Linked below, please find two seemingly unrelated stories about two separate Jihadis from the Mobile, Alabama area (one of our favorite cities actually and the permanent homeport for the battleship USS Alabama, one of the great historical treasures that every American should visit at least once).
Nevertheless, something is going on in that area. There are two known Jihadis that made news recently, one we have known about for some time and the other only more recently came on the scene.
The first one is Omar Hammami, a Muslim who grew up in Daphne, Alabama, a really nice town outside of Mobile. Hammami’s Dad is a Syrian immigrant and was at one time at least the Imam of the Islamic center there. While a student at the University of South Alabama, Hammami was the President of the Muslim Students Association, which of course is the oldest Muslim Brotherhood front group in the United States. (Hammami is certainly not the first member of the MSA to turn to violent Jihad. That list is long.) As President of the MSA at South Alabama, he was interviewed by local TV news stations about perceived discrimination against Muslims in the wake of the 9/11 attacks of 2001.
Not long after all of that, Hammami turned to violent Jihad and via Canada and Egypt found his way to Somalia, where he came a member of Al Shabaab, the Al Qaeda affiliate there. It was at that time that he hit the big-time in Jihadi circles and changed his name to Abu Mansoor Al-Amriki. He became a spokesman for the organization and found himself on the FBI’s list of most wanted terrorists.
Omar Hammami/Abu Mansoor Al-Amriki
More recently, Hammami/Al-Amriki hasn’t been getting along so well with his Jihadi pals in Somalia. He released a video back in March in which he claimed to be in fear for his like from none other than Al Shabaab over differences in sharia and strategy. There was even speculation that he was killed.
But now he has resurfaced again. It turns out Al Shabaab didn’t kill him, they just think he is an assclown (our word, not theirs) and have essentially disowned him. We imagine he must be pretty lonely over in Somalia these days. Good riddance. We hope for his untimely demise, sooner than later preferably.
Which brings us to the question of how he ended up in the Jihad in the first place. Being a member of the MSA may have had a hand in it. After all, Carlos Bledsoe (aka Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad) found his way to Jihad after getting involved with the MSA in Nashville, which is less than a day’s drive from Mobile. Of course, Bledsoe/Muhammad also got involved with a local Islamic center in Nashville as well and that is also a know recruiting outlet for Jihad in America and the West in general. Now we come full circle, Hammami’s Dad, who was the Imam of the Islamic Center of Daphne claims to have no idea how his son got involved in Jihad. We were always skeptical of that claim because other sons of Imams have gone the same route. But now that another Jihadi has emerged from the area, we think there may be something worth looking into in the Lower Alabama region…
…And his name is Randy Lamar “Rasheed” Wilson. Wilson was arrested boarding an airline flight from Atlanta to Morocco earlier this month. Authorities say he planned to enter “another African country” and wage a violent jihad in support of his Islamic beliefs.
They don’t say which African nation Wilson had in mind. It certainly could be Somalia, but the Jihadists are also active in Mali, Morocco, Libya and a few other places in Africa. In fact, Mali appears to be mentioned in some of the initial court records. But so is Hammami. It seems that Hammami and Wilson were roommates at one time…hmmm…At this point we don’t know much about Wilson, how he became Muslim (we doubt he was born Muslim) and how he found his way to Jihad and on his way to Africa.
Randy Lamar “Rasheed” Wilson
Like we said, something is going on in with Jihad in Lower Alabama…which seems to be one of the least likely places in America for such activity. This shows that no where is immune.
Terror Trends Bulletin 