Fate of Missing Pilot Unknown as Deadline for Hostage Swap Passes

In the short history of negotiations between the Islamic State and actual states, Jordan’s willingness to swap an imprisoned terrorist for a missing pilot not the first time a country has agreed to such an exchange. It is, however, the first time such a proposed deal has been aired in public. And with the swap’s deadline now hours in the past, it may also be the first time such an exchange has been publicly spurned.

Late Wednesday, the Islamic State militant group posted an audio message saying that Sajida al-Rishawi, jailed in Jordan for her involvement in a 2005 terrorist attack, had to be delivered to the Turkish border by sundown Thursday or Moaz al-Kasasbeh, the captured Jordanian pilot, would be killed.

That deadline came and went on Thursday without any announcement that the swap had taken place. The Islamic State remained officially silent on the issue, with Twitter accounts affiliated with the group posting contradictory information about the status of the exchange.

After publicly agreeing to the swap on Wednesday, Jordan demanded evidence Thursday of Kasasbeh’s health and safety before released the terrorist. “We want to see a proof of life of the Jordanian pilot and then we can talk about the exchange between Sajida al-Rishawi and the Jordanian pilot,” Mohammad al-Momani, a government spokesman, told reporters.

Since his plane went down over Syria in December, the Islamic State has provided no public evidence of Kasasbeh’s well-being, posting only photos of him shortly after his capture. In those photos, the pilot appears dazed but it is unclear whether he has sustained any injuries.

Though governments are loath to admit it, prisoner swaps with the Islamic State are not unprecedented. Turkey, for example, has hinted that it carried out such an exchange with the group in order to secure the freedom of 49 of its citizens that had been taken captive when the militants conquered the Iraqi city of Mosul.

What is unprecedented is the public nature of the latest round of negotiations, and in all likelihood that fact does not point toward a happy outcome to the talks. A source described as a “Jordanian with knowledge of the negotiations” told the New York Times Thursday that the talks appeared to have collapsed.

Based on the public statements by Jordan and the Islamic State, the dispute appears to be the following: Jordan wants to trade Kasasbeh for Rishawi; the Islamic State wants to trade the Japanese journalist Kenji Goto for Kasasbeh. Whether a two-for-one trade is possible is unclear — and it would certainly depend on a proof of life about Kasasbeh.

In the case of Kasasbeh and Goto, who has been delivering the audio recordings relating the Islamic State’s demands, there are now two immediate questions: How will this round of negotiations end? And how it will affect future negotiations between the Islamic State and foreign governments?

Only the Islamic State and Jordan can answer the first question. With regard to the second, the fact these negotiations have spilled out into the open after reportedly being quietly carried out through Iraqi intermediaries can only have negative consequences for those held by the Islamic State. It all but certainly means that the channels of communication have broken down, that there is distrust between the two parties, and that future negotiations will be shadowed by this ugly episode.

KAZUHIRO NOGI/AFP/Getty Images