Under President Obama, Delta Force carried out a daring, dangerous and successful raid in Syria that killed a top ISIS leader, captured his wife, and resulted in no U.S. deaths. Naturally, Fox News did its darnedest to tarnish any luster.

From the New York Times:

American Special Operations forces mounted a rare raid into eastern Syria early Saturday, killing a leader of the Islamic State and about a dozen militant fighters, as well as capturing his wife and freeing an 18-year old Yazidi woman whom Pentagon officials said had been held as a slave.

In the first successful raid by American ground troops since the military campaign against the Islamic State began last year, two dozen Delta Force commandos entered Syria aboard Black Hawk helicopters and V-22 Ospreys and killed the leader, a man known as Abu Sayyaf. One American military official described him as the Islamic State’s “emir of oil and gas.”

Even so, Abu Sayyaf is a midlevel leader in the organization — one terrorism analyst compared him to Al Capone’s accountant — and likely is replaceable in fairly short order.

… The commandos were back in Iraq with the two women around dawn local time, officials said. They said the American forces were able to seize communications equipment and other materials from the site, which may prove useful in intelligence assessments.

In a discussion about the raid with John Hannah, a former national security advisor to Dick Cheney, Fox host Leland Vittert’s first question made it clear his priority was Obama, not the mission nor what it may have accomplished.

VITTERT: The first thing that struck me when I heard about this raid was, it sounds an awful lot like ‘boots on the ground,’ something the president said wasn’t going to happen.

Hannah agreed.

Vittert also questioned why the White House had risked so much in the raid. When told that Abu Sayyaf was likely of “incredible intelligence value,” Vittert suggested he was not of any value now that he has been killed.

Hannah explained that there was probably valuable intelligence in the form of “electronics, computers, telephones” in the house.

So Vittert asked, “As you look back on it, was it worth it? You have his wife but that doesn’t really seem like she probably was the one who held the family checkbook.”

But CNN reported:

Abu Sayyaf and his wife are suspected to be involved in or have deep knowledge of ISIS hostage operations, a U.S. official with knowledge of the operation told CNN. A team from the FBI-led High Value Interrogation Group is expected to interrogate the wife, the source said. They will seek to figure out what she may know about the capture, movement and treatment of hostages.

Hannah reiterated that there could have been valuable information seized in the raid. “Are there things on his computers, on his phones that begin to let you really unravel the leadership network and begin to go after these guys? And let’s face it: this is a statement as well. The U.S. for the first time going in on the ground, killing a high-value leader, the rest of the leadership now is even got to be more wary than they were before,” Hannah said.

Foiled again, Vittert suggested that maybe all the credit for the raid should go to others.

VITTERT: Is this something that President Obama would have had to authorize specifically and personally or is this something that, say, he had said to the chairman and other folks, hey if you think you can go get somebody, go get him?

Sorry, Leland! “No, I think absolutely the president was intimately involved in this decision,” Hannah told Vittert. “He finally gave the green light to go order to make this happen. It’s just such a diversion in direction for U.S. policy on the ground and in Syria. The risks were so high. As you said, the consequences could have been devastating. We could have seen another Black Hawk Down in Somalia …This had to be the president’s call.”

Vittert took one final swipe: “Well, thankfully, all the Special Forces, we know have returned safely. Obviously, they didn’t get the guy they wanted to alive, they got him dead. We’ll see what intelligence comes out of it.”

Fox just can’t stand it when President Obama looks good!

Watch it below, from today’s America’s News HQ.

(H/T emailer Alice C.)