Should Israel ransom captured citizens?

Maybe you’ve heard of Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier held captive for five years by the terrorist group Hamas. And maybe you’ve heard about the lengths that Israel went to to get him back, like swapping over a thousand prisoners for one missing man. But Shalit isn’t the first Israeli POW to be redeemed at a high price. In this episode, Noam asks: why does Israel pay such a high price to return captured soldiers? And, even more poignantly, is doing so good for the Jewish state?

Big Ideas

1. Ransoming kidnapped citizens forces nations to navigate between individual well-being and collective safety.
2. The act of paying a ransom can create unintended consequences that ripple beyond the immediate crisis.

Essential Questions

1. What are the potential consequences, both short-term and long-term, for a country that chooses to pay ransoms for captured citizens?
2. How should a country weigh the immediate relief of bringing a citizen home against the possible repercussions of empowering terrorist groups?