Press Release on Huckabee Action
PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 25, 2025
CONTACT: Eli McCarthy, Christians for Ceasefire and Just Peace, emccarthy@franciscanaction.org, 510-717-8867
Washington DC — Christian leaders offered active nonviolent resistance in the tradition of Jesus and disrupted the confirmation hearing for Mike Huckabee, President Trump’s nominee for U.S. ambassador to Israel. Demanding the Senate vote against Huckabee, police detained four Christians, including two pastors. One elderly Christian was cuffed and his wrist started to bleed. This followed the disruption and detainment of two Jewish leaders.
Wearing shirts emblazoned with “All Eyes on Palestine”, “Christian Zionists are complicit in the Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine”, and an image of the “Eyes of the Blind Man” mural that was just installed in the neighborhood of Silwan in occupied Jerusalem, police forcefully drove out the Christian protesters and arrested them seconds into their disruption.
“Mike Huckabee, the former governor and current TV personality is an extremist choice for the US Ambassador to Israel. His clear embrace of a violent Christian ideology and Christian Nationalism makes him very dangerous in this position.” said Rev. Margaret Ernst, a United Church of Christ minister and member of Christians for a Free Palestine. “As Christians committed to living into the loving and liberatory roots of their tradition, I felt it imperative to reject Huckabee’s violent Christian ideology.”
Protesters believe that, as ambassador, Huckabee will embolden Israeli settlements, annexation, and genocidal bombing campaigns, endangering Palestinians’ lives and rights to self-determination on their own land.
Huckabee openly denies the very existence of Palestinians and claims that Israel owns all of the West Bank. This flies in the face of established international laws and is instead based on his Christian Zionist theology and end-times prophecy, according to which Israel’s takeover of Palestinian land and expulsion of non-Jews will bring about the second coming of Jesus Christ and the apocalypse.
Activists said they wanted to highlight the struggle of Palestinians resisting Israeli ethnic cleansing and military occupation in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan as an example of the violent, destructive impact of Huckabee’s beliefs. Silwan is a vibrant community, where residents continually find creative ways to resist. Today, the Israeli government is forcibly displacing Silwan’s Palestinian families — some of whom have lived in the neighborhood for up to 900 years — and replacing them with Israeli settlers.
According to the Bible, Silwan is also the site where Jesus healed a blind man at the pool of Siloam. The Israeli government, working together with the Israeli Settler organization Elad and supported by other Christians, seeks to economically benefit from this story through the tourist attraction project “City of David”. In 2018, in another part of the same neighborhood, Huckabee was at the ribbon cutting for an Israeli Settler tourist center, furthering evidence of his staunch support for forcibly displacing Palestinians in Jerusalem. This echoes Trump's much maligned statement about turning Gaza into “the riviera.” According to the Rome Statue of the ICC, forcible population transfers, such as plans put forward for Gaza and Silwan, are both a war crime and a crime against humanity. Huckabee’s support of the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Silwan actively renders homeless the Palestinians in the same place where Christians believe Jesus had once sought ought the poor and marginalized to comfort and to heal.
The Christian protesters urge U.S. Senators to oppose Mr. Huckabee. The U.S. cannot afford diplomats who promote extremism and violent ethnic cleansing; instead, U.S. diplomacy must prioritize justice.
Christian Leader Quotes:
“We must never forget that all the victims of the genocide are Christ in the Rubble.” Philip Farah, Palestinian Christian and Founder of Palestinian Christian Alliance for Peace
“UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell has said ‘Gaza is once again the most dangerous place in the world to be a child.’ As Americans, we are more than just complicit in this. We are fully responsible. I call on all people of goodwill to take a loud committed stand against this genocide.” Hazami Barmadi. Barmadi has lost family members in Gaza and was on a hunger strike.
“We also call on the Shepherds (Clergy) of our Christian community to speak out more boldly to protect the children of Gaza. Christ came into this world to bring hope, peace and love. We need that now more than ever.“ Jesse Wheeler, Friends of Sabeel, North America
“Defending apartheid and arming genocide is antithetical to our Christian values. We need an arms embargo now.” Frank Panopoulous, Pax Christi Metro DC-Baltimore
Media from the disruption and from Silwan canbe found here.