done that with an extraordinary sense of honor, joy, and also a sense of great

00:58responsibility. The relationship between the United States and Israel is not ceremonial.

01:04It is deep. It is rooted in our love of democracy, in our love of the Judeo-Christian understanding

01:14that every life has worth and value. And it is one of the reasons that the president

01:22president prays that every hostage will be released immediately. And it's why I wear this

01:29on my lapel today. But I want to express my appreciation to the rabbi and to all the people

01:37who accommodated our visit here today. But also, I really do come with a sense of hope and optimism

01:45that God will do great things here in this holy city. And with that, I welcome questions. And

01:55if they're hard, then I'll say, I don't have an answer. It's that simple. Yeah, go ahead. You'll start.

02:00I don't have any updates that I'm authorized to release. All I can tell you is that every effort

02:21continues to be made for every hostage to be released. Those who are living and those who

02:28remains are still in Gaza are still in Gaza as a result of the horrific massacre that was inflicted

02:36upon the Israeli people and several American citizens as well. Yes.

02:48Speak up a little bit.

02:49As you may know, the ambassador doesn't make the policy. He carries it out. So I tell people I'm not

03:09a chemist. I'm a pharmacist. Somebody else named the president who was elected. He'll be the one who

03:15will make the formula. He will give to me and I will dispense it. So when those instructions come,

03:23I'll be here to deliver them.

03:25Last last point is, wouldn't the U.S. government message to officials in the Israeli government

03:31think talking about Iran, essentially a waste of time, and then the other solution is demanding

03:36Israel's territory?

03:37Yeah, I would never try to inflict my view upon the Israeli government.

03:42They're dealing with very challenging circumstances. I have great respect for what they're trying to get

03:49done and the manner in which they're getting it done. And so I'm not going to second guess

03:54their efforts whatsoever. It would be inappropriate for me as a representative of the U.S. government

04:00to evaluate what the Israeli government is doing.

04:04Yes, well, it gives me an extraordinary sense of personal joy to have been named by the president

04:18as an evangelical Christian believer to take this post. And to be honest, I was a little concerned

04:25that maybe there would be some resistance to that on behalf of Israeli people and Jewish people.

04:31But what I found is that just the opposite, and many people, my Jewish friends have expressed this

04:38over and again, that if I were Jewish and came as ambassador, they'd say, well, of course,

04:45he supports Israel. He's Jewish. He doesn't have a choice. I say to them, I have a choice and I make

04:52my choice to support Israel and to show my friendship that has existed, by the way, for 52 years from my

05:02very first trip here, which was in 1973 when I was a month shy of my 18th birthday. So I've seen you,

05:10obviously, Chris, probably several dozen of the times that I've been here. And it never grows old. I never

05:18get to the point where I don't learn something. I never get to the point where I don't experience

05:23something being in this very magnificent place. Yes.

05:28I didn't get the last part.

05:41I think the plans are yet to be determined. The tragedy is there has to be plans to do something

05:56different. If Hamas had been a civil people, if they had been something less than savages

06:05that massacred in the most vicious way, innocent civilians, they did not attack soldiers. They

06:13attacked civilians. They attacked women, children, babies, helpless elderly people. They brought this

06:21upon themselves. Everything that people see there is not the result of anything other

06:28than the vicious hatred that Hamas harbored and carried out on October the 7th. And they are paying

06:37the price. And tragically, so many innocent people are paying the price for the sins and the evil

06:43people of these monsters of Hamas. Yes.

06:51Well, Israel is an incredibly important ally to us. And people sometimes only think that Israel

07:16benefits from the United States. The truth is the United States benefits a great deal from Israel

07:22and not just militarily. We certainly benefit from the technology, from the innovation, from defense

07:28systems that were developed here. But there's a much more important and long lasting side of where

07:35Americans benefit in agriculture, technology, medical advancement. So it is not a one way street.

07:42The United States and its citizens are directly the beneficiaries of some of the extraordinary

07:51achievements and accomplishments and innovations of people here in Israel.

07:58Anyone else? Yes.

07:59Well, I can't speak to how happy or unhappy they are because they have not communicated.

08:14Yeah, I'm just saying it's it's not for me to determine what they're happy or unhappy about.

08:20I'm here to represent the president, the American people. And I do know that there's never,

08:27ever been a president in America who has been a better friend to Israel than President Donald J.

08:35Trump. That I know. One last question. Anyone? Yes, sir.

08:39But the president himself has made very clear Iran will never have a nuclear weapon. They will not be in

08:57a position where that they can threaten the peace, not just of Israel, but all of the people of the rest

09:03of the world. Let's never forget that the Iranians have not simply threatened Israel with extinction,

09:10which they have repeatedly over 46 years, but they have also threatened the United States.

09:16They don't just say death to Israel. They say death to America. And there's an old saying that

09:21when people tell you over and again, they're going to kill you, you might want to take them seriously.

09:27So I don't think that this is just about Israel. Israel has often been called the little Satan

09:34and the U.S. the great Satan. I'd put it in simpler terms for the Iranians. Israel is the appetizer

09:42and the U.S. is the entree. Whatever happens at the hands of the Iranians to Israel

09:48is the intended happening to those of us in the United States. Thank you very much. Pleasure to visit with

09:55you. Thanks for coming out.

Category

Transcript

Recommended