Blinken Admits Hamas Hardened Hostage Position Due to U.S. Public Pressure on Israel
Noted Columnist Caroline Glick: “Blinken himself has devoted most of his energies to pressuring and castigating Israel.”
U.S. Secretary of State Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, on Saturday made a stunning admission explaining how U.S. pressure on Israel emboldened the terrorist group Hamas and made it toughen its stance on the issue of hostage release.
Whenever there was open disagreement between the U.S. and Israel, Hamas backtracked on hostage release, the outgoing secretary of state acknowledged.
“Whenever there has been public daylight between the United States and Israel and the perception that pressure was growing on Israel,” he said an interview with The New York Times. “[W]e’ve seen it: Hamas has pulled back from agreeing to a ceasefire and the release of hostages.”
In NYT interview, SecState Blinken acknowledges that Hamas pulled back from agreements in ceasefire-hostage deal talks whenever there was there was “public daylight” and a perception that “pressure was growing on Israel” by the U.S. pic.twitter.com/QMaWLvCy16
— Jacob N. Kornbluh (@jacobkornbluh) January 5, 2025
Blinken’s shocking admission was met with sharp criticism in the Israeli press. The newspaper Israel Hayom commented: “Now, as the hostage release deal nears completion, the cat is out of the bag,” In an interview with The New York Times, acknowledged the damage that American pressure on Israel caused to the hostage release efforts.”
Noting Blinken’s own role in weakening Israel’s negotiating position, prominent Israeli author and commentator Caroline Glick wrote that “Blinken himself has devoted most of his energies to pressuring and castigating Israel.”
Glick commented in her Sunday’s column for the Jewish New Syndicate (JNS):
The hostages have been held in Gaza for 457 days. And the question of why they are still there, why has Israel been unable to bring them home, gets asked with increased frustration and alarm every day from all quarters.
On Saturday, we received an answer to that question. Shortly after news broke of the release of the video of Liri Albag, The New York Times published an interview with outgoing U.S. Secretary of State Tony Blinken. Blinken said that Hamas has refused to agree to release the hostages in exchange for a ceasefire for two reasons.
Under harsh questioning from the Times’ anti-Israel reporter Lulu Garcia-Navarro, Blinken revealed that U.S. pressure on Israel began immediately after Oct. 7, 2023, and became a central feature of U.S. policy in relation to the war from its very earliest days. From the outset, the provision of unlimited supplies to Gaza—euphemistically referred to as humanitarian aid—has been the constant focus of U.S. pressure on Israel.
Almost immediately after the Oct. 7 invasion, then-Defense Minister Yoav Gallant announced a siege of Gaza. The move was self-explanatory. The Gazans had taken 256 Israelis hostage to Gaza. So long as they weren’t released, Gaza would remain under siege. Siege warfare has long been considered one of the most humane, least destructive forms of warfare, and it is legal under the laws of war.
Hamas was also hoping to drag Israel into a wider regional conflict, Blinken told the NYT:
“There have been two major impediments, and they both go to what drives Hamas. One has been whenever there has been public daylight between the United States and Israel and the perception that pressure was growing on Israel, we’ve seen it: Hamas has pulled back from agreeing to a ceasefire and the release of hostages.
“The other thing that got Hamas to pull back was their belief, their hope that there would be a wider conflict, that Hezbollah would attack Israel, that Iran would attack Israel, that other actors would attack Israel, and that Israel would have its hands full and Hamas could continue what it was doing.”
Blinken’s made those remarks as Hamas on Saturday released another propaganda video showing a distressed Israeli female hostage. Liri Albag, a 19-year-old girl who has been in Hamas captivity for 457 days, was shown trembling and weeping in a 3-minute video released by the terrorist group.
In recent months, Hamas has released a series of hostage videos in a bid to pressure Israel into agreeing to a ceasefire without committing to release all the hostages. “Hostage videos released by Hamas are part of the terror organization’s ongoing engagement in psychological warfare,” the Jerusalem Post noted.
During the latest round of negotiations, the Gaza-based terrorist group has refused to name the living hostages in its captivity. Hamas holds nearly 100 Israeli hostages taken on October 7, 2023. According to official Israeli sources, 64 hostages are still believed to be alive after 15 months of captivity under inhuman conditions.
IDF eliminates PIJ terror commander who infiltrated Israel on October 7
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) eliminated a senior Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) terrorist who infiltrated Israel on October 7. Sa’ed Saeed Zaki Dahnoun, a PIJ terror commander, was killed in “close-quarters combat” in the Jabaliya area of northern Gaza, the military said.
The slain terrorist was a “Company Commander and Deputy Head of the Rocket Array in the northern Gaza Strip for the Islamic Jihad terrorist organization,” the IDF revealed in a press statement Sunday. He “infiltrated Israeli territory and participated in the brutal massacre on October 7th. Additionally, he planned and led several ambushes against our troops in the Beit Lahia area.”
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Key Islamic Jihad Commander Eliminated in Northern Gaza Raid
Saad Said Zaki Dahnon, a company commander for Palestinian Islamic Jihad and deputy head of the group’s rocket division in northern Gaza, was killed by IDF troops during operations in Jabalia, the military… pic.twitter.com/4hSZnerXw6
— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) January 5, 2025
IDF hits Syrian military base, Arab sources say
The Israel military reportedly is continuing with its operation to destroy Syrian military assets the wake of the fall of the Assad regime. Israeli airstrikes and special ground operations come as jihadst groups consolidate power in a post-Assad era.
“The Israeli military struck military bases in Damascus, Syria, according to local reports,” the Israeli TV channel i24NEWS reported Sunday evening. The IDF did not comment on the latest reports.
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Comments
I’ll be glad when ‘Blank’ Blinken is gone.
Along with the rest of the Biden administration.
Natch, and take Jake Sullivan along too.
I saw him bad mouthing Israel on one of their news channels. I don’t think I have ever seen an issue with as sharp lines of right and wrong as this.
Translation: Blinken and his employees at state are terrible at diplomacy.
But, they are exceedingly skilled at feckless, emasculated, gullible, stupid and cowed dhimmitude.
Come on, Blinken, give us a little Carswell Defense. Say the thing!
“Incompetent people need Cabinet representation, too!”
The sooner Biden/Blinken/Sullivan are gone, the better. Set Israel loose. End “humanitarian” aid until each and every hostage is released or their murderers are turned over to Israel to face justice. Tell Iran that a new sheriff’s in town and if they think the embarrassment they suffered from Israel’s attacks was bad, wait until the US decapitates their military and oil infrastructure (and no, I don’t care if world oil prices go up–that will just stimulate US production). They’re already at war with us–when are we going to fight back?
How about just end humanitarian aid? I have people living 20 miles from me this very moment who need aid far more than a bunch of people who hate our guts.
Hamas’s interest is rhetorical intervention in the press of the enemy, as a means to get support from Iran as being the biggest bad-asses in the terrorism surrogate business. Skimming that support is the reward to Hamas’s leadership and that’s the entire incentive.
Being nasty pays, in that business. It’s no punishment to be called nasty with as much proof as you want to give. That’s Hamas’s point. That shows more bang for the terrorist buck if you give it to Hamas.
Also supports somewhat unreflective Western clickbait.
Verbal flatulence.
Have yourself a glass of Metamucil.
Let us know when you have something relevant to say, KKKluxer.
It seems that a hallmark of the Biden administration has been incompetence. This is consistent with the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan, the embarrassing unresponded harangue of Blinken by the Chinese, the baffling indecision to shoot down the spy balloon, the firing of service members for not taking the COVID vaccine and then discovering a shortage of service members, the taking billions of dollars and two years to build 8 charging stations, the squashing of oil and gas pipelines and production only to see pump prices rise and then drain the SPR to mitigate prices, the increased criminal activities due to their policy of intentionally unlimited and unvetted immigrants entering at any point along the boarder, the energy policies implemented without an understanding of the cost or the benefits, and the list can go on and on. They could not even competently implement their DJT lawfare. Every administration will have its failures but this one has achieved unparalleled heights in incompetence.
How much is incompetence and how much is it graft for Biden’s?
“It seems that a hallmark of the Biden administration has been incompetence.”
Competence and incompetence need a third part of the trinity, like information and disinformation have malinformation. It would account for 95% of the Biden Administration’s “major malfunction”: bad decisions that were incompetent but knowingly so.
Maybe we don’t need a third word, we already have sabotage.
Would a converted ICBM silo make a good dudgeon? I have seen them for sale. Divide vertical space with wire mesh floors and a 5′ clearance. Lock them in and allow self governance.
No, ICBM silos are underground, hence they are only low dudgeon. For high dudgeon, you need a grain silo.
How fabulous it is to have a U.S. President, Administration and State Department that bends over backwards to accommodate the interests of goose-stepping, genocidal and murderous Islamofascists/Muslim supremacists/terrorists, but, doesn’t give a damn about the American and Israeli hostages that these reprobates have kidnapped.
This is what electing and empowering the vile, stupid and evil Dhimmi-crats gets you.
And Blinken and the rest of Traitor Joe’s junta continued on with jumping all over Israel … because they are pro-hamas/pro-iran.
Traitor Joe and his junta are all traitors. They have spent 4 years giving aid and comfort to every enemy of America they could find, in every way possible.
“Blinken announces his latest discovery: water is wet.”
NY Times disagrees
Calling water wet is a hallmark of white supremacy.
Blinken admits everything he did was wrong and caused nothing but trouble and then says the U.S. is in better position.
That is a blinken idiot.
Even Blinken Nods.
Look at Blinken Sullivan and Biden. Obama too, and so many others. Just a glance, in Ann guarded moment: None of these men look like they’ve ever lifted a weight, nor attempted a push-up, nor swam a lap in a grownup pool.
Can any society last for long ruled by girlymen? and by girls?
I’m not trying to be mean. But good grief any 18-year-old gang-banger in any American prison could have served America’s interests better than these credentialed naïfs these past four years.
*unguarded* not Ann guarded
Is it just me? I can’t look at Blinken without seeing Peter Sellers as Inspector Clouseau. Everything the guy touches turns to chaos. And he still acts as if he is somebody who shroud be taken seriously.
On film, it’s comedy.
In real life, it’s tragic.
And on 20 January 2025, he’ll go home self-satisfied with what a first-rate job he’s done.
That’s pretty much true of the whole administration, especially the Cabinet.
Blinken. Mayorkas. Buttigieg. Yellen. Garland. Austin, Becerra. Granholm, Cardona.
Putting in their thumbs, pulling out their plums, and chanting, “What a good they/them am I!” while their s*t crashes and burns around them (in Buttigieg’s case, literally).
(Teenaged gangbangers understand that first and foremost it’s about turf, and money.
(Teenaged gangbangers understand that it’s not about being liked, or being charming, or playing guitar.
What a jerk.
Americans held captive 444 days (1979-1981) by Iranian-supported “students.”
Americans held captive >450 days (2023-2025) by Iranian-supported gazans
Thank you Mr. Blinken
Thank you Mr. Biden
After 45 years, and millions spent on education, and here we are. Incredible.
“With friends like him, who needs enemies?”
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