Mike Huckabee Tells Geraldo Rivera 'I Will Not Apologize' For Remarks Comparing Iran Nuclear Deal To Holocaust

Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee traded rhetorical blows with Fox News personality Geraldo Rivera on Monday, defending his remarks that President Barack Obama's nuclear deal with Iran would march Israelis "to the door of the oven."

Huckabee, a former Fox host himself, wouldn't back down from comments he made Saturday to the right-wing website Breitbart News. Monday's Fox-on-Fox violence took place on the evening panel show, "The Five," when Rivera decided to confront Huckabee after the former Arkansas governor repeated his charge against Obama.

"As a Jew," Rivera said, looking Huckabee in the face, "it was inappropriate."

"There are some places you cannot go. You cannot compare the slaughter of six million Jews to anything, except maybe the slaughter of the Armenians or something else in history," Rivera added. "You cannot compare it to a negotiation over a deal like this."

Rivera told Huckabee that the comments had offended many in the Jewish community and called Huckabee's "oven" line a "sloppy rhetorical phrase."

Huckabee shot back that he was making sure an event like the Holocaust would never happen again.

"I'm begging you to apologize," Rivera said, undeterred.

"I will not apologize and I will not recant," Huckabee replied. "The Democrat Jewish community has been universal in condemning [the 'oven' remark]. For them it's political, for me it is not. It's a humanitarian issue."