It is now being reported that James Foley and other ISIS victims were severely tortured before being beheaded, with Foley and other American and British prisoners singled out for especially harsh treatment because our respective governments refused to pay their ransoms.

How did we get this new, horrifying information?

Some of it came from former cellmates of the prisoners, men from other countries now freed because their ransoms were paid, which forces us to ask the question again: Should we ever negotiate with terrorists?

If that were your family member being held captive, enduring horrific suffering and threatened with a cruel death, wouldn’t you want your government to do everything possible to secure your loved one’s release, including paying a ransom?

Foley and some of the other prisoners were reportedly starved, beaten, subjected to mock executions, hung upside down by their feet and waterboarded. (ISIS has only admitted to waterboarding, claiming that it was retaliation for America’s waterboarding of Islamic terrorists in Guantanamo.)

If you had the power to spare a loved one from such suffering, no matter how great the cost, wouldn’t you do it?

The one country in the world that faces the most constant threat of terror is Israel, and while the government will not negotiate a political settlement with terrorist groups (like Hamas), they will do everything in their power to secure the release of one of their soldiers held by terrorist groups, including swapping large numbers of Palestinian prisoners.

Israel exchanged 1,027 prisoners to win the release of soldier Gilad Schalit, held by Hamas for five years. Included in that swap were more than 250 Palestinian prisoners who had received life sentences for planning or participating in terrorist acts against Israel.

Not only that, but, “Hamas military leader Ahmed Jabari was quoted in the Saudi Arabian newspaper Al-Hayat as confirming that the prisoners released as part of the deal were collectively responsible for the killing of 569 Israelis” (according to Wikipedia, with references).

How do the families of these 569 Israelis feel about a swap like this?

Sadly, in June it was reported that one of the Palestinian prisoners released in the Gilad Schalit deal (who had been serving a life sentence for killing Palestinians who had collaborated with Israel) murdered a senior Israeli police officer on Passover Eve.

So, the freedom of one Israeli resulted directly in the murder of another Israeli. Can this possibly be right?

And that, of course, is one of the great problems in negotiating with terrorists, since complying with their demands means that, first, we officially recognize them, which is one of their goals; and second, that we potentially empower them, since they are now emboldened to take more hostages.

So, if your loved one was held hostage by ISIS and you wanted to accede to their demands – let’s say a $1 million payment – but you knew that freeing your loved one would only result in their taking more hostages, would you do it? And if you knew that in giving them that money the funds would likely be used to kill and imprison and torture others, would you still comply?

The Obama administration came under serious criticism for negotiating the release of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, not only because of the stealthy manner in which it was carried out but also because we released five Taliban leaders in exchange for Bergdahl, men who were in the upper echelon of Taliban leadership and who were dead set on continuing their violent acts.

On the other hand, don’t we have to do everything in our power to get a POW back home, even if, at one time, he may have been a defector?

Unfortunately, this is not a problem that is going away soon, and it’s hard to imagine the agony families have gone through as they dealt with these situations, in particular those families that expressed frustration with the government for not doing enough to spare their loved ones from a brutal and gory death.

But if we make terrorists more powerful by negotiating with them, are we putting others at greater risk?

Strong arguments can be raised on both sides of the debate, but what do you say? Should we negotiate with terrorists to secure the release of our hostages?