Mosul suicide bomber was Saudi medical student: report

Mosul suicide bomber was Saudi medical student: report
(AP)

3 January 2005 
[ANSAR AL-SUNNAH VIDEO REFERENCED: http://www.globalterroralert.com/video/1204/ansarsunnah-mosul3.wmv]

 CAIRO - The suicide bomber who killed 22 people when he blew himself up in a US mess hall in Mosul, Iraqi, was a Saudi medical student, an Arab newspaper reported Monday.  Saudi-owned Asharq Al-Awsat identified him as 20-year-old Ahmed Said Ahmed al-Ghamdi, citing unnamed friends of the man’s father. The friends said members of an Iraqi resistance group contacted al-Ghamdi’s father to tell him his son was the suicide bomber who carried out the Dec. 21 attack, the deadliest on an American installation in Iraq.

The Associated Press was unable to reach Saudi security officials for comment despite several phone calls on Monday.

The US-led coalition that toppled Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein has faced fierce resistance, most of it carried out by Saddam loyalists or Iraqi nationalists. Some of the deadliest attacks, though, have been blamed on foreign Muslim extremists.

US officials have said their preliminary investigation indicates the bomber was dressed in an Iraqi military uniform - but was not an Iraqi soldier - when he slipped into a mess tent packed with soldiers eating lunch in northern Iraq.

The father refused to discuss the suicide bombing, but told the newspaper his son had gone to Iraq to fight the Americans and had died there. The family held a mourning ceremony the paper said. It did not say when the ceremony was held or where in Saudi Arabia the family lived.

The paper did not name the Iraqi resistance group. But Ansar al-Sunnah, a radical Islamic Iraqi group that has been active in northern Iraq, claimed responsibility for the mess hall attack. In a videotape posted on the Web, Ansar al-Sunnah identified the suicide bomber as Abu Omar al-Musali - an apparent nom de guerre meaning Abu Omar of Mosul.

The man identified as Abu Omar al-Musali appeared in the Web video wearing an explosives-laden vest, but did not speak. Another man, speaking in an Iraqi accent, described how the operation had been planned. A subsequent segment showed what appeared to have been the attack.

Asharq al-Awsat said al-Ghamdi started studying medicine in Sudan when his father worked and lived there. Al-Ghamdi stayed to complete his studies when his family returned to Saudi Arabia, the paper reported, without saying when the family left.

It said the father said he learned Dec. 16 that his son had withdrawn all the money left in a Sudanese bank account for him and later received a phone call from his son telling him that he was in Iraq to fight the Americans.

The al-Ghamdis are a large Saudi clan. Three al-Ghamdis were among the Sept. 11 hijackers.

Notes from Evan Kohlmann:

A friend and supporter of Ahmed al-Ghamdi responded to this story:

"I carry on and confirm to you the news concerning the martyrdom of Ahmad Said Omar Al-Ghamdi, who carried out the Mosul operation and previously was studying in Sudan at the Medical School of the Umm Durman Islamic University.  His real name is written this way, and it is not Ahmad Said Ahmad Al-Ghamdi as was reported in As-Sharq al-Awsat.  Also, he was studying at the Islamic University in Umm Durman and not at Khartoum University... His father was formerly the charge d'affaires at the Saudi embassy in Khartoum, but returned to Saudi Arabia sometime ago at the end of his appointment period.  However, Ahmad continued to study here until he disappeared suddenly after informing his friends that he was going back to Saudi Arabia.... Allah have mercy on him, he was humble, well-mannered, and very polite.  He reached great success in his studies... [at the] Faculty of Medicine at the Islamic University of Umm Durman.  The university is marked by its Islamic theme, without the typical mixture found at other universities between the material and legitimate sciences [science and religion].  While at the university, he began to show signs of his committment, growing out his beard, and becoming persistent in studying the lessons of Islamic clerics and shaykhs.  The last time I saw him was in June 2004 at the Hijra Mosque in the Riyadh neighborhood of Khartoum."

On a related note, the Ansar al-Sunnah Army has also released a videotaped "martyr will" of "Abu Abdullah al-Muhajir", identified as responsible for the January 3, 2005 attempted suicide bombing attack on the Baghdad headquarters of Iyad Allawi's Iraqi National Accord Party that killed four bystanders.  See http://www.globalterroralert.com/video/0105/ansarsunnah-martyrwill.wmv.