Kidnapped marine ‘safe after defecting’ to Islamists
Kidnapped US marine Wassef Ali Hassoun has been taken to “a place of safety” after he pledged not to return to the US military, his captors told al-Jazeera television in a statement yesterday.
The Islamic Response Movement, the same group that last week admitted to kidnapping Corporal Hassoun and threatening to behead him, would not say where he was being kept.
Last Saturday, another militant group calling itself Ansar al-Sunna Army posted a note on an Islamic website saying it had killed him, only to post a denial of the killing on Sunday followed yesterday’s statement from Islamic Response.
Could the New York Times reports have been accurate that he was a deserter?
Will we ever know?
I hope for the sake of his family they, at the very least, will learn his whereabouts.
I’m going to hope for the best. What’s the best? That he is working with someone in the military and they decided to see if he could infiltrate the kidnapping group and help the marines find the bastards and therefore eliminate them. Dangerous, very dangerous game. But a gamble that I can see a real marine being willing to do.
That’s the best I can hope for.