NEW YORK — US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee criticized CBS News on Aug. 8 for selectively editing a recent interview with him, conveying different messages from the ones he actually said in the interview.
“Ever wonder how the media edits an interview to give you a different story than the one they had?” Huckabee tweeted.
The diplomat then added a link to the full transcript on the US embassy website, providing readers the opportunity to identify the misleading edits for themselves.
The interview was aired on Aug. 7 and was conducted by CBS News’ Debora Patta.
Here is what was broadcast:
Patta asks Huckabee whether he is “deeply troubled by images of starving children.”
Huckabee replies, “I’m moved when the photos are verified.”
The reporter follows by insisting that “there are real images,” to which the American official says, “Oh, I think that there are certainly people suffering in Gaza.”
Here is what Huckabee actually said:
“I’m moved when the photos are verified. I mean, we’re all moved when you see someone, especially a child who’s starving. But The New York Times published a picture on the front page of what was purported to be a starving child. Turns out the child had a birth defect and had not been starving.
“There were other pictures, for example, that were published of starving children in Gaza. Turned out one of them was from Yemen. One was from 2017. There was another photo that appeared to be somewhat staged, with [the] photographer all set up to get pictures of a few people herded into a small area . . . ”
Here Huckabee was interuppted, with Patta asking about “real images.”
Huckabee continued (as in the full transcript):
“Part of the reason is, is because you’ve had pallets and trucks full of food that the UN won’t take in because they say they don’t want military escort from IDF, but they say it’s not safe, and 87% of their own food every time they do take it in gets hijacked and looted. That’s their numbers. Those aren’t mine. I didn’t make that up. That’s what they report.
“So there’s not been a lack of food or even a lack of attempt. It’s been an inefficient way of getting it in. It’s been a problem because you have a terror organization who is stealing it, looting it, and then turning around and selling it to the people who are hungry.”
In the aired interview, Patta pushed back, saying that the United Nations’ World Food Program stated it had not seen evidence that humanitarian aid was being diverted to Hamas.
Huckabee replied:
“The [US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation] sites are effective, and they are getting food to people. It’s not perfect, but it’s doing what President Trump required us, asked us to do, that was set up through GHF, give food to people, but in a way that Hamas can’t steal it.”
In the full exchange, which CBS News omitted, Huckabee went on to say:
“Hamas made half a billion dollars last year, 500 million US dollars stealing food, selling it on the black market in order to finance their activities. That’s stunning. That’s a real business they have. They put it in warehouses. Yes, there have been some of the just regular population who are looting the trucks.
“One of the things we heard at GHF feeding sites was people, when they first started coming, they said, well, this is the first time you didn’t have to pay for the food.
“They were used to having to buy food from Hamas at prices that Hamas was inflating because they stole something. And then they turned around and sell it.”
Patta said, “every single day there are people dying near GHF sites.”
Huckabee said, “Tell me about the people dying at the GHF sites, in what way?”
Patta said: “So you have no reports of anybody being killed near a GHF site?”
Huckabee was aired as saying:
“No, we’ve had reports that there have been incidences . . . but forgive me if I’m a little skeptical and someone says these people are being killed in the GHF sites. I’m getting reports every day from them, every single day. If I would hear that, I assure you we’d be interested in getting the details. And if there was some random shooting of people who are coming for food, those people would be consequented severely.”
The full transcript shows that the following from Huckabee’s answer was cut out:
“We’ve had reports that there have been incidences, but we’ve also had reports one day that there were 27 people killed at a GHF site. We had the video to show that no one was even injured. Much less killed. But it went all over the world, The New York Times, the Washington Post, BBC, CNN, all reported [and] it turned out as a total hoax. It never happened.
“Did those media companies come back, some of them with a tiny little correction in the fine print, but the story went out there that 27 people had been murdered at the GHF side. It never happened.”
In the full transcript, the interview commences with Huckabee reasoning against further negotiations with Hamas.
He says, “I think the negotiations are broken down completely because Hamas is not serious about negotiating. I’m not sure they ever were, but they certainly aren’t anymore. . . . I’m not sure there is a way to revive negotiations with people who were so savage that they would rape women in front of their families, burn elderly people in their wheelchairs, in front of family, and do the hideous things that they not only did on October 7, but they continue to do in torturing hostages that have been in these tunnels now for almost 22 months.
“So, if I believe that there was a way to sit down and reason with people like that I would love to see it happen, but you have to look at who they are and what they have done, what they’ve done to their own people.
“How many of their own people they’ve murdered in Gaza, and ask yourself, are these people that really want a conclusion? Do they want some level of stability? I see no sign of it.”
The CBS News interview closed with Patta asking Huckabee about the claims that Israel was committing genocide in Gaza.
Huckabee is aired as saying:
“If Israel is attempting genocide, they’re really, really bad at it. They could have had genocide on October the 8th.”
In the full exchange, Huckabee continued:
“They could have dropped a few bombs and have annihilated all Gazans, it’s not that big an area. They certainly had the capacity to do it, and saw that in the 12-day war with Iran.
“It is the most ridiculous thing in the world to say that Israel is committing genocide. That’s absurd. On its face, it’s absurd. If they were trying to commit genocide, it would not have taken them 22 months.”
