CNN’s Tapper to NSA Sullivan: Is Rescuing American Hostages Priority as Israel ‘Bombs the Crap out of’ Gaza?

Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” anchor Jake Tapper asked National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan why it looked like nothing was being done to rescue Americans currently held hostage by Hamas in Gaza.

Partial transcript as follows:

TAPPER: Is rescuing the hostages a priority at all? I mean, Israeli news media, like “Haaretz,” they say it doesn’t seem like it at all. And frankly, Jake, if my kids were being held hostage in Gaza — and, as you know, there are Americans being held hostage in Gaza right now — I’d want you to send in the Navy SEALs. What’s the conversation like in the White House about the U.S. conducting any sort of operations in order to save Americans being held hostage in Gaza?

SULLIVAN: Well, the president has been very clear that he has no higher priority than getting Americans back safe, Americans who are being held hostage by Hamas in Gaza right now.

TAPPER: The Israelis are bombing the crap out of Gaza.

(CROSSTALK)

TAPPER: I mean, what — it doesn’t seem like saving the hostages are a priority at all right now.

SULLIVAN: Well, for President Biden, they are a priority. They’re the highest possible priority.

And he has sent hostage experts to coordinate and consult with the Israeli government on hostage recovery efforts. He’s also made sure that our diplomats are in touch with third countries in the region to explore avenues for their safe release.

I have to be cautious about how much I can say about certain efforts he’s undertaking, because we want to protect those efforts to give us the best possible chance of getting our people home.

Now, Jake, one important point when it comes to the issue of the Navy SEALs is, we do not at this point have pinpoint location information for where the American hostages are. So, we have to continue to refine our understanding of where they are and even, Jake, who they are, because we know there are 15 unaccounted-for Americans, but we cannot confirm the precise number of American hostages being held by Hamas at this time.

All we can do is to continue to work closely with the Israeli government on hostage recovery options, which we are doing, and then work through third countries to see if there are avenues for release. Those efforts are under way. Our hope is that they can produce results. We will continue to stay focused on this.

It’s as high a priority as the president has.

TAPPER: One senior political operative with Hamas floated the possibility a few days ago of a potential prisoner swap with the U.S. for the release of hostages.

Would the U.S. entertain that?

SULLIVAN: We have not looked at that. We have not heard from them something like that. That’s not something that is currently under active discussion. It has not been proposed.

What we are focused on instead, as I said before, are pursuing avenues with third countries for release. I’m not going to get into the details of what that might look like, again, to protect those channels, in hopes that they can bear some fruit.

But I will say that President Biden has shown over the course of the past few years that he will make hard decisions to get American hostages home. In this case, our focus is on working through those third-country channels, and I will leave it at that for now.

TAPPER: So I think there are serious reasons to question how good any intelligence about what is in Gaza is. I mean, obviously, Hamas was able to carry out this horrific attack eight days ago, catching everybody completely off guard.

You just said that we don’t know where the hostages are in Gaza. And yet the Israelis claim, the IDF claims that it is bombing places that it knows are Hamas targets. How can we be sure that that’s true?

I mean, Hamas is a terrorist group, don’t get me wrong, but how do we know anything about what they’re hitting, given the fact that it doesn’t sound like any of the intelligence inside Gaza is particularly good?

SULLIVAN: Well, Jake, Israel has known where particular parts of Hamas’ terrorist infrastructure have been located. They know, for example, where rockets are fired from, and they can go back to those locations to take out the rocket emplacements.

They know from various forms of intelligence collection where certain individuals are located who are senior commanders in Hamas who are part of the bloody and barbaric attacks that took place against Israel last Saturday.

So, they do have information to be able to go after specific targets, actionable targets, similar to the way the United States has been able to do that in other places in other contexts.

The United States has taken a very clear stand. It is a stand that we don’t just take in this situation, but we have taken all along, which is that we stand for the rule of law, we stand for the law of war, we stand for the protection of civilians, and we want to make sure that innocent Palestinians who have nothing to do with Hamas can get to safe areas, where they will be safe from bombardment and where they will have access to necessities like food, water, shelter and medicine.

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