‘That’s Not True!’ Huckabee Throws Down With Tucker Over Whether Qatar Treats Christians Better Than Israel

Screenshot via YouTube

Tucker Carlson dropped his highly contentious interview with U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee on Friday. Huckabee urged Carlson to agree to a sit-down with him in early February after Carlson put out a clip claiming Israel mistreats Christians, a topic they sparred over during their interview.

Carlson introduced the interview by attacking Huckabee, claiming he sounded like a man who could not speak freely, and argued he represented the Israelis’ interests over the U.S.

Carlson put out several clips from the 160-minute interview on X, including one in which he presses Huckabee on Israel’s involvement with Jeffrey Epstein, baselessly claiming there is “quite a bit of evidence” Epstein was Mossad.

In one clip, Huckabee rips Carlson for claiming that Israel kicked out Christians.

“But I would also say that when you said the Christians were kicked out, Tucker, Christianity is growing in Israel. And there is a big lie that goes out there, but let me finish this because I keep hearing that Christians are really not treated well in Israel — that’s simply a lie. It is a lie! There are lots of different… There were 34,000 Christians in Israel in 1948. There are 184,000 Christians here today,’ Huckabee said.

“And by Israel, what are you counting? You’re talking about the land? What territory are you counting? Are you counting Israel proper? Are you counting the West Bank as well as Gaza? I mean, when you say Israel, those numbers apply to what landmass?” Carlson hit back.

Huckabee replied, “It would be in Israel proper — there are 184,000. Now I’ll tell you where Christians are not doing very well: they’re not doing well in the Muslim-controlled countries. There are almost no Christians in Qatar, for example, except those who live in the Christian ghetto, who are the service workers. You can’t pray.”

Carlson cut in, “I’m sorry. Look, I don’t want to argue with you. There are many more Christians in Qatar than there are in Israel.”

“That’s not true!” Huckabee hit back as Carlson claimed, “It actually is true. And I refer you to Wikipedia, Mr. Ambassador. Wikipedia, the… I refer to the government of Qatar, the government of Israel. These are knowable facts,” Carlson scoffed.

“In Jordan, the numbers are down, the numbers are down in Syria, the numbers are down in Lebanon, the numbers are down,” Huckabee replied.

“I’ll just tell you that there are about twice as many Christians,” Carlson shot back as Huckabee clarified, “But they live in the enclave; they are not native Qataris.”

“Okay, we’re mixing so many different categories here. I’m just saying, I get things wrong all the time, you’ve just gotten something wrong, and I think it’s important to acknowledge it. There are many more Christians in Qatar than there are in Israel, fact,” Carlson claimed.

“How many?” shot back Huckabee.

“Now you’ve caught me, I don’t know, I can look it up on my phone, but I was just there, and there are many — whatever,” Carlson claimed.

Carlson is indeed correct that there are more Christians in Qatar than in Israel, but Huckabee’s point about them not being citizens was a key distinction. The some 300,000 Christians are foreign workers from countries like the Philippines — only about 12% of the Qatar population are citizens with full rights inside the country. Qatar has long been accused of widespread human rights violations surrounding its treatment of foreign workers.

Human Rights Watch noted in 2025, “Leaving an employer without permission, known as ‘absconding,’ remains a crime. Passport confiscations, high recruitment fees, and deceptive recruitment practices remain largely unpunished. Despite the scrutiny brought on migrant worker deaths in Qatar in the lead up to the 2022 World Cup, Qatar has failed to prevent, investigate, or compensate the deaths of thousands of migrant workers.” Israel, meanwhile, has several predominantly Arab Christian cities with their own elected local governments and has had Christian members of its parliament, the Knesset.

Tucker hilariously claims there are more Christians in Qatar than in Israel.

Amb. Huckabee correctly responds that Christians in Qatar are forced to live in ghettos without equal rights.

He then asks Tucker what Qatar’s Christian population is. His answer? “I don’t know.” pic.twitter.com/PrTwoFCeJO

— Eitan Fischberger (@EFischberger) February 20, 2026

Watch the clip above.

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