Historian Victor Davis Hanson, a frequent guest of Tucker Carlson, pushes back on the pundit’s recent critiques of Israel and pro-Israel Christians.
By David Rosenberg, World Israel News
Victor Davis Hanson, a historian and professor emeritus of California State University, Fresno, pushed back on criticism of Israel on the American Right, adding that recent comments by right-wing pundits like Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens do not represent the conservative movement or the American Religious Right.
Hanson, who has frequently appeared as a guest on Carlson’s now-cancelled Fox News show, “Tucker Carlson Tonight”, and his current, independently-produced “Tucker Carlson Uncensored,” spoke with Megyn Kelly on Wednesday regarding the rise in anti-Israel rhetoric on the American Right.
“Most of the evangelical community I know is still very pro-Israel,” Hanson said.
“I think what we’re talking about is the libertarian, right intellectual movement. I know that Tucker Carlson is voicing things, Candace Owens has, the CATO Institute has been very vocal.”
“But I don’t think it represents most Christians, much less most Americans. But I don’t know quite what their argument is because I’ve seen so many of them.”
“It doesn’t take a lot of brains to say ‘there’s 500 million people in the Middle East and there’s 12 million that live in a democratic government.’ And that is the only democratic constitutional system there.”
On Tuesday, Carlson sparked controversy with his interview of Munther Isaac, a Lutheran pastor from Bethlehem who lauded the October 7th invasion of Israel, accused Israel of genocide, and defined the Christian cross as “an important Palestinian symbol.”
During the interview, in which Isaac repeatedly lambasted American support for Israel while blaming Israeli policies for Hamas’ invasion last October, Carlson slammed Republican lawmakers and evangelical Christians over their pro-Israel views.
“It is very obvious to me that many Evangelical leaders in the United States care much more about the highly secular government of Israel than they care about Christian communities in the Middle East,” Carlson said.
“If you wake up in the morning and decide that your Christian faith requires you to support a foreign government blowing up churches and killing Christians I think you’ve lost the thread,” Carlson added.
Speaking with Megyn Kelly a day after Carlson’s interview with Isaac was published, Hanson made a veiled reference to claims during the Carlson interview that Israel was responsible for the decline in Bethlehem’s Christian population.
“I think a lot of it’s based on ignorance. I really do…If anybody goes to say Bethlehem, or they go into Lebanon, what’s happening all over the Middle East is Christians are being ethnically cleansed.”
“They’ve been ethnically cleansed from Gaza, most of them. But if they’re speaking in Syria, or they’re speaking in the Palestinian Authority, they’re terrified, and everything they say is monitored. So mostly the Christians are very anti-Israel, the spokespeople. But if you look at the events on the ground, they’ve fled.”