Hostage Expert Tells CNN That Hamas is Holding ‘Entire Gazan Population’ Hostage: ‘Of Course There’s Gonna Be Casualties’

Former Navy SEAL and coordinator of the hostage working group at the U.S. embassy in Iraq Dan O’Shea pinned the blame for civilian casualties in Gaza on Hamas Monday, charging the terrorist organization with holding the “entire Gazan population hostage” during an appearance on CNN.

The interview began with host Jim Acosta asking O’Shea about the “execution” of Israel’s rescue operation that returned four hostages taken on October 7 to their families over the weekend.

O’Shea replied that the mission was “incredibly successful” considering the fact that all four hostages were rescued and only a single Israeli soldier was lost in the ensuing battle, considering the “risk” involved.

Acosta then noted that while Hamas claims that 274 Palestinians were killed during the operation, the IDF claims that number is under 100 before asking if the operation could have been executed “with fewer Palestinian deaths?”

“Well, again, the reports I’m reading coming out on various number of signal groups that are coming from on the ground that the force came under attack and they responded in kind. So again, when you’re holding hostages in civilian locations that happen to be armed civilians that are firing at the rescue force, of course there’s going to be casualties,” argued O’Shea. “And that, quote, ‘civilian’ term is probably exaggerated in terms of the numbers. And the term civilian is loosely used because we know Hamas routinely fires from hospitals, they fire from churches, they fire from a synagogue, from mosques and from schools. So this is part and parcel. They, you know, they are in a sense, keeping the entire Gazan population under hostage themselves to their ideology. And that’s, this is the result when that and that kind of law of armed conflict is ignored and you hold hostages in civilian houses, you’re going to have civilian deaths when you watch a hostage rescue mission.”

Watch above via CNN.