IRAQ - July 5 - US Marine Hostage Moved To Safety.

Raising hopes for the fate of Lebanese-born Corporal Wassef Ali Hassoun who had previously been reported as beheaded, a statement of Islamic Response Movement(group it reported on June 27 as claiming to have abducted Hassoun), released by Al Jazeera TV says it moved him to "safety" after he pledged to leave the military. Hassoun's relatives in Lebanon said the same statement had been faxed to them. The Islamic Response Movement did not say where the abducted Hassoun had been taken, only that he had been moved to a "place of safety", Al Jazeera said. A family friend and spokesman Tarek Nosseir said: "At this point we are uncertain of the destiny of our brother, our friend Wassef. If he is still in captivity, we remind the captors of the saying of our beloved prophet; 'Be merciful to those on earth. Mercy will descend on you from heaven'". Hassoun's family has declined all comment on media reports that Hassoun had deserted the US military or that he had been lured away from his base in Iraq after a romance with an Arab woman. Reports of Hassoun's fate conflicted wildly June 3 after statements posted on Islamist Web sites attributed to another Islamist group - the Army of Ansar Al-Sunna - said he had been decapitated, then that he was still alive. On June 27 Al Jazeera showed a brief video of a blindfolded man dressed in camouflage sitting in a chair with a hand holding a sword above his head. The US military says Hassoun has been absent from his unit since June 21. Battling militants blamed for kidnappings and bombings, the US military launched an air strike on what it said was an Islamic guerrilla safe house in the Iraqi city of Falluja, killing at least five people. Neighbours said they were members of a family with no connections to extremist groups.