Nasser al-Bahri, Saudi-born Yemeni Islamist militant and bodyguard, Died at 43

Nasser al-Bahri was born in 1972 and died on December 26, 2015.

He was a Saudi-born Yemeni Islamist militant and bodyguard

Nasser was also known by his kunya or nom de guerre as Abu Jandal – “father of death”.

Al-Bahri was a citizen of Yemen.

al-Bahri was a member of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan from 1996 to 2000.

Nasser gave his bayat (secret oath of allegiance) to Osama bin Laden in 1998, an experience he describes in detail in his memoir.

Allegedly al-Bahri was in al-Qaeda for four years, first as one of bin Laden’s twelve bodyguards, and then as head of Osama bin Laden’s security detail.

Al-Bahri was radicalized in his teens by dissident Saudi Ulemas and participated in clandestine political activities which were funded in part by people trafficking.

Nasser became a jihadist he went first to Bosnia and then, briefly, to Somalia before arriving in Afghanistan in 1996 in the hope of joining Al-Qaeda, which he soon did.

After Nasser first four years, al-Bahri became “disillusioned”, largely because bin Laden consolidated al-Qaeda’s relationship with the Taliban by giving his bayat to its leader, Mullah Omar.

Because he had married and become a father.

After his return to Yemen in 2000, he was taken into custody by the authorities and held for two years without trial. He agreed to abide by the parole conditions of a Yemeni jihadist rehabilitation program directed by judge Hamoud al-Hitar.

During his time there Nasser had to accept more education about Islam, as well as discuss his new and old ideas about jihad with the judge and younger students.

Reportedly, he said that he was no longer a member of al-Qaeda, but that he supported the organization for some of its beliefs.

Nasser al-Bahri married, Tayssir, in 1999, and they had four children.

Bin laden gave him orders that Al-Bahri and Salim Ahmed Hamdan married sisters, and became brothers-in-law.

Hamdan had returned back to Yemen in November 2008 after he was imprisoned by the United States in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp and being convicted on a charge in 2008.

He was captured in Afghanistan and detained by the United States, Salim Ahmed Hamdan was the first detainee tried under the military tribunals and took his case to the United States Supreme Court in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld (2006).

After appealing his conviction, Salim Ahmed Hamdan was acquitted in October 2012 by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

Nasser al-Bahri passed away at 43 yrs old due to illnesses.