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Second Minnesota fighter may have been killed in Syria

By Paul McEnroe and Allie Shah, Star Tribune Staff Writers

The FBI is looking into the possibility that a Twin Cities Somali man was killed in Syria fighting with terrorists.

Abdirahman Muhumed
Abdirahmaan Muhumed, with a rifle, reportedly has died in Syria fighting for terrorists. Photo by Star Tribune

A Minnesota Somali community leader said Thursday that he has multiple photos of a dead soldier believed to be a second man with Minnesota ties killed while fighting with terrorists in Syria.

Omar Jamal, former head of the Somali Justice Advocacy Center and a longtime Somali activist in Minneapolis, said he showed the photos to a person acquainted with Abdirahmaan Muhumed, and that person felt sure it was Muhumed.

Jamal cautioned however that he, himself, could not say for certain whether the dead soldier pictured was Muhumed. “People are saying it’s him, but I don’t know for sure,” Jamal said.

The FBI in Minneapolis and the U.S. State Department would not confirm Thursday whether a second American had been killed while fighting for the terror group, Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIL).

There have been unconfirmed reports that Muhumed died in the same clash as Douglas McAuthur McCain, who attended Robbinsdale Cooper High School in New Hope and later lived in San Diego before he left the country. On Wednesday, a State Department spokesman said it was looking into a report that a second American had died in the fighting.

Reports of Muhumed’s reported death heightened concerns that a new wave of Minnesota men are leaving the country to join terrorist groups, much like a previous group that went back to Somalia in recent years. Most who went to Somalia died not long after arriving, including a suicide bomber.

The latest departures are reportedly heading to Syria, via Turkey, to fight alongside the ISIL armies that have won control over a vast swath of territory in Syria and Iraq. U.S. intelligence agencies have identified nearly a dozen Americans fighting for ISIL, according to the New York Times.

Jamal showed two of the purported photos of Muhumed’s corpse — stored in his cellphone — to Star Tribune reporters. One showed a man clad in a green khaki uniform with a gaping wound to the side of his head.

Muhumed, 29, left Minneapolis about two years ago, said Jamal, director of a new foundation called American Friends of Somalia. Muhumed was the father of nine children and had reportedly struggled to support them.

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Source: Star Tribune

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