one is a taliban fighter. his name is mullah cable, and he gets his -- [inaudible] from the fact that back in the 1990s when the taliban was in power, he used to wield a metal whip and go around and whip his detainees. and he he's, he was very interesting because he's somebody who obviously, was a brutal member of the taliban but then he quit the taliban and tried to blend into civilian life only to be drawn back into the fighting. the second person is a warlord, a very powerful warlord named john mohamed khan, and the americans used to call him jmk for short because he was closely allied with the u.s. military. he was somebody who rose from obscurity. back in the '70s he was a high school janitor, and when the soviet union invaded in 1979 the cia flooded afghanistan with guns and money and he was one of the recipients of this, and he grew to wealth and power became a major warlord. and after 2001 became one of the closest allies to the u.s. military and particularly to the special forces. and the third person

>> i don't think that the taliban -- the taliban is an rmed insurgency. that was the winding down of the war in afghanistan and that's why this arrangement was dealt. >> katie, editor of -- a fox news contributor. katie, i don't know which one it is. even josh ernest today is still sort of not calling it what many people believe it is, which is a terrorist organization. but the big question is why? >> this is all a big distraction, away from what the key issue is here. this is the who is doing verbal gymnastic gymnastics, to save barack obama and hiss legacy when it comes out that bowe bergdahl by all accounts according to his platoon members was a deserter. so the white house didn't violate the -- they other trying to take the taliban in afghanistan out of the terrorism classification because they want to be able to say, well, we were dealing with insurgents so this isn't at the wlefl that you think it is with regards to that negotiation. >> they stayed an armed insurgency, that came as breaking news when they were sudden will i saying it wasn't a -- the

taliban. you will remember the taliban five are the gitmo detainees who were traded and, yes, released in exchange for sergeant bo bergdahl. and for more on this breaking news fox news chief intelligence correspondent catherine herridge joins us. what in the world is going on? >> this the second time that fox has been able to confirm that the taliban five are members of that group have really declared their public intention to reengage with their networks in afghanistan. shortly after they were transferred or released to it qatar, we were able to confirm that they had two visitors from the hack canny network. it's a terrorist organization that works closely, sort of hand in glove with the taliban. now tonight we have had confirmation from an administration official and a military official that one of the five has tried to have direct phone contact with the taliban. so, it's not a mystery that they are trying to reengage. >> here's my thought. this is just my guess. we caught them doing it once

one is a taliban fighter. he gets his information from i can 19-inch when the taliban was in power he used to go around and -- he was interesting because someone who was a brutal number of the taliban but he quit the taliban and try to blend into civilian life only to be drawn back in to the fighting. the second person is a warlord a very artful warlord, and the americans used to calling jfk because he is very close allied with the u.s. military. he was somebody who rose from yesterday. he was back in the '70s is a high school janitor and when the soviet union invaded in 1979 the cia flooded afghanistan with guns and money and he was one of the recipients of this anti-group to wealth and power making it a major warlord. in 2001 became one of the closest allies to the us military, and particularly to the special forces. the third person i fall is a housewife. she was somebody who grew up in kabul and was forced to flee to the countryside during the civil war, and what she found was a war that was very different

and the pakistani taliban has to be distinguished from the afghan taliban because -- >> who can keep track of it all? >> they're counting on you not being able to keep track of it all. when bush actually said exactly the right thing after 9/11, it was clarifying. he said our message to all regimes across the world is you are with us or you're with the terrorists. it wasn't a bunch of little network independently acting organizations that didn't have a shared ideology. >> go ahead. >> but we're fooling ourselves when we don't -- when we say hamas and the taliban are not international per se. hamas is a proxy of iran. >> right. >> it gets its funding from iran. if you look even at the afghani taliban, they're engaged in a human trafficking network that does span international borders. and they take that money and use it to fund terrorism. >> the administration they don't want to use that term terrorist. this is of course a day after we saw al jazeera english, the television channel, say we're going to ban the use of the word terrorist because one man's man's terrorist is another man's

do you think the taliban is a terrorist group? >> from a military perspective we consider the taliban as armed insurgency the state department has not designated them as a foreign terror organization. not designated as such. >> but the commander in chief in 2002 did designate them as a terrorist group. do you follow what the state sdeptz or commander in chief says? >> the state department is the agency in charge of designating these organizations as such. >> after you, but the president in july, 2002 president bush issued an executive order that specially designated global terrorists and included the taliban as a terrorist group. i don't understand why the pentagon won't come out and say yes, they're terrorists. >> they are armed insurgency and remain a dangerous group. >> should we be negotiating with them for terrorist swaps? we don't do that with terrorist swaps. >> in this case sargent bergdahl being held in a prisoner of war status and we stand by that decision. >> it was okay -- if they had been a terrorist group would it ha

phone calls to the taliban. but today pentagon press secretary rear admiral again making trade insisting the taliban five under control. >> we had reason to believe that there was some activities by at least potential reengagement. we communicated with the government of qatar and again steps are being put in place to further limit it. i would haven hasten to remind it is because of the process we have in place and the strong relationship that we have with the government of qatar that we were able to identify this particular activity. >> senator john mccain joins us. nice to see you sir. what about what the admiral has to say? >> he is really quick isn't he? >> stunning how he kept her. ming and hawing. >> trying to return to the fight. these people are free to go anywhere in three months. let me just mention this to you about this aspect. when i was in hanoi with my fellow pomplet p.o.w.s was home with honor. we didn't want anything our country might do which would impair our ability to defeat the enemy on our b

but one, that now in contact again apparently with the taliban.ely to reestablish contact with terror. >> i think what the rear admiral was trying to do was reassure american we got this. the pentagon will worry about it. you don't need to. the problem is i think it sounded overconfident and a little bit arrogant and rather than just saying yes, we knew it was a risk, we are managing the risk. we are on top of it. we can assure you that we are on top of it. but they can't guarantee that nothing is going to happen. i think if a militant is released from our prison in a swap and they end up on the battlefield eight months later, and even if it is just a phone call how do you think terrorists organize? they communicate with one another. it's good. i think that the good news is that we are able to track that. in that regard, we can feel more secure that the pentagon is on top of something. >> we're creating the situation where they're able to reestablish contact by releasing them in a trade. >> i felt maybe he was trying to do was suggest maybe we wan

should we be doing that with the taliban? >> in this case sergeant bergdahl was being held in prisoner of war like status and we were negotiating with an armed insurgent group to get sergeant bergdahl back. we absolutely standby that decision. >> if they'd been a terrorist group, would it have been okay to do that? >> we do not negotiate with terrorist organizations. >> see, so that's why the distinction actually does matter. so you're asking the american people to say this was okay because the state department hadn't labeled them a foreign terrorist organization even though the president of the united states and the commander in chief did label them a terrorist organization. and that designation stands. >> and from a military perspective we consider them an armed insurgency. we can go around and around about the history here. >> but don't you see the aggravation saying wait i thought we didn't negotiate with terrorist groups and look at that designation isn't there and the american people say come on, you did it you negotiat

>> i don't think the taliban -- the taliban is an armed insurgency insurgency.s would be winding down in the war in afghanistan. >> that brings us to "look who is talking." ment karls kraut charles krauthammer calling it an outrageous statement. >> they drive car bombs into markets you can't power the administration. you the idea the united states doesn't do this is preposterous. of course we do. the idea that the war is winding down tell that to anybody who lives in afghanistan. this is a fantasy. obama is pretending the war on terror the war on afghanistan are all winding down. this is sort of embarrassing. >> this coming after a brand new fox news poll says they are down-playing the threats for terrorists. 43 percent saying his approach is about right, 47 percent under emphasizes the threat. >> log on to fox and friends first facebook page for a live debate #keep talking. >>> it didn't happen in the streets. instead in city hall. >> that meeting was held in the wake of the michael brown shooting in ferguson. an hour in that fight broke out when witnesses say

the taliban has resorted to terror tactics.se terror tactics have sought to carry out attacks against americans and interests. that explains the difference in classification. >> there was one point when he did slip and called the taliban terrorists. >> the deadline passed the fate of a japanese journalist and jordanian military pilot remains unclear. after the sunset on a possible swap. >> they are demanding proof their pilot is alive before going through with the swap. they threatened to kill the pilot unless jordan frees this woman a would be homicide bomber. >> how do you land a plane without a pilot? they wanted to know when the door of the cockpit got jammed halfway through their flight from minneapolis to las vegas. >> they got locked out. (indiscernible) >> the first officer was able to p land the plain safely. they tried to figure out what caused the door to malfunction. caught on camera the very moment a powerful gas explosion ripped through a mexico city maternity hospital. >> now a nurse and two babies are dead. at l

>> i don't think that the taliban -- the taliban is an armed insurgency. >> it attacks buses, it drives car bombs into markets and it's not a terrorist group. look, you can't this administration. >> press secretary joshua earnest was back at the white house today and attempted to clarify the comment. >> does the administration consider taliban a terrorist group or not? >> they carry out tactics akin to terrorism. they do pursue terrorism to advance their agenda. >> all right. so let's get this conversation started. they tried it again today. eric i have a theory. we swap theories back and forth. i think they are not making a political rationalization. they are trying to tell everybody that the war in afghanistan is over. they don't want to call the taliban terrorists because they want to be able to say see america, we said we'd get out of these wars, even if it's premature and misguided and we're going to create the problem that they created in iraq by leaving early because isis is already showing up in afghanistan but that's what they are trying to dance around here. they don't want to

don't even try because the taliban apparently aren't terrorists. >> the taliban is an armed insurgency. isil is a terrorist group so we don't make concessions to terrorist groups. >> that explanation had reporters stunned. >> yeah then it's one of the more popular stories on that regional blog "politico" with this catchy headline: mike huckabee complains of trashy women at fox. problem is it's not true. the governor responds in moments. >> they're not the only ones. the daily news spewing lies about one of my cohosts and it's not elisabeth. they said it about steve in the dark. >> so right. >> i have that exclusive story. i cannot reveal my source. thank you very much. i'm working on it now and i've got levinthal working in the background. >> hi. i'm joe theismann and you're watching "fox & friends." i wake up with them in the morning. of course not with brian. who would want to wake up with brian? but you've got to watch "fox & friends." >> wait a minute. does that suggest he wakes up with me? i think that means figure figuretively. >> i knew you married i quarterback. i didn't think

taliban. joining me with reaction is pept gone press secretary rear admiral john kirby with us. thank you for being here. >> thank you sean. >> how do you reconcile a white house saying that bergdahl served with honor and distinction with his platoon mates say it's a spit in the face, that he deserted that he should be court-martialed. these are the people -- how do you reconcile these stories? >> i know there's a lot of emotion revolving around this. we understand there are former troops that served with him that have concerns about accountability here. what i can tell you is that the characterization of his service will be one of the things that general milly works on as he works through this investigation and how to dispose of the case. certainly characterization of service will become a part of that. and i can tell you no institution, none that i've seen in almost 30 years of serving in the military is more accountable than we are. and we're transparent about it. and we expect a certain le

what do we know how about these contacts made by one of the taliban five with the taliban?ll, multiple u.s. officials tell us one of the five taliban leaders in exchange for sergeant bo bergdahl has made tell calls to members of the taliban. senator lindsey graham said publicly it was members of the haqqani network pakistani network of taliban, who are on the state department's terror list. defense department tells me that the white house was told by u.s. military commanders it would be difficult to react to dim finish the threat posed by taliban leaders should they go is missing from qatar. pentagon has close security partnership with the government of qatar. we're cost in our -- confident in our ability to mitigate any threat posed by former guantanamo detainees. intelligence sources say release of taliban may be viewed by suspicion of terror group, which may fear they could be u.s. plants, bill. bill: jennifer, what is the reaction you're hearing in the town? >> a lot of angry reaction from capitol hill. some members of certain committees briefed on the developments, the

>> i don't think the taliban the taliban is an armed insurgency. this was the winding down of the war in afghanistan. that's why this arrangement was dealt. >> so you got that? isis is a terrorist group. the taliban in began dan not at all. we found the state department does classify the pakistani taliban as such. the white house's verbal gymnastics getting this reaction from congressman duncan hunter, one of the administration's biggest critics on the bergdahl trade. he says, quote, it is commentary indicative of a delusional world view. the white house screwed up on the bergdahl trade plain and simple. now they want to justify their actions splitting hairs how they compare the taliban to isis. congressman duncan hunter also points out, bergdahl was initially held by the taliban-aligned haqqani network which is technically been declared a terror group. doesn't hunter sum it up? they have egg on their face particularly the rose garden ceremony where they screwed up the terror trade and trying to play verbal gymnastics. not really taliban not a terr

taliban. >> well, it's interesting brett, the pentagon is down playing the story officially. a senior u.s. official tells fox tonight that the u.s. has intercepted phone calls placed by one of the so-called taliban five, they didn't say which one. the pentagon says that all five of the gitmo detainees are accounted for. they remain in qatar, but a u.s. official says they have broached the issue with the qatari officials. we also are learning late tonight, brett, that this information leaked out from a classified briefing on the hill and reports of the concerns about this member of the so-called taliban 5 who were traded of course, for sergeant bowe bergdahl last may, thoughs concerns have come out in recent days. but, again pentagon officials telling us they are not concerned that he has so-called returned to the fight because they have no evidence that he's left qatar. brett? >> yeah, but there are a lot of questions about how much qatar is monitoring these guys and how this whole trade actua

>> i don't think that the taliban -- the taliban is an armed insurgency. lou: the idiocy of such remarks creating a furious backlash against misplaced political correctness at the white house and apparently in the minds of the white house required even further rationalization by josh earnest today. >> it's clear that the ambitions expressed by the taliban and the ambitions expressed by al-qaeda. the threat from the taliban, is -- is acute. if you are a service member serving in afghanistan or if you are a us diplomat or a contractor that is working in afghanistan in this case there is a clear difference between the aspirations that have been articulated by the taliban and the way they carry out or resort to some of their terror tactics and the terror tactics are carried out by al-qaeda. lou: his expression saying, if not all of it, much of it, idiocy and drivel. the result no better for the administration stirring more word games. this administration argued absurdly that it isn't negotiating with terrorists, just the taliban. as they did when they swapped

>> i don't think that the taliban -- huh the taliban is an armed insurgency, this is the winding downthe war in afghanistan and that's why this arrangement was dealt. >> the arrangement, mr. schultz referring, to is the trade of five top taliban commanders for sergeant bo bergdahl whom we will deal with in a moment. but what about schultz parsing the terrorist description embarrassing, right? stop this nonsense because it's become a national joke. taliban slaughtered 132 pack establish school children recently. it's an armed insur is genesee? come on, that's just insulting. so i am going to send a chart to the white house by fedex. the following are terrorists because they either kill or support killing civilians. al qaeda isis, boko haram, taliban, iranian mullahs, hezbollah, hamas the muslim brotherhood and every other jihadist group. it's going on the chart. write them down. send it down to the white house so they know. now, there are also terror groups not aligned with radical islam but they are insignificant at this point, thank god. a new fox news poll shows americans are are ge

>> i don't think that the taliban -- the taliban is an armed insurgency. >> not a terrorist group? here with reaction fox news military analyst colonel david hunt. i'll get to that comment in just a second here. this has been finished since october. as many as six people died. now one of the taliban five has returned and re-engaging in terror. and we still have no answers. and one has to question what is going on here. what are your thoughts? >> question and comment. this is not the first time in the history of the united states army that we've looked at a deserter. it was two reports sean 2009 when bergdahl walked off his post, left a note made a phone call changed clothes, left his weapon. and now this report by general doll. that's two times. two times. the first time called a deserter and they changed it. the army changed it to person -- location unknown. invented a new category. now we go to a four-star general who gt to be a four-star general making decisions. the army has delayed this -- >> colonel -- >> to say one month, doesn't take a four-star general three days to make a

jennifer glasse reports now on the taliban's justice system. >> reporter: a taliban court called into session in kunar province eastern afghanistan. three men are accused of using their fighter status to steal livestock from a neighbor neighbor. >> it is proven these men are indeed criminals and thieves. >> reporter: the men must pay a fine? $2,000 each and replace the goats they stole. their faces are blacked out and haircut off. they are whipped with sticks. the punishment is carried out immediately. that is attraction of the taliban justice system. it is immediate local and cheap, unlike the government's legal system. government refused to comment on the taliban justice system. >> there is corruption in many other problems in the government courts and instead of solving the case they create more problems. that's why people come to the taliban court. >> reporter: the convicted men are put on donkeys and taken to the village center to be publicly shamed. the taliban say they pay for this and other activities by collecting taxes from people. >> we don't have a specific income like at

>> i don't think that the taliban -- the taliban is an armed insurgency, this was the wintding down ofngement was dealt. >> the taliban is an armed insurgency, not a terrorist group. back with the panel. charles? >> it slitsz slits throats. drives cars into buses. you can't parody this situation. the idea that the united states would not do this is preposterous. of course we do. also the idea that the war is winding down, tell that to anybody who lives in afghanistan. this is a fantasy. obama pretended that the war on terror, the war in afghanistan. the war in iraq are all winding down and the wars are all back. i mean, this is sort of embarrassing. the issue for the jordanians is they are a miraculous ally in the region. they have been our friend and stable for 50 years in a region where regimes last a week and a half. but they are extremely pressured by sis by their internal opposition. by the muslim brotherhood inside of jordan and yet it joined our coalition. if it has to make a swap to recover a pilot, do it. >> okay. latest fox news polls ron islamic terrorist also try to launch

taliban just murdered 140 school children.nd he said that is the pakistani taliban. >> this latest charade is inability to call evil what it was, to call islamic terrorists islamic terrorists. we see this throughout. fort hood was a work place violence now we have the tall hi ban they're not terrorists, they're insurgents. you can be an insurgent group and a terror group at the same time. so the question is why? why won't this administration say afghani taliban is a terrorist group? the answer is because we'd be admitting we're leaving afghanistan in the words of the terror group. >> i know you believe that too. there is a reason to say oh, hamas and hezbollah are focused on their own countries different from al qaeda and isis on a global jihad. why is that not valid? >> they're discounting ideology and by minimizing each place, so hamas is just concerned about what is going on in the palestinian territories and bokah haram. and -- >> they're counting on you not being able to keep track. when bush actually said exactly the rig

jennifer glasse reports on the taliban's justice system. >> reporter: a taliban court called into session in kunar province in eastern afghanistan. three men are accused of using the fighter status to steal livestock from a neighbouring district. >> translation: we question the criminals and the owners of the livestock. in the end it's proven these people are criminals and thieves. >> the men's punishment they must pay a fine, about $2,000 and replace the goats they stole. their faces are black and cut off. they are no longer allowed to be taliban fighters and will be whipped with sticks. punishment is carried out. that's the attraction. taliban justice system - it's immediate, local and cheap. the government refused to comment on the taliban court system. >> translation: there is corruption and problems in the government court. instead of solving the case they create more problems. that's why people come to the taliban court. >> the convicted men are put on donkeys and taken to the village center to be shamed. they collect taxes from the people. >> translation: we don't have a specific i

a former taliban commander has changed sides. the his merchants -- the emergence of the so-called islamic state is a disturbing sign of how much there was yet to do when they left. tribal elders were called in for an afghan military parade, a show of strength. they told of gun battles between the taliban and the new groups leaving many dead. one said that the new group were flying islamic state black flags and they took down taliban flags. separately, a video has emerged online of pakistani taliban fighters across the border pledging allegiance to the islamic state. there is a link. some are from afghanistan. the video displays the crude is to mince favored by the movement. this is a large conventional army trained by western forces including britain and america. such an army crippled the -- crumbled in iraq, and there is the first concrete evidence that islamic state fighters have set up here. the coffin of an afghan soldier fallen in the fight was loaded onto the plane that brought us back to kabul and the fight has just become

. >>> and a look inside taliban courtroom in eastern afghanistan. we see the justice system in action. >> the indonesia transport minister is threatening to revoke airasia's operating license. it said that the airline violated it's reasons. the head of the indonesian search search and rescue said parts of the jet has been found in the java sea. 162 passengers and crew were killed when the airbus crashed during severe thunderstorms. tell us horror our airasia has violated it's operating license because it could mean that it's grounded all together. >> yes, that's correct. even before before the black box is found and even before we know the reason for the crash last sunday the prime minister has said that they had no license to fly on that particular day. they he have no license to fly on sunday. they can only fly on weekdays, and it has been confirmed that they've been flying every sunday. the prime minister has been talking about a big investigation because many questions are being asked how is it possible that an airline without a license can actu

the taliban and is not a terrorist group.ip even though he said it to their reporter. the second hour starts in two minutes. ♪ the rich, or maybe the rich, spend all these free goodies. that is what the president called middle-class economics. we are kicking off the second hour of varney and company. ♪ >> coping working families feel more secure and a world of constant change. helping folks with child care, college, healthcare, a home, retirement. my budget will address each of these issues. lowering the tax of working-class families and putting thousands of dollars back into their pockets each year. what the president did not mention is how he is going to pay it all. we will accept an economy where only a few of us generate rising incomes and chances for everyone who makes the effort. you wrote a piece of obama's peter pan economics. >> it starts with the idea when he proposes free community college for two years. what does he mean by free? everybody understands nothing is free. he thinks it will be free. how will he pay for

>> reporter: defense officials insist five taliban leaders released from taliban prison last june toountry of qatar have not rejoined the fight against the u.s. even though one made phone calls to his taliban contacts in afghanistan, phone calls that were intercepted. the taliban five were swapped for bowe bergdahl last year. a deal the white house says it does not regret. some republicans said then and say now it was a bad idea to let those guys out of gitmo. >> they're the worst of the worst and to expect them not to go back in the fight and for them somehow to undergo some conversion is just damned foolishness and so again i repeat, additional american lives will be threatened because of these people which they most likely will as 30% of the others released will pose a danger to american men and women who are serving. >> reporter: president obama was promised his country would keep tabs on the men through the end of men and then they'll be free to leave qatar. for now the obama administration says there are ways to monitor what the taliban five are doing. >> we remain confident as

i think this whole thing is a tragedy waiting to happen if the taliban take back over. bad news for us there, bad news in pakistan which could fall to radicals and see their entire arsenal of weapons fall into radical hands. it isn't just semantics. i think it masks the confusion of obama's overall afghan policy. >> we will watch and wait and hope for the best. ambassador ambassador, thank you. >> thank you. >>> a tragic murder case in court decades after this little girl disappeared. how his trial is shaping up from missing children's investigations across the country. >>> plus how this daredevil climbed up one of the most famous places in the world. not for the faint of heart. >>> and the fda says nacho cheese is not a real cheese. h. that means us to our question of the day. you can weigh in on nachos, but what is your favorite super bowl snack-etizer? tweet me, we want to hear from you. this tylenol arthritis lasts 8 hours but aleve can last 12 hours. and aleve is proven to work better on pain than tylenol arthritis. so why am i still thinking about this? how are ya

>> i don't think that the taliban is, the taliban is an armed insurgency. >> reporter: is at least onenow and what is being done behind the scenes to secure her release is still up in the air and very big question, bill. over the past 24 hours there are a lot of more questions what if any exceptions might be to the u.s. policy of not negotiating with terrorists. bill: leland, thank you from the north lawn there at the white house, leland vittert on that. three minutes past. martha: there is growing anger in the white house over house speaker john boehner inviting israel's prime minister to address the congress. "the new york times" reporting that the president's inner circle is outraged that he accepted that invitation without consulting the white house. one senior official even slamming israel's ambassador about this whole situation. speaker boehner sat down with bret baier and say, he was not surprised. >> do you think there is some kind of antipathy in this administration towards netanyahu? >> of course there is. they don't even try to hide it. israel has been our strongest ally in

if the taliban can be convinced to do that, so much better. if some faction within the taliban can be convinced to do that so much the better. if not we need to smash in this place and we build. >> talking about different factions within the taliban. that's one of the crazier parts of your book. within a matter of three weeks before after 9/11 you end up in a room with the number two guy in the taliban and you're negotiating with this guy trying to convince him to split with malawmar. >> yes. >> unfortunately, it didn't work. >> he agreed briefly. and we went through a long process. we had eight or nine hours of conversation on two different occasions, and basically he got to a place where he was just in a corner. he realized the americans are not going to be deswayeded. he realized that his own leader was not going to cut a deal. he was at wits' end. he slumped in his chair. he took off his turbine and he said tell me what i should do. i said you must move him aside. no one is suggesting that he should be harmed. but you are the commander in

and the taliban are ultimately going to go back into afghanistan. >> indeed, something that the talibanled off in afghanistan illustrates that point. my next guest to and who is left at gitmo. we have 50 to 80 detainees who have either direct yemeni connections or from yemen, and now as you know, yemen is to put it mildly in great unrest. what do we do with them? if the administration is that trot to get them out of gitmo one middle ground is send them to another country. what is to stop them when they get in the middle east to go back in. >> there's nothing to step them. thew prisoners or let prisoners lose before the end+u g of the war, they go back into the fight. we know in the past that yemen;ñá may go in the front of door of the prison about go out the back doctor and get back into the fight now. we don't have good real estate with yemen, there's nothing to guarantee they don't go back into the fight. this stems from the president's eagerness to close gitmo. once the place is empty of prisoners he'll say, we might as well close gitmo. the problem is they're going back into the fig

five had reached out by telephone to taliban contacts in afghanistan. defense officials said this does not constitute a return to the fight. >> i would hasten to remind it was because of the process we have in place, and the strong relationship that we have with the government of qatar that we were able to identify this particular activity, and i can assure that you steps are being taken to mitigate any activity in the future. >> what i can say is confidence is this individual has not returned to the battlefield. this individual is not allowed to travel outside qatar and this individual has not engaged in physical violence. in fact, this individual is in qatar right now. >> reporter: the five detainees included deputy minister of intelligence and interior minister who had ties to mullah omar and osama bin laden. >> i believe there are 35% of those returned to the fight. it should be of no surprise that one or more of these five would return to the fight. >> reporter: the pentagon is also backing the white house's continued reluctance to refer to the tal

phone calls to the taliban.ress secretary rear admiral again making trade insisting the taliban five under control. >> we had reason to believe that there was some activities by at least

we negotiated with the taliban. the life of an innocent person, i think that's something i might have gritted my teeth and done. but really what k.t. is talking about is we need a strategy. and we don't have one. now, senator lieberman ran a great op-ed in the "wall street journal" recently that said the civilized world has to recognize we are at war with radical islam, it has to declare war on radical islam and we have to have a global alliance including western nations, saudi united arab emirates and egypt to work together against this threat. i think we are a long way to getting a strategy like that. >> a long way from getting a strategy why do you think that? first, as you said, identifying who the actual enemy is, what it is the heinous crimes they are committing and realizes this is not just some group of guys out there playing for keeps, if you will. these people are quite organized. they have a very strong recruitment effort with using the internet like magicians, and you know and selling their ideology so w

>> i don't think that the taliban -- the taliban is an armed insurgency. >> the idiocy of such remarksreating a furious backlash against misplaced political correctness at the white house and apparently in the minds of the white house required even further rationalization, explanation, if you will, by press secretary josh earnest today. >> it is clear that there is a difference between the ambitions that are expressed by the taliban and the ambitions that are expressed by al qaeda. the threat from the taliban is acute if you are a service member serving in afghanistan or if you are a u.s. diplomat or a contractor that is working in afghanistan. in this case there is a clear difference between the aspirations that have been articulated by the taliban and the way they resort to some of their terror tactics and the terror, you know the terror attacks that are carried out by al qaeda. >> bill plant's expression saying all of it. the result no better for all of the administration's stirring more word games perhaps because this administration can argue absurdly that it isn't negotiating with

taliban, um, -- the taliban is an armed insurgency, this was the winding down of the war in afghanistan and that's why this arrangement was dealt. >> joining us our political panel the daily beast jackie kucinich and the hill's a.b. stoddard. a.b., i thought that jonathan karl of abc, i haven't talked to jonathan but i think he was shocked that the white house won't call it taliban terrorist group. >> i think everyone was. and i think you could see eric schultz struggling to remember his talking points. he paused and closed his eyes a bit and reiterated it armed insurgency. >> is this insane you? say it's humiliating. but is it also insane? >> no. it's is a failure to deal in reality. i think they know what reality is. even if you wanted to defend the berg dave swap you still would have to say that the taliban, who behead and bombed innocence in public women and children, amputee videotaped executions, hang bodies from trees are absolutely terrorists. the whole question of the swap is another story. but you couldn't get any -- any eighth grader or 80-year-old in this country to make sen

the white house has conceded the taliban carries out tactics that are akin to terrorism. in washington, joel waldman, fox news. >>> an 83-year-old man robbed of his brand-new iphone and the crime caught on camera. where it happened and who police are searching for. >>> plus, a minor warmup in store for the weekend. rosemary orozco will be here with the forecast. and is there any rain on the horizon? >>> and roger goodell issues his state of the nfl address. what he said about the year overall and about the calls r for him to resign. o?oowq >>> police in berkeley have released surveillance video of a man who stole a brand-new iphone from an 83-year-old man in berkeley. it happened back on december 26th. police say the man had just bought the iphone at the apple store on 4th street when a man in a red hoodie walked up to him and ripped the phone from his hand. here's another look at the suspect. police say he escaped in a silver audi with paper license plates. no other information about the suspect. police are asking anyone with information to give them a call. >>> mitt

if we go back to the taliban while we're busy talking about the designation of whether or not the talibane terror list, they go forward with their agenda. look at the gitmo five that we released. already one has been caught communicating back with the taliban. what does the pentagon and white house say this week? they say that we believe that they are still in qatar. we believe that they have not gone back to the battlefield and what they should add to that sentence is that they haven't gone back to the battlefield yet. we already know they're communicating and that we're allowing when we swap these terrorists out, when we're -- this is human currency. they're asking for their terrorists back to replenish their stockpile of top, top terrorist leaders. >> it is so tragic and it continues and they have other hostages. let's read to the statement the president just releasing. we're getting this from president obama. quote, the united states condemns the heinous murder of japanese citizen kenji goto by the terrorist group isil. he courageously sought to convey the plight of the syrian people