Jon Stewart says the Arab states won't give Palestinians citizenship because they're really terrified of the 'Islamists' they backed

• Jon Stewart slammed Arab states for not granting citizenship to the Palestinians.
• Stewart said the states were "scared shitless" of all the Islamists they helped foster.

The "Daily Show" host Jon Stewart says the Arab nations have a "dirty little secret" that may explain why they aren't granting Palestinian refugees citizenship in their own countries.

Stewart was interviewing the journalist Christiane Amanpour about the Israel-Hamas war when he ripped Arab states such as Jordan over their passiveness regarding the plight of Palestinians.

"Look, they're all terrified of Hamas and Hezbollah," Stewart told Amanpour on Monday's episode.

"The dirty little secret over there is the Islamists that they helped foster through madrasahs and all those other actions, they're scared shitless of," Stewart said. "They just are."

"Yeah, and they would like to see Hamas get a bloody nose. There's no doubt about it," Amanpour said.

It's not just citizenship. In October, when the fighting first broke out, Arab countries such as Jordan and Egypt said they wouldn't be taking in Palestinian refugees from Gaza.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi said then that taking in Palestinian refugees would risk turning his country into "a base for attacks on Israel."

This, el-Sisi said, meant Israel could decide to "strike Egyptian territory" to defend itself.

This isn't the first time Stewart has opined on geopolitics in the Middle East. In a previous episode of "The Daily Show" that aired in February, Stewart said he'd thought of a solution to the Gaza conflict — forming a Middle Eastern version of NATO.

"Israel stops bombing. Hamas releases the hostages. The Arab countries who claim Palestine is their top priority come in and form a demilitarized zone between Israel and a free Palestinian state," Stewart said in February.

Stewart's proposal was met with pushback from experts, who told Business Insider the plan would be difficult to realize in practice.

Amanpour also told Stewart on Monday that Israel didn't seem keen on resolving the conflict via plans such as creating a DMZ in the region.

"So there've been certain plans floated," Amanpour said. "At the moment, the Israeli government wants none of it."

"It doesn't want the UN. It doesn't want the Arab countries," she added.