Updated: May 13, 2011

Omar Hammami, a 25-year-old American citizen from Alabama, has become a primary recruiter for an Al-Qaeda linked terrorist group based in Somalia. Al Shabaab, the Somali-based terrorist organization, disseminates propaganda videos featuring Hammami via the Internet to recruit young Somali-American men to join its insurgency against Somalia's transitional governments and its Ethiopian supporters.

Hammami is identified in Al Shabaab statements and recordings as Abu Mansour al Amriki, Arabic for "Abu Mansour the American." On August 5, 2010, federal authorities unsealed an indictment charging Hammami, with providing material support to terrorists. After arriving in Somalia in late 2006, Hammami rose through the ranks of Al Shabaab due to his fluency in Arabic and his proficiency working with computers. 

Hammami has increasingly become the public face and voice of Al Shabaab as part of the terrorist organization's effort to recruit English-speakers. In his numerous written, video and audio statements, Hammami has issued appeals to Americans and other English-speakers "to come and live the life of a mujahid [holy warrior]." Since the fall of 2007, approximately 25 Somali-American men between the ages of 17 and 27 have traveled to Somalia to join Al Shabaab, as have other recruits from Britain, Australia and Canada.

In May 2011, Hammami spoke alongside other Al Shabaab leaders at a public rally south of Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia, vowing to avenge the death of Osama bin Laden. "We are sending a message to [Barack] Obama and [Secretary of State] Hillary Clinton that we will avenge the death of our leader Sheikh Osama bin Laden very soon," he said. "Osama is dead but the holy war is not dead. Mujahedeen fighters all over the world are fully prepared to revenge the death of our leader."

His threats against the U.S. and other Western interests indicate that Al Shabaab may have ambitions outside Somalia's borders. Hammami's statements also underscore Al Shabaab's goals to establish an Islamic state in Somalia by ridding the country of outside influences.