Omar Shafik Hammami (Arabic: عمر شفيق همّامي, Umar Shafīq Hammāmī; 6 May 1984 – 12 September 2013),[1] also known by the pseudonym Abu Mansoor al-Amriki (Arabic: أبو منصور الأمريكي, Abū Manṣūr al-Amrīkī), was an American citizen who was a member and leader in the Somali Islamist militant group al-Shabaab.
[5] Hammami's father, Shafik, a Syrian Muslim, grew up in Damascus, Syria and moved to Alabama for college, later becoming a civil engineer.
While in college, he became influenced by Tony Salvatore Sylvester, an American convert to Islam at the Masjid in Mobile, Alabama and Hamammi became a Salafi.
In March 2005, Hammami married 19-year-old Sadiyo Mohamed Abdille, a woman from Somalia whose family had fled in 2001 for Canada from the civil war which had been going on since 1991.
[5] Through an Internet forum, Hammami met Daniel Maldonado, an American convert to Islam who was living in Cairo with his wife and two children.
[5] In October 2007, Hammami appeared publicly identified as "Abu Mansoor Al-Amriki" (the American) for the first time, giving an interview for Al Jazeera.
[5] In a January 2008 letter, Al-Amriki explained al-Shabaab's goal to establish an Islamic caliphate "from East to West after removing the occupier and killing the apostates.
"[12] Hammami became a major leader in Al-Shabaab, "commanding guerrilla forces in the field, organizing attacks and plotting strategy with al Qaeda operatives, according to The New York Times.
A superseding indictment was returned against Hammami in 2009 on terrorism violations for leaving the United States to join al-Shabaab, a terrorist organization.
[1] Al-Amriki revealed his face in a 31-minute video released 31 March 2009, and in recruitment footage posted to a Somali terrorist website on 5 April 2009.
One of the Americans featured in the video is Shirwa Ahmed, known to have been among four people to die in suicide attacks in October 2008 against the United Nations compound, the Ethiopian Consulate and the presidential palace in Hargeisa.
"[15] In the message, al-Amriki affirmed al-Shabaab's allegiance to Al Qaeda and condoned the 9/11 terror attacks in the United States.
"[16] The 127-page document deals with his evolution from Muslim convert to Salafi to jihadi; enlisting in the Shabaab, life in combat fighting off hungry lions and giant ants at night.
[citation needed] Long War Journal reported on 15 March that Hammami had not been killed as Somali officials had claimed, as he had released a videotape.
In the 45-minute lecture, originally posted in January but removed, he criticized jihadist organizations with a local focus, likening them to a "cancerous tumor."
[26] On 17 December 2012, Al-Shabaab posted a message on Twitter publicly chastising Hammami for releasing videos in a "narcissistic pursuit of fame."
Preaching at a mosque in Bula-Barde town of Hiran region in central Somalia, Shangole said that Abu Mansoor al Amriki was killed after men he dubbed to be "apostates" ambushed him.
[28] Omar Hammami was killed on 12 September 2013, in an early-morning ambush by al-Shabaab militants in a village near the town of Dinsoor,[29] south-west of the capital, Mogadishu.