The synagogue killer, Jihad al Shamie, radicalised himself after searching online for videos of the Islamic State terror group, according to a friend.
The man, Qas, said al Shamie “started using [encrypted messaging app] Telegram and searching for ISIS videos.
“Once, he even tried to show me one at the shisha lounge. I told him to go away and asked how he even got access to that content, and he said it was through Telegram. After that, I didn’t see him for a long time until I heard what had happened.”
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Another friend, Asim, told Sky News he met al Shamie through their shared interest in computers. He said he noticed a difference in al Shamie a year ago.
Asim said al Shamie “changed a bit, I felt his thoughts were a bit too radical for me. He was a nice guy, very quiet and softly-spoken. I was shocked about what he did.
“He started asking me for money – not small amounts, but thousands,” Asim explained.
“When I refused, he became angry. I’d never seen that side of him before.”
Earlier this year, al Shamie was working as a call handler for the RAC motoring organisation.
He was employed through an agency as a part-time temp from December to the end of March, when he was no longer needed.
Last year, al Shamie had money problems and was subject to a government debt relief order, which meant that his debts would be paid off in a year if he agreed to certain restrictions.
Money appeared to be one of many problems.
A former friend of al Shamie described how he became increasingly withdrawn and “in his own world” after a steroid addiction had led to heavier drug use. They said his behaviour became strange and unpredictable.
“I once noticed on his phone that he had several notifications from dating apps, which confused me because I knew he was married,” the friend said.
“You could be having a normal conversation with him, and suddenly he would flip and start ranting. I eventually blocked him.”
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Multiple marriages and ‘obsessed’ with dating app
It’s believed the terrorist married several wives in Islamic wedding ceremonies, one of them even before he split up from the mother of his young child.
He reportedly became obsessed with an Islamic dating app, and sent abusive messages to an ex-girlfriend, hit her and told her to dress more conservatively during their brief on-off relationship.
The woman, who was 18 at the time, told the Manchester Evening News: “He used to say ‘I want you to be dedicated to the cause’, and he used to sit there and make me watch videos, like extreme videos, that I had no interest in.
“I am Muslim and of course I love to learn more, but this stuff were things that I have been raised to not agree with. He used to always say I was taught the wrong way and I wasn’t taught right. He was basically just trying to groom me into what he thought.”
She said he would message girls on his Muzmatch – now Muzz – dating app, using false names such as Valentino and Ahmed.
“He kept getting banned because of his speech and what he was sending,” she said.
“There were times when he would send me videos of him with other girls, and the girls were quite young.”
‘Rape fantasies’
The woman said al Shamie told her he had “rape fantasies”, and that he “used to say weird stuff, it was just insane. I can’t believe I stayed as long as I did”.
His marriage collapsed after he secretly wed an NHS nurse, a widow, who had converted to Islam.
A neighbour, Geoff Halliwell, who cleaned the family’s windows for many years at their home in Prestwich, told Sky News al Shamie had lived there with his wife and young child, but he believed left six months earlier.
Mr Halliwell said: “There was the mother and three lads, but one moved away. We’re talking about the eldest, he had a wife and kid, but she moved out some time ago.
“There was no sign of radicalisation, nothing like that. We never talked politics. Just ‘good morning, how are you? Lovely day, isn’t it?’
“He was fine, the whole thing has come out of the blue. He was a smashing lad to talk to, so were the other two lads.”
Mr Halliwell said the father left the family home about 10 years ago, but sometimes visited.
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He thought he had moved to France because sometimes he turned up in a French-registered car.
Faraj al Shamie, a trauma surgeon who has worked for the International Committee of the Red Cross in Africa, condemned his son’s attack on the synagogue.
He said in a statement: “The al Shamie family in the UK and abroad strongly condemns this heinous act, which targeted peaceful, innocent civilians. We fully distance ourselves from this attack and express our deep shock and sorrow over what has happened.”
But, two years ago, on 7 October, he praised the actions of Hamas terrorists for their attack on Israel in which 1,200 were killed and 251 taken back to Gaza as hostages.
Al Shamie wrote on Facebook: “The scenes broadcast by the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades of a group of fighters storming an Israeli army camp using simple means, namely balloons and motorcycles, prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Israel will not remain.”
Additional reporting by Shakir Ahmed, specialist producer and Rebecca Spencer, crime producer
