Just like the ACORN story that took weeks for the “state-run” media to report, so too FOX News is initially dominating this story of an Alabama boy going to Somalia and becoming a leader of a Jihadi terrorist organization—Al Shabaab. I’m guessing this whole concept—American born Muslim convert becoming an Al Qeada wannabe—is outside of the mainstream media’s world view.
Abu Mansour al-Amriki — or Omar Hammami as he was known — appears in a video posted online Tuesday by the group al-Shabaab, which has ties to Al Qaeda and was labeled a terrorist organization by the U.S. government last year. In the new video, al-Shabaab fighters pledge their allegiance to Usama bin Laden.
“I ask Allah to grant victory to the [Muslim fighters] in every land and under every sky,” says one fighter in the video, excerpts of which were provided to Fox News by the Washington-based Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI). “We ask Allah that the Islamic Nation be liberated from invaders by the next [end of Ramadan] and [an Islamic state] be established by then.”
During the 50-minute video, titled “We Are At Your Command, Usama,” al-Amriki pops up in scenes of apparent military training. In one scene, he stands in the background – a black, bulging vest strapped to his chest – while at least four people whose faces are hidden by cloth point rifles forward.
Al-Amriki has been in Somalia for several years, but he first became a public figure in October 2007, when Al-Jazeera TV featured him in a report on the “common goal” of Al Qaeda and hard-line militants in Somalia. He kept his face hidden.
He showed his face for the first time in April, when a video posted online featured him purportedly leading a group of al-Shabaab militants in an ambush of “the enemy.”
We need more western kids! (Six former refugees, American-Somalis, have died so far in Somalia.)
Speaking about one man killed in the fight, he said, “We need more like him, so if you can encourage more of your children and more of your neighbors, anyone around, to send people like him to this jihad, it would be a great asset for us.”
Read the rest of the FOX report on how Al-Amriki came to be in Somalia in the first place.
We first reported to you about Al-Amriki here in April.