Donald Trump hopes to turn slow progress on American hostages’ release into a political liability for Biden
By Rebecca Morin and Nicole Gaudiano
Two American hostages have trickled out from Hamas’ control while more than 80 Israeli and other nationalities have been released during a temporary ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war that expired early Thursday.
While President Joe Biden has praised the Americans’ release, former President Donald Trump has tried to seize on the administration’s slow progress in getting more Americans freed by Hamas — hoping to make it a political liability for the current president who is already floundering in polling for his handling of the Israel-Hamas war.
Four-year-old Abigail Edan’s release on Sunday and Israeli American Liat Beinin’s release Wednesday follows those of an American mother and her daughter in October, just two weeks after Hamas’ Oct. 7 terrorist attack in Israel that killed 1,400. Beinin is “safe in Egypt just across the border,” Biden told reporters on Wednesday, and she “should be home soon.”
But more than a handful of others aren’t on their way home yet, even after intense diplomacy from U.S. officials and President Joe Biden, who has remained in close contact with foreign leaders.
Trump blamed U.S. leadership for Americans still being held as hostages. The former president wrongly claimed that not a single American prisoner has been released by Hamas, writing in a Truth Social platform post, “There is only one reason for that, NO RESPECT FOR OUR COUNTRY OR OUR LEADERSHIP.
"This is a very sad and dark period of America!" he added.
Trump’s statements are “patently ridiculous” because Americans are getting out, and aid is getting in, said Mark Mellman, a Democratic strategist and president and CEO of the Democratic Majority for Israel, who credited Biden’s diplomacy.
“One thing Trump doesn't understand is you have to be careful when you're in the middle of negotiations, because things you say can have an impact on them,” Mellman said. “So I'm sure the White House is being very careful about dancing in the endzone because it's not finished yet. And there's more to come and more work to do. So the president's focused on doing the work as opposed to claiming the credit.”
Along with Trump’s criticism, Biden also faces questions about whether Hamas is using the Americans for leverage.
All parties are “looking for something” during these negotiations, and Hamas wants to come out of the war in a stronger political position than when they first attacked Israel, said P.J. Crowley, a national security expert who served as spokesman for the U.S. Department of State under the Obama administration and served on the National Security Council under the Clinton administration.
Biden has to be careful to not jeopardize hostage negotiations while siding with Israel in its mission to eliminate Hamas, experts say.
“This is an enormously complex situation,” Crowley said. “You're trying to free hostages, and you're trying to also destroy Hamas. To some extent, the two objectives are in contradiction.”
Top Biden administration officials, including CIA Director William Burns and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, have been working with Israeli officials and Qatar as a mediator, to help negotiate on hostage releases.
Even so, much is out of U.S. control.
The U.S. isn’t involved in the drafting of the lists and determining on Hamas’ side who will come out on any given day, said White House national security spokesperson John Kirby.
The U.S. doesn’t have firm information on each of the American hostages, he said. Hamas is missing some hostages and it’s unclear whether Americans are among that group.
“We can't just assume that Hamas has ready access to everybody at a moment's notice or that all the Americans are being held by Hamas and certainly not that they're in the same place,” he said Tuesday.
Despite U.S. involvement in the negotiations, Hamas in recent days has shown good will to U.S. adversaries, including Russia.
The terrorist group said Wednesday that it was releasing two more Russian citizens, likely Israelis with dual citizenship, in what it called “a gesture” to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Kirby was asked on Tuesday whether Hamas was holding back Americans for leverage, but he said there’s no indication of that.
“I mean, we've got -- remember, the first test case of this entire program was two Americans, a mother and a daughter,” he said. “And then, of course, we got Abigail out over the weekend. So, there's no indication that Hamas is trying to play some sort of game here in terms of the -- the Americans.”
Mellman said Jewish leaders continue to feel gratitude toward Biden, given that people thought it would be impossible to get any hostages out.
A recent survey by the Jewish Electorate Institute found that 74% of Jewish Americans approve of Biden’s response to Israel’s war against Hamas. The poll also found that 80% of Jewish Americans support the president’s request to Congress for aid to Israel, and 68% said they support the calls for a humanitarian pause so aid can enter Gaza.
But overall, the majority of Americans – 56% – said they do not approve of Biden’s handling of Israel’s war with Hamas, according to an NBC News poll published this month. The president’s approval rating also dipped down to 40%, according to the poll.
Crowley said U.S. leaders will likely have to make hard compromises to get hostages home, but that American voters will be watching the president to make sure he brings home U.S. citizens.
“Regardless of who's president, if American citizens are in danger, the United States will go to great lengths to try to bring them home,” he said.