President Biden is on a dangerous path negotiating for Hamas hostages

The modern world was introduced to hostage terrorism when Iran held 66 Americans in Teheran for 444 days

It is time to get back to a coherent hostage policy based on historical precedents and not one pandering to wishful thinking.  Commander Dan O’Shea is a retired Navy SEAL. He established and served as the Coordinator of the Hostage Working Group US Embassy (Baghdad) Iraq from 2004-2006.  O'Shea arrived at the height of the Al Qaeda inspired hostage-taking crisis where 40-50 foreigners were being kidnapped every month. He managed the inter-agency coordination of more than 400 hostage-taking incidents during his time in Iraq. Kidnappings were in single digits with only one hostage incident in the final month of his tour. 

When Hamas was rounding up hostages on October 7 during their barbaric terror attacks, they did not discriminate when selecting their victims. The hostages are from more than 40 countries. And it did not matter if you were a grandparent as old as 85, a ten-month-old grandchild or even if you were 8-months pregnant. Nothing protects you from Hamas’ kidnappers. 

All of these people were intentional targets. Why? Because hostage-terrorism works.