“Duck Dynasty’s” outspoken patriarch Phil Robertson has a plan for how to deal with the Islamic State terrorists.
“I’m just saying either convert them or kill them,” the minister said during a Tuesday night interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity.
The long-bearded reality TV star brought a weathered Bible with him on to the set of the show and fired off numerous scriptural references backing up his claim that the extremists were motivated by pure evil.
Then, he took it one step forward by suggesting the United States give the Islamic State, formerly known as ISIS, a taste of its own medicine.
“I’d much rather have a Bible study with all of them and show them the error of their ways and point them to Jesus Christ,” Robertson continued. “However, if it’s a gunfight and a gunfight alone, if that’s what they’re looking for, me personally, I am prepared for either one.”
Robertson’s solution of “convert or die” was a chilling echo of the ultimatum that Islamic State militants gave to Christians, Yazidis and other minority religious sects who live in their new “caliphate.” “Hundreds” of men have been killed for refusing to convert to the Islamic State’s extremist interpretation of Islam,” Amnesty International reports. “Hundreds, if not thousands” of women and girls have been abducted and some may have been raped or forced to marry the fighters.
Robertson compared the Islamic State to “street thugs on steroids.”
“We’re going to have to deal with this group way more harshly than we have up to this point,” the man said.
The Duck Commander isn’t one to dodge confrontation. Last year, he was temporarily suspended by A&E after an inflammatory GQ interview where he called homosexuality a sin, and claimed he’d never seen black people mistreated before the civil rights movements.
He was on set to promote his new book, “UnPhiltered: The Way I See It,” where he shares more of his opinions.
When host Sean Hannity pointed out that Robertson may be lampooned for his remarks about the Islamic State, the minister didn’t seem perturbed.
He remembers hating Bible-preaching ministers in his younger years and said that Christians shouldn’t be surprised when they’re rejected by the world.
“(Jesus) told all of us like they hated me, they will hate you also,” the minister said, adding. “Jesus said ‘Listen, rejoice, be happy, because great is your reward in heaven.'”
