MSNBC host Chris Matthews ripped evangelical Christians for supporting Israel, contending that they are ignorant about Israel and the "tricky" region. Appearing on MSNBC's "Morning Joe", Matthews tore into Christians who cheered President Trump's decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Matthews accused Trump of making his decision to sway Christian voters in Alabama in next week's Alabama special Senate election to fill the seat vacated by Attorney General Jeff Sessions. Republican Roy Moore and Democrat Doug Jones are locked in a dead heat despite eight women having accused Moore of being a sexual predator. "Don’t think this isn’t related to Alabama next week," said Matthews. "It is related, because it’s the Christian evangelicals down there with their crazy ideas about Israel, which is, I don’t know, mythical. They don’t understand the situation over there and how tricky it is ethnically and tribally. They don’t care because it’s a religious belief. Trump’s playing to that this week. You watch him.” Matthews also lambasted Trump's decision, arguing that "the only hope for peace" was to give the Palestinian Authority "a portion of East Jerusalem, maybe all of it.” "Because if you don’t give the Palestinians hope that they can have national integrity and have a capital where they believe it should be, you’re going to have an unending problem," continued Matthews. "Deaths are coming now because of this. You can just bet that in the next few weeks, we’re going to have hell to pay for this totally erratic decision by this president.”
