Over the holiday weekend, my husband and I ponied up $5.99 to watch the “Reagan” biopic on Amazon. It was money well spent, and I highly recommend it. The movie spanned many decades and briefly touched upon the fact that American hostages in Iran were freed almost the moment Ronald Reagan took the oath of office on January 20, 1981.
Recall that in April of 1980, the Carter administration launched a failed rescue operation to rescue the hostages.
“Equipment failure” was blamed after two U.S. aircraft “collided on the ground in a remote desert location in Iran.” In the end, there was “no fighting & no combat” but plenty of “deep regret” after eight American crewmen were killed and several other Americans injured.
One can’t help but compare Carter’s botched hostage rescue to Joe Biden’s botched withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2020.
At a welcoming ceremony at the White House for the freed hostages, Reagan warned, “Let terrorists be aware that when the rules of international behavior are violated, our policy will be one of swift and effective retribution. We hear it said that we live in an era of limit to our powers. Well, let it also be understood, there are limits to our patience.”
Is President-elect Donald Trump about to have a similar foreign policy win? He wrote on Truth Social today:
Everybody is talking about the hostages who are being held so violently, inhumanely, and against the will of the entire World, in the Middle East – But it’s all talk, and no action! Please let this TRUTH serve to represent that if the hostages are not released prior to January 20, 2025, the date that I proudly assume Office as President of the United States, there will be ALL HELL TO PAY in the Middle East, and for those in charge who perpetrated these atrocities against Humanity. Those responsible will be hit harder than anybody has been hit in the long and storied History of the United States of America. RELEASE THE HOSTAGES NOW!
Hamas savages abducted 251 innocent men, women, and children on October 7, 2023. The Washington Post, citing Israeli government sources, estimates that 63 hostages remain in Gaza. Other estimates put the number at closer to 100. We learned over the weekend that 21-year-old Omer Neutra was confirmed to have been killed in the October 7 attack, and Hamas has been holding his remains hostage since then.
Omer Neutra, a 21-year-old American-Israeli, served as a platoon commander in the Armored Corps. Today we can confirm, based on intelligence, that he was killed in battle on Oct. 7 and his body has been held hostage in Gaza since.
May his memory be a blessing. pic.twitter.com/gfQvXsuEbO
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) December 2, 2024
Pray for a miracle for those missing hostages and some semblance of closure for the families of murdered and missing loved ones. Whether it comes on Joe Biden’s watch or Donald Trump’s, the release of the remaining hostages would be a huge “win” for humanity, though it would never erase the vicious brutality visited on Israel on Oct. 7. May there be “hell to pay” for Hamas’s atrocities.
