EFL
Three days after he was reported beheaded, a U.S. Marine held captive in Iraq has been released, his family said Tuesday. But the mystery surrounding the Marine, Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun, was not fully resolved: His family said they had not spoken with him directly. "We received a sign that he is alive and he is released and everything is OK," his older brother Sami Hassoun, 26, said in a telephone interview from Lebanon, where Wassef Ali Hassoun was born and where some of his family live. "The sign is something that came directly from him. There is something that nobody else could possibly know. It's a certain clue. He is alive and he is released." | Well, he was alive when he sent that message. I'll believe he's released when he walks into a US base or embassy. |
A Lebanese government official also said Hassoun was released, though his whereabouts were unknown. The kidnappers freed the 24-year-old Marine after he pledged not to return to the U.S. military, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity, The Associated Press reported. The two statements were positive signals for Hassoun's relatives in Lebanon and the United States, who have seen their hopes rise and plummet amid contradictory Internet messages by Iraqi militants about the Marine's fate. Hassoun, who worked as an Arabic translator, disappeared from his base June 20. A videotape was broadcast June 27 by Al-Jazeera, the Arab news network, that showed Hassoun blindfolded, with a sword held above his head. In that tape, the group Islamic Response said it would behead him if the Americans did not release all of their prisoners. Saturday, two Islamist Web sites carried a message attributed to the leader of another militant group, the Army of Ansar al-Sunna, saying it had beheaded Hassoun and would shortly release images of his death. That message, which was addressed to President Bush, also said the corporal had been involved romantically with an Arab woman and had been lured off his base, according to the AP. | Sounds like he was thinking with his.....gun. |
In an unexpected twist, Ansar al-Sunna posted an Internet message Sunday saying that it had not killed Hassoun and that someone had put a false message on the two Web sites. Then Monday, Islamic Response issued a statement saying Hassoun had been moved to "a place of safety." | It almost sounds like two different groups are fighting over him. |
His brother Sami Hassoun would not provide details of the sign he said the family had received that the corporal had been released but said the family was much more hopeful about his safety than in recent days. "We are still crossing our fingers and praying to see him again," Sami Hassoun said in an interview from Tripoli, Lebanon. "It's a much better mood than the last couple of days. We are optimistic." |