[2] He came to the United States working as a translator for Ayman al-Zawahiri who toured California in 1993 following the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, hoping to raise money for al-Jihad from the numerous Islamic charities that still existed from the days of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan.
When he simply walked into the CIA office in Cairo and asked to speak to the station chief to offer his services, the Americans assumed he was an Egyptian spy, but nevertheless recruited him to be a junior intelligence agent.
Another loyal American spy was also in the congregation and he reported Mohamed to the CIA, which dismissed him and sought to ban him from entering the United States.
[4] Mohamed was charged with the 1998 United States embassy bombings in Nairobi, Kenya, and in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
Mohamed conducted training during the war to small classes that included Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, later leaders of al-Qaeda, and the terrorist members responsible for the bombings of the two U.S. embassies in Africa.
During this time, it is widely believed that he continued to train cells of terrorists using the information learned while living in the U.S. After a month he returned to the United States.
[10][11] The system of cell structures and groups within a terrorist faction was developed by Ali around this time as a means of making it harder to destroy terrorism by spreading members out.
[8] Bin Laden and Ali Mohamed worked closely to create cells in Tanzania and Kenya to help prepare for the bombings of the embassies.
After setting up, he moved back to Afghanistan where bin Laden and other members of al-Qaeda discussed plans for the bombings and other information.
According to Lawrence Wright he "immediately told the Iranian cleric in charge that he was an American spy assigned to infiltrate the community."
By this "time, however, Mohamed was already in California on a visa-waiver program that was sponsored by the agency itself, one designed to shield valuable assets or those who have performed important services for the country."
[12] He enlisted in the U.S. Army and managed to get stationed at the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, until 1989.
"[5] According to Cooperative Research, Mohamed was a drill sergeant at Fort Bragg, and was hired to teach courses on Arabic culture at the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School.
During his time he was open about his religious beliefs, cooking his own meals to ensure they were halal and listening to the Quran on his Walkman during morning runs.
[5] In 1989, he transferred from active duty to the U.S. Army Reserve, taking a job as a security guard at a defense contractor manufacturing components of Trident missiles.
[5] Mohamed also conducted clandestine military and demolition training through the Al Kifah Refugee Center in Brooklyn and Jersey City.
[16] In the early 1990s, Mohamed returned to Afghanistan, where "he trained the first al-Qaeda volunteers in techniques of unconventional warfare including kidnappings, assassinations, and hijacking planes, which he had learned from the American Special Forces."
According to FBI special agent Jack Cloonan, in one of Mohamed's first classes were Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and other al-Qaeda leaders.
[4][7] In 1993, Mohamed escorted Ayman al-Zawahiri, posing as a Kuwaiti Red Crescent representative, on a speaking tour across the United States.
[8] Ali then included information in the events leading up to the embassy bombings; “In the early 1990s, I assisted al Qaeda in creating a presence in Nairobi, Kenya, and worked with several others on this project.
Wadih el Hage created a charity organization that would help provide al Qaeda members with identity documents”.
Ali then told the court that he was asked by bin Laden to identify possible targets of which he conducted surveillance on the American Embassy building.