CNN
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Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, who President-elect Donald Trump announced Tuesday was his choice to serve as U.S. ambassador to Israel, previously argued that there is “no such thing as a Palestinian.”

Huckabee, who has been a strong defender of Israel throughout his career, made the statement during his 2008 presidential campaign, claiming that Palestinian identity was “a political tool to try to wrest land from Israel.”

In a video obtained by CNN’s Andrew Kaczynski during Huckabee’s election for president in 2015, Huckabee suggested that if a Palestinian state were to be created, it should be located in neighboring countries such as Egypt, Syria or Jordan, rather than within the borders of Israel.

“Basically, there’s no such thing as — I have to be careful when I say this because people are going to get really upset — there’s really no such thing as a Palestinian,” Huckabee said during a campaign stop in Massachusetts in 2008, while speaking to two Orthodox Jewish men. “There isn’t one.”

In response to a question from one of the men about the possibility of a Palestinian state outside Israel, Huckabee said he believed this was the preferable option.

“There’s Arabs and Persians,” Huckabee continued during the 2008 performance. “And there’s such complexity in that. But such a thing doesn’t actually exist. That has been a political tool to try to wrest land from Israel.”

In the video, which was previously published by BuzzFeed, Huckabee added that he thought a Palestinian state could be created from land in Egypt, Syria or Jordan.

“My point is, if that’s the problem, if it’s real estate, if you look at a map and say here’s how much Israel has and here’s how much the Arab states have, then there’s plenty of land,” he said .

Huckabee reiterated that point during a 2015 interview on Israeli television, in which he argued that a two-state solution was “irrational and unworkable” and said there is “plenty of land outside of Israel in the “rest of the world” for a Palestinian.” stands.

CNN reached out to Huckabee and the Trump transition team for comment on whether Huckabee stands by his comments.