TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — An uproar continued Sunday after the U.S. ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, said Israel has a right to much of the Middle East, as more Arab and Muslim countries objected and the U.S. said his comments were taken out of context.
Huckabee spoke in an interview with conservative commentator Tucker Carlson that aired Friday. Carlson said that according to the Bible, the descendants of Abraham would receive land that today would include much of the Middle East, including parts of modern-day Jordan, Syria, Iraq and Lebanon. He quoted from Genesis Chapter 15 and asked Huckabee if Israel had a right to that land.
Huckabee responded: “It would be fine if they took it all.”
A spokesperson for the U.S. Embassy said Sunday that Huckabee’s comments were taken out of context and that there is no change to U.S. policies on Israel.
In the interview, Huckabee added: “They’re not asking to go back and take all of that, but they are asking to at least take the land that they now occupy, they now live in, they now own legitimately, and it is a safe haven for them.” He added that Israel isn’t trying to take over Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, or Iraq but is trying to protect its own people.
A joint statement Sunday by Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Bahrain, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Indonesia, Pakistan, Turkey, Syria, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, the Palestinian Authority and several Arab governing bodies called Huckabee’s remarks “dangerous and inflammatory” and ones that endanger the region’s stability.
“These statements directly contradict the vision put forward by U.S. President Donald J. Trump … based on containing escalation and creating a political horizon for a comprehensive settlement that ensures the Palestinian people have their own independent state,” the statement said.
Huckabee, an evangelical Christian and strong supporter of Israel and the West Bank settlement movement, has long opposed the idea of a two-state solution for Israel and the Palestinian people.
Carlson has been critical of U.S. support for Israel in the war in Gaza and has come under fire for his own far-right views, including the white-supremacist theory that says whites are being “replaced” by people of color.
Meanwhile, tensions are high in Israel as the country prepares for a possible attack from Iran. Iran previously said it will attack both Israel and U.S. bases in the Middle East if the United States attacks it.
Trump warned on Friday that limited strikes against Iran are possible, even as the country’s top diplomat said Tehran expects to have a proposed deal ready in the next few days following nuclear talks with the United States.
The movements of additional U.S. warships and airplanes to the region, with the USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier near the mouth of the Mediterranean Sea, don’t guarantee a U.S. strike on Iran, but they bolster Trump’s ability to carry out one if he chooses.
Netanyahu warned last week that if Iran attacks Israel, they will risk a “response that they cannot even imagine.”
Israel attacked Iran last year during indirect U.S.-Iran talks, sparking a 12-day war. The United States inserted itself in the war by bombing Iranian nuclear sites.
Magdy reported from Cairo. Associated Press writer Sam Mednick contributed from Tel Aviv, Israel.
FILE - U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee poses for a photo during an interview in Jerusalem, Aug. 20, 2025. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg, file)
LIVIGNO, Italy (AP) — Eileen Gu snatched a gold ribbon off a gift basket on her way to the mountain Sunday and stuck it in her pocket just in case.
Just in case?
If her 16-day odyssey at the Milan Cortina Games taught the world anything, it’s that there are no sure things in sports. Especially when the athletes flip 15 feet over rock-hard snowscapes for a living.
But that gold ribbon Gu tied into a bow in her hair after her curtain-closing Olympic performance on the mountain did, in fact, match the color medal she won in the women’s ski halfpipe final.
And that gold medal also was the third she's won over two Olympics — more than any athlete in her sport.
And she is now 6 for 6 — six events, six medals, three of them gold, three silver — over a still-young Olympic career that has cascaded well beyond sports, veering into geopolitics, inclusion and, as the gold ribbon reminded us, fashion.
“I took a big risk in trusting myself,” Gu said of her frenetic quest this year, “and I’m glad that I did.”
Gu, born in the United States but competing for her mother's homeland of China, knows that the modeling career, the fame, the platform she commands and the message she sends wouldn't be possible if she weren't the best freeskier in the world. She was also the only one willing to divide her attention between halfpipe, slopestyle and big air over the 2 1/2-week marathon of Olympic risk-taking.
It was a quest that limited her training, rest and sometimes her sanity. Never her confidence, though.
“I’m not a gambling woman, but if I were, I took a pretty big bet on myself,” Gu said. “There was a chance everything could go wrong and I could have walked away with nothing, because I was trying to do too much. But in my head, even if everything crashes and burns, I tried. I'll never regret trying.”
The risk of doing too much once again reared its head on the first run of this bluebird day in Livigno — the halfpipe bathed one half in sun, the other in shade a day after a snowstorm postponed the final. Gu lost balance on the landing of her very first jump of the contest, forcing her to abandon the run toward the top of the pipe.
Each of her qualifying rounds at these Olympics involved a fall and a must-make return that she landed every time just to get to the final.
In halfpipe, largely viewed as the premier event in the sport and also the event where Gu has won 15 of her 20 World Cup titles, the odds of Gu not landing any of her three runs in the final seemed slim. In fact, it was none.
She ended up with not just the best score of the 32 runs by 11 athletes, but the best two scores of them all. Her second run was a 94 and her last was a 94.75.
“I tried for gold,” said Li Fanghui, who made this the first 1-2 finish for China in this event. “But my first goal was for silver.”
Gu won because she flies higher than almost everyone (except for bronze medalist Zoe Atkin), does more rotations than anyone (highlighted by two 900-degree spins in opposite directions) and, in a key separator in a 1.75-point win over Li, tried one more trick (Gu and most skiers did six, Li only tried five).
“She is ‘Wonder Woman,’” New Zealand’s eight-place finisher Mischa Thomas said.
After Gu landed smoothly on her final run, she lifted her right hand in the air, skied to the scoring area, then pumped her fist. That was trip No. 16 down the mountain over 16 days — every one of them dangerous in their own way, every one of them packed with pressure.
“I'm so tired, but I'm so happy,” she said.
At the end, with the gold medal secure, she wasn't too tired to run in her ski boots to the side of the halfpipe, if only to reach over the blue fencing and share the love with a cohort of fans who celebrated her every appearance in the pipe by chanting “Gu Ailing, Gu Ailing,” which is the Chinese way to say her name.
She isn't the only skier who brought a handful of fans to this remote village in northern Italy. But she's the only one who brought a following. For these Olympics, they came from Stanford, from San Francisco, China and many points in between.
Part of the reason she skis for China was to get more eyeballs on her sport. She recited figures from the Chinese government that said more than 300 million people have taken to the mountain in that country since she first burst onto the world stage at the Beijing Games four years ago.
“She brings a lot of visibility to our sport, which is awesome, especially in China,” said Canada's Amy Fraser, the only woman to beat Gu in a halfpipe over the last four years. “That’s my favorite event we go to. People treat us like proper celebrities when we go there.”
What country she competes for will follow Gu around until she's through skiing, and probably beyond.
Four years ago, the debate felt more supercharged because it was fresher and the Olympics were in the very country she was representing.
This time, a lot of it felt rehashed and reheated.
Vice President JD Vance weighed in on Fox News last week. Gu stuck to the message she's been preaching all along: the more the merrier when it comes to her sport and, as for her critics, “I encourage those people to use that energy and direct it toward something that makes the world better in their own way.”
With the six medals, Gu stands alone among those in the relatively new sport of freeskiing. She's also shooting up there in the pantheon of Olympians in any sport.
“I walked away as the most decorated free skier of all time, male or female,” Gu said. “I have the most gold medals of any free skier ever, male or female, and that is something that I’m so, so proud of. It’s unbelievable to me.”
AP Sports Writer Pat Graham contributed.
AP Winter Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics
China's Eileen Gu holds her gold medal alongside her two silver medals after the women's freestyle skiing halfpipe final at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)
Gold medalist China's Eileen Gu poses with her medals after winning the women's freestyle skiing halfpipe final at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)
Gold medalist China's Eileen Gu reacts to winning the women's freestyle skiing halfpipe final at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)
Gold medalist China's Eileen Gu celebrates winning the women's freestyle skiing halfpipe final at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)
China's Eileen Gu reacts during the women's freestyle skiing halfpipe final at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)
China's Eileen Gu, left, reacts alongside her mother, Yan Gu, during the women's freestyle skiing halfpipe final at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)
Britain's Zoe Atkin celebrates during the women's freestyle skiing halfpipe final at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)
China's Eileen Gu celebrates during the women's freestyle skiing halfpipe final at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)
China's Eileen Gu competes during the women's freestyle skiing halfpipe final at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)
China's Eileen Gu smiles during the women's freestyle skiing halfpipe qualifications at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Thursday, Feb. 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)
China's Eileen Gu, right, reacts alongside her mother, Yan Gu, after Canada's Cassie Sharpe crashed during the women's freestyle skiing halfpipe qualifications at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Thursday, Feb. 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)
