Two British medical students have been killed after quitting their studies and going to fight with Islamic State terrorists.
Ahmed Sami Khider (pictured above), from London, and Hisham Fadlallah, originally from Nottinghamshire, are understood to have died over the weekend, the BBC has learnt.
Both men were of Sudanese origin and part of a wave of around 20 students to have joined Islamic State after going to study at the University of Medical Sciences and Technology (UMST) in Khartoum, Sudan.
Mr. Khider was reportedly killed when a convoy he was in left the war-torn city of Mosul, Iraq, and was hit by gunfire. It is not known if Mr. Fadlallah was killed in the same incident.
The pair travelled to Islamic State territory with nine others (seven British) from UMST in March 2015. They were among at least 14 Brits, many of them the children of British-Sudanese doctors, to have made the trip from the institution.
Tarik Hassane, 22, who was jailed last year for an Islamic State-funded drive-by shooting plot in London, also studied there, The Times reports.
On their website, UMST claims to be “a leading institute established in 1996 to meet the educational needs of Sudanese, African and Arab students”.
Mr. Khider, the son of a doctor, was privately educated at Whitgift School in Croydon before graduating in medicine at the university in Khartoum in July 2014.
The following year, he left the country to join the terror group. He appeared in one of their propaganda videos in June 2015, where he told doctors it was their duty as Muslims to join him.
Calling himself Abu Amir al-Muhajir, he said: “As the media would like to tell you, things are pretty chaotic here but what I’ve come to see here is there’s actually a really good medical service being provided; lots of hospitals, lots of services…
“I came here and I found good people… We as Muslims and as doctors, we have a great responsibility to help these people. All you are doing is sitting in the West in the comfort of your homes. Use your skills and come here.”
According to the BBC, the terrorist’s parents had travelled to Khartoum for a period of “mourning”.
Friends have claimed he drank beer at school, smoked marijuana, and was an academic high achiever. He was said to have become more devout in 2013 whilst at university.
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