Jordan’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Fouad Al-Majali, responded to statements made by the U.S. Ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, stressing that they contradict U.S. President Donald Trump’s declared position rejecting the annexation of the West Bank, and that they constitute a violation of diplomatic norms, international law, and the UN Charter. Several Arab parties adopted positions similar to the Jordanian one — including the Arab League and a number of Arab states — condemning the ambassador’s remarks and the negative implications they carry for regional security.

 

In reality, Huckabee’s statements did not stop at the West Bank alone. His rhetoric appeared saturated with the logic of a religious-political “right” as perceived by Christian Zionist fundamentalist currents and Israel’s religious right — extending to insinuations about the legitimacy of expansion across the “Promised Land,” according to a biblical reading that, in the discourse of these currents, stretches from the Nile to the Euphrates — a formulation often invoked in the literature of “Greater Israel.”

 

Huckabee’s remarks came during an interview on the podcast/program of American media figure Tucker Carlson, who has traditionally been associated with the MAGA current (Make America Great Again). This same current has itself witnessed a visible internal divide regarding the scale and limits of massive, unconditional U.S. support for Israel — and its political, moral, and strategic costs for the United States.

 

Returning to the Jordanian diplomatic response, one could argue that the statement was tactically astute in drawing attention to the contradiction between Huckabee’s declared rhetoric and the official line emanating from Washington. Yet the deeper question remains: to what extent can Trump’s “guarantees” actually be taken seriously? Are they a fixed reference point to rely upon, or merely part of the Trumpian political condition — one marked by a torrent of contradictory statements often used for maneuvering, signaling, or even deliberate obfuscation?

 

Huckabee’s statements can hardly be read as a personal whim or an isolated deviation from policy. At minimum, they represent a candid expression of a powerful current within Trump’s surrounding political environment — a current that effectively blesses annexationist policies, or at least tolerates them, albeit in less blunt language than Huckabee himself. Meanwhile, Israel’s religious-nationalist right continues to push a far more radical agenda, as reflected in repeated statements by senior ministers — including Bezalel Smotrich — regarding annexation, the dismantling of Oslo, the weakening of the Palestinian Authority, and even the promotion of Palestinian “emigration” as a long-term solution.

 

Trump’s own record does little to inspire confidence: from relocating the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, to cutting funding for UNRWA during his first term, to a series of political and symbolic alignments that cumulatively shifted realities on the ground in Israel’s favor. Even within American political discourse, attempts have grown to institutionalize biblical terminology such as “Judea and Samaria” in place of “the West Bank” — a battle over narrative no less consequential than the battle over policy itself.

 

It is important for Jordanian — and broader Arab — diplomatic and political discourse to expose these contradictions, and this is indeed a role Jordan has consistently played in support of the Palestinian cause. Yet, on the other hand, it would be dangerous — indeed a grave miscalculation — to treat the statements of this ideological ambassador as merely personal views detached from administration policy. Developments on the ground, successive Israeli government decisions, and the accelerating momentum of settlement expansion and far-right politics often pass without a level of American objection commensurate with their gravity — narrowing the gap between Huckabee’s rhetoric and actual policy far more than many would like to believe.

 

The unspoken question that lingers in political corridors remains this: why is the rhetoric of the religious Zionist right — with its extremism and incitement that threaten regional peace and security — so often overlooked, while any Islamic discourse is closely monitored and framed as extremism or antisemitism, even when articulated within a political context? Ironically, accusations within the American arena itself have become weapons in intra-right political struggles — something glimpsed in the controversy surrounding Carlson’s interview with Huckabee and the reactions it provoked.