ISIS, Arizona hostage spur talk of retaliation, warning of a 'trap'

Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson said Sunday that his department is monitoring developments on the fate of Kayla Mueller, the Prescott-born aid worker captured by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. But Johnson did not shed any new light on the fate of Mueller, who ISIS claimed on Friday was killed by a Jordanian airstrike.

"Obviously we're learning as much as we can as quickly as we can about Ms. Mueller's situation," Johnson said on CNN's "State of the Union." "Our thoughts, our prayers, our concerns are with her family right now."

U.S. officials have not confirmed the claim that Mueller was killed in the airstrike.

Mueller was a focus of the Sunday national political shows where discussion of the situation included doubts about ISIS' claims, the U.S. government's policy against paying ransoms and its attempts at rescue operations, and whether escalating military action is needed or is a trap set by terrorists who appear to be deliberately attempting to provoke such escalation.

Johnson said the U.S. had shown, with the attempted rescue of journalist James Foley, that it is willing to try to rescue hostages in similar situations. "It's something we continually evaluate our ability to do in this region," Johnson said. "But it is a very, very challenging situation, obviously."

Nasser Judeh, the Jordanian foreign minister, appearing briefly on ABC's "This Week," said he had no solid information on Mueller's fate. "We're hearing what you're hearing," he said. "Of course, our prayers are for Kayla Mueller to be safe and sound and alive."

Jordan's media minister, Mohammed al-Momani, appearing on CBS's "Face the Nation," cast doubt on whether Mueller was killed as ISIS claimed.

Jordan launched airstrikes after a video released by ISIS showed a Jordanian pilot being burned alive. On Friday, ISIS said a bomb from a Jordanian airplane hit the building where Mueller was held, killing her. ISIS provided no further evidence to support its claim.

"They tend to lie about these things all the time," al-Momani said. "They negotiated a swap with our pilot that they killed weeks ago. … They're liars. They don't have any respect for human life. That's why it's very difficult to actually make any accurate assessment or conclusions regarding the fate of the American lady."

U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, D-Hawaii, who is on the House Armed Services Committee, said on CNN that the country cannot allow itself to "fall into the trap that (ISIS) is trying to set."

"We must strengthen … understanding exactly who our enemy is, why they are perpetrating these horrific acts, and then come up with an effective strategy to defeat them," Gabbard said.

Former U.S. Rep Mike Rogers, now a CNN commentator, said ISIS played rhetorical games with Foley, the journalist it captured and beheaded. It made an unrealistic ransom offer for him, Rogers said. "They really never intended to turn Foley over," Rogers said. "They were using all of this for propaganda."

Rogers said paying ransoms would put other Americans overseas at risk. "Think how many other people are exposed if you make those ransom payments," he said.

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, also told CNN it would be wrong to pay ransoms for American hostages. "Giving money just buys additional arms for them to kidnap more Americans, for them to murder more," Cruz said.

Col. Jack Jacobs, an MSNBC military analyst, highlighted one challenge the U.S. faces in the region: a lack of intelligence on the ground.

"We work really hard to intercept phone messages, radio messages and all that. We have overhead capability with satellites and spy planes and all that," he said on MSNBC's "Up with Steve Kornacki." "But what we don't have is human intelligence. We don't have people on the ground in order to verify things, so we're in a position where we have to believe everything that is told to us, or at least make-believe everything that is told to us, until we get some human intelligence."

He noted, however, that Jordan does have human intelligence and doubts ISIS' claims.

Fawaz Gerges, an expert in international relations at the London School of Economics, told MSNBC that for ISIS, killing a woman could be more problematic from a religious and public-relations standpoint. Some have speculated that ISIS had already killed the aid worker and only latched onto the airstrikes claim for cover.

"ISIS knows, or some of the leaders in ISIS know, they cannot display a video of Kayla in the same way they do when it comes to a man. Islam not only prohibits the killing of women, and children and the elderly, even though ISIS has violated all of the principles and values of Islamic doctrine," Gerges said. "But we are no longer surprised by what ISIS will do and does not do. They have done everything that does not exist in the book, from slaughtering in the name of religion (to) twisted interpretations of the faith."

NBC foreign correspondent Ayman Mohyeldin noted ISIS has killed women in the Christian Yazidi sect.

Rep. Mike McCaul, R-Texas, the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, blamed the Obama administration for not doing enough to attack ISIS. He said he hopes the United States can galvanize Arab nations to to take on a greater military role, including ground troops.

"The airstrikes have been limited. It's a policy of containment, not a policy to degrade and destroy the enemy," he told CBS' "Face the Nation." "There's no ground force in Syria, and the airstrikes are not sufficient to date to take care and take out ISIS."

McCaul said the threat is not just overseas, but here at home.

"We don't want them to attack us here on the homeland," he said. "Let's face it: There are about 15,000 to 20,000 foreign fighters, 5,000 with Western passports. We've had hundreds of Americans go to fight in the region, and some have come back. So talk about barbarians at the gate."

But international experts on CNN's "Fareed Zakaria GPS" warned that ISIS already is faltering and the United States should avoid being sucked further into the conflict. They called for political and economic reforms to counter groups pursuing Islamic extremism. Military action alone will not solve the long-term problem, they said.

Foreign correspondent Rula Jebreal said ISIS will get exactly what it wants if the United States steps up its military campaign. She called for greater inclusion of Muslims in Western culture, as well as greater political and economic freedom for people in the Middle East.