American jihad: Facing up to homegrown militancy

The town of Daphne in the state of Alabama is one of the last places you would associate with violent jihad.

It is a place of ease and comfort, tidy and prosperous. Large houses sit well back from the road, sprawling lazily in the trees in the warm spring sunshine. In front of many homes and shops the Stars and Stripes hangs, barely moving in the late afternoon stillness.

Here Omar Hammami grew up, an all-American boy, baptised and church-going.

Here he discarded his upbringing and religion and turned to an ever more orthodox Islam.

And here he began a journey that has taken him to the wilds of Somalia, and a high profile position in al-Shabab, the brutal Islamist insurgent group.

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