Amin al-Haj Ahmad
In September 2018, Italian authorities learned from Lebanese authorities that Muhammad Hassan al-Haj Ahmad, an Islamic State militant, had been arrested and accused of devising a plan to contaminate a water tank from which the Lebanese army was supplied. During interrogation, he stated that his cousin Amin al-Haj Ahmad was also an IS affiliate who re-enacted a chemical agent attack in Sardinia, where he had lived with his family for years.
Muhammad Hassan explained to the Lebanese authorities that he approached the Islamic State in 2014 at the urging of Abu Adam El Makdessi, his relative who was already a member of the terrorist organisation. Initially, its activities were limited to online, proselytising, and disseminating propaganda on social networks. Later, on the instructions of other IS members, he became interested in artisanal techniques for producing nasty substances such as ricin and anthrax.
In April 2018, with the help of his cousin Amin, who was in Lebanon at the time, Muhammad Hassan tried to synthesise ricin to use in the aforementioned terrorist plan. However, although he followed the instructions for synthetisation, the substance proved ineffective. Therefore, the following month, Amin returned to Sardinia from Beirut.
In another questioning by the Lebanese authorities, Muhammad Hassan stated that his cousin Amin had embraced jihadist ideology since 2013. However, at that time, he was uncertain whether to join Islamic State or Jabhat al-Nusra. So, after clashes with an affiliate of the latter organisation, Amin decided to join IS, partly because of some acquaintances within a refugee camp in Lebanon that had particularly influenced him.
According to Muhammad Hassan’s statements, Amin was interested in producing ricin. The latter had asked his cousin to get him some castor bean plant seeds needed to make the poisonous substance. After returning from Lebanon to Italy in May 2018, Amin contacted his cousin to get valuable suggestions on how to plan an action to contaminate some foods with ricin powder during a public event in Sardinia. At the end of the statements, however, Muhammad Hassan could not state whether his cousin could synthesise the poisonous substance.
More specifically, Amin al-Haj was a Palestinian refugee of Saudi origin living for years with his Moroccan wife and three children in Macomer (NU), 500 meters from a Sassari Brigade Barracks.
Sometime before his arrest, Amin withdrew all the money from his bank account, desperately searching for his passport, which he had probably misplaced, a circumstance that hinted at an impending attack and subsequent escape.
On Nov. 28, 2018, Amin was arrested by Italian authorities as he probably intended to contaminate some foodstuffs with ricin powder during a public event or to dissolve ricin in the drinking water pipes of the city where he lived.
In February 2020, the Cagliari Assize Court issued an order revoking the imprisonment for two reasons: first, the cousin Muhammad Hassan withdrew the charges he had declared to the Lebanese authorities when questioned by the Italian authorities, and second, no poisonous substance was found during the search.
Shortly after his release from prison, the Sassari Police Headquarters detained Amin and subsequently sent him to the Repatriation Centre in Rome with a deportation order. A few days later, the Justice of the Peace of Rome decided not to validate the detention in the Repatriation Centre and restored Amin’s freedom.
Finally, in November 2022, the Cagliari Assize Court acquitted Amin of charges of being a member of the Islamic State organisation and planning a terrorist attack to be carried out in Macomer.
