US Ambassador Huckabee Calls West Bank Settlers 'Terrorists' Again During Visit to Palestinian American Village

Since Ambassador Mike Huckabee first branded rioting settlers "Israeli terrorists" after the mid-August siege of homes in Qusra, the label has stuck, and he repeated it Saturday, September 5, during a visit to the West Bank village of Turmus Ayya, according to the Associated Press.

Huckabee met with roughly 10 Palestinian American residents who described how settler attacks have upended their lives over the past year. "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," Huckabee said, according to the AP. "But it extends beyond a criminal act. It's an act of terror."

The word "terrorist" is one U.S. officials typically reserve for Palestinian militants, not Jewish settlers, which is why Huckabee's repeated use of it has drawn attention. The AP reports the term first surfaced from Huckabee after the August unrest in Qusra, where settlers surrounded several homes including one belonging to Loui Ridi, a Palestinian American who told Reuters in an August 20 interview that he remained in contact with Huckabee's staff at the embassy.

In that same August 20 interview, reported by the Epoch Times, Huckabee invoked the Ten Commandments directly. "If someone owns the land and they own their house, then having someone come and take it over and scare the family away from it, that's a violation, not just of man's law. That's a violation of God's law," he told Reuters, adding that settlers responsible could face U.S. sanctions. The Israeli military responded to the Qusra incident by detaining one Israeli and dismantling two "illegal outposts" in the area, the IDF said.

Days after Qusra, residents of the village of Bazariya said settlers burned a mosque and spray-painted a message on a wall reading "Huckabee regards from the terrorists" in Hebrew. "I'm glad they admitted it," Huckabee said Saturday, adding that the perpetrators "represent a very tiny minority."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the unrest roughly a week before Huckabee's Saturday visit, condemning the actions of a "handful of rioters," while Israel's foreign ministry called the violence "a disgrace," according to the AP. Neither statement named specific suspects or announced criminal charges. Netanyahu's government, described by the AP as the most ultranationalist and religious in Israel's history, has presided over a significant expansion of settlement construction in the West Bank, which most of the international community, though not the current Israeli government, regards as illegal under international law.

Huckabee himself has historically supported Israeli settlement activity broadly. His pointed language against violent settlers specifically, not against the settlement enterprise itself, is the distinction he's drawn since August: lawful residency is one thing, torching mosques and seizing property is another. "You don't take something that doesn't belong to you," he told Reuters in August. "I think the message is bigger than just even the Trump administration. It's a message of basic civility and civilized behavior."

Fox News reported that Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna said a violent settler crowd detained his congressional delegation for roughly 75 minutes during a separate West Bank visit, and that Huckabee "fired back" at Khanna's account, though the specific substance of that exchange has not been detailed beyond Fox's brief mention.

Separately, Al Jazeera's September 5 report from Arraba documented Israeli bulldozers uprooting olive groves along the Arraba-Ya'bad road, with the al-Fari family telling the outlet their phones and IDs were confiscated by soldiers during the demolition of their trees. Arraba mayor Ahmed Arda told Al Jazeera his town is now hemmed in by an established settlement, a newly founded settlement, and several new outposts. Al Jazeera's own framing, describing Israel's Gaza campaign as "genocidal" and citing unnamed "experts" who say the West Bank attacks "fit the definition of a pogrom," goes well beyond what AP, Reuters, or Fox News reporting establishes and should be read as Al Jazeera's editorial characterization rather than an agreed fact.

Huckabee has floated possible U.S. sanctions against violent settlers since August, but no sanctions have been announced against specific individuals in these reports. Huckabee himself acknowledged Saturday that the embassy "can't investigate criminal activity" and can only press Israeli authorities to pursue "the investigation and adjudication that every person has a right to expect." Whether that translates into actual prosecutions or actual U.S. sanctions is still to be determined.