A mediator who worked on a 2011 Israeli prisoner exchange says Hamas' hostage-taking is 'unprecedented': 'What do they even do with them now that they have them?'

• Gershon Baskin helped secure the release of an Israeli soldier from Hamas in 2011.
• He says Hamas' hostage-taking campaign is "unprecedented," per The Wall Street Journal.
• "What do they even do with them now that they have them?" he asked.

A mediator who helped negotiate the 2011 exchange of an Israeli soldier said Hamas' hostage-taking in its recent terror attacks was "unprecedented" due to the sheer number of people involved, according to The Wall Street Journal.

"It's unprecedented, there's no doubt," Gershon Baskin, the Middle East director for International Communities Organization, a UK-based peace-building NGO, told the newspaper.