Abu Omar al-Saif

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Abu Omar al-Saif (Arabic: أبو عمر السيف ) was an informmmal name or nom de guerre of a Saudi Wahhabist Islamist and militant operating first in Afghanistan (1986-1988) and later in the North Caucasus (1996-2005) as the mufti of Arab fighters in Chechnya, allegedly with close ties to Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda.. His full name was Muhammad bin Abdullah bin Saif al-Tamimi ( محمد بن عبد الله بن سيف التميمي ). He sometimes also used the name, or was addressed as, al-Jaber. He was born in 1968 or 1969 in Saudi Arabia, and died in Dagestan in December of 2005^[1][2], either by suicide or by Russian military action.

Al-Saif seems to have been the trustee of Arab financiers, receiving money from them through some institution in Dagestan (likely the Makhachkala office of Benevolence International Foundation, a KSA-based terrorist charity, now banned^[3]), and distributing it to paramilitary forces and terrorists across southern Russia. His predecessor in this role was Ibn al-Khattab^[1], who was also a Saudi and was also killed in Dagestan. It is possible that, after al-Saif's elimination, the Jordanian or Saudi known as Abu Hafs al-Urduni took over al-Saif's function, or tried to take it over. Al-Urduni was killed 11 months after al-Saif, again in Dagestan. BIF had been shut down by that time. Since al-Urduni's time, the Wahhabi terrorist presence in Dagestan has been completely wiped out.

In the Zelimkhan Yandarbiev's Islamic government of Chechnya Abu Omar al-Saif held the title of “chairman of the Shariah judges” and was responsible for implementation of the Islamic courts. It is unclear whether he took command of Abu al-Walid al-Ghamdi’s forces in Chechnya after the latter's death in 2004. He was known to a small extent as an ideologue and spiritual leader; one essay by him is preserved in al-Qaeda's online library called Tawhed.

Abu Omar al-Saif was suspected in Russia in connection with the 1999 apartment bombings in Moscow and Volgodonsk, and suspected of financing the 2004 Beslan school hostage crisis.

Al-Qaeda's media organ as-Sahab released a video around the third anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks; al-Saif appears in it, praising the violence of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula during the summer of 2004.

Abu Omar al-Saif wrote several articles and books, especially related to the issues of Iraq and democracy which he considered un-Islamic and idolatrous ^[4][5], and the conflict in the Caucasus which he believed could only be solved through armed Islamic Jihad^[6].

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