‘Hamas cannot exist’ – Trump’s pick for Israel ambassador sets out ‘day after’ plans

Mike Huckabee, President Trump’s pick for US ambassador to Israel, has said that "Hamas is not going to be able to exist" in Gaza going forward, calling it a "done deal"

Speaking during an interview on Fox News the former Arkansas governor predicted that the Middle East would see change of "biblical proportion” under the new administration’s foreign policy plans.

During the interview, Huckabee said: “A lot of people forget that Gaza was once a place inhabited by both Jews and Palestinians, until 2005 when Ariel Sharon decided to give it all away.

"They [Israel] militarily marched 10,000 Jewish people out of Gaza. Turned it into a complete Palestinian state, and the result we saw was October 7.”

President Trump, he continued, "did something bold. He looked into the future and said kind of a ‘what if’. We don't know exactly what might happen in Gaza, but here's what could have happened in Gaza: Gaza could have been Singapore. Instead, Hamas turned it into Haiti. And in fact, maybe worse, far worse than that”.

Huckabee went on: “The only time we've had real, significant peace in that region was the four years that Donald Trump was president, and I'm very optimistic that with his leadership, his bold and innovative thinking—he doesn't think like the other politicians and diplomats have thought, and thank God he doesn't because we get results."

"[He doesn’t think outside the box.] He throws the box away and says ‘let's start with a blank slate and see where this could go’. That's leadership, and that's what we have with President Trump.

"I'm personally optimistic that we're going to see something bold. I think we will see something of biblical proportion happen with his leadership in the Middle East."

His comments come in the wake of the president doubling down on his stated aim for the US to “own” Gaza and redevelop it into the “riviera of the Middle East” after resettling its population.

The suggestions has prompted backlash from the international community, including influential states like Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Qatar, while humanitarian organisations have condemned the proposal as ethnic cleansing.

However, Trump remains insistent on the plan and has received backing from the Israeli right, with defence minister Israel Katz ordering the IDF to begin facilitating “voluntary emigration” from the Strip.

Writing for the JC Professor Jonathan Rynhold, who heads the Political Studies department at Bar-Ilan University, argued that the president’s radical approach to diplomacy could actually deliver lasting peace.