What flydubai FZ1073 attacker Hamam al-Hammami’s deleted posts said about women, work and niqab
A LinkedIn profile in the name of Hamam al-Hammami, the Omani co-pilot accused in the flydubai attack, listed his job history. CNN also found deleted posts and videos linked to him.
A FlyDubai aircraft carrying Israelis who experienced an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia is seen parked at Ben Gurion International Airport, near Tel Aviv, Israel. (Photo: AP)
In the days since an attack on a flydubai flight heading for Tel Aviv, attention has turned to the man accused of carrying it out. Hamam al-Hammami, the Omani co-pilot accused of attacking Indian pilot Captain Smit Machchhar, left behind deleted social media posts that give a view into what he wrote about women, religion and mixed-gender workplaces.
An analysis of nearly 3,000 now-deleted tweets from 2021 and 2022 showed the Omani pilot was deeply religious and misogynistic, according to CNN. The tweets were studied using an AI-powered search tool and are now part of a wider picture.
He was removed from his previous job at Oman’s national airline last year following concerns about his extremist views, the report said. A LinkedIn profile linked to Al-Hammami has also surfaced which showed him working in Oman Air for seven years. However, there was no mention of flydubai.
UAE has also opened an investigation into whether the attack was linked to terrorist activity.
What the deleted tweets say
In a LinkedIn post from February 2022, he wrote about how hard it was for his mother to find him a wife who would accept his conditions. She had to wear a niqab, a face covering, and stop working after marriage. Families refused, he wrote, until his mother told them “My son is a pilot”. Then they agreed.
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Other posts argued against mixed-gender workplaces. A post from January 2022 asked how many religious women had been ruined in such settings, and the posts claimed that these workplaces corrupt women.
Two posts went up on the LinkedIn profile on Wednesday, about nine hours after the incident. It is unclear who published them or whether they were scheduled in advance. One source confirmed to CNN that the profile belongs to the pilot.
A plane takes off as a flydubai aircraft sits on the tarmac at Dubai International Airport in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. (AP Photo)
The first post was a video of clips filmed in Boeing 737 Max cockpits, including planes of the Israeli airlines El Al and Arkia. It ended with photos of Ayman al-Zawahiri, who led al Qaeda after Osama bin Laden’s death, and Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, who killed nine people in a 2009 suicide bombing and was loyal to al Qaeda. The second post was an AI-generated image of Islam’s three holiest sites, with a poem about rejecting humiliation and not fearing death.
His career and the Oman concern
The LinkedIn profile said he worked at Oman Air for seven years and left in February 2025. It said he joined Royal Air Maroc in June 2025 and left in January 2026. An Israeli official said he had worked for flydubai for only eight months.
A regional diplomat said he was taken off flight training because of concerns about his radical views and was given another role at the airline. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday the suspect was believed to have gone through “Islamist radical indoctrination”.
What investigators are doing
Israeli agencies, including Shin Bet and Mossad, are looking into how an Omani citizen, from a country that does not recognise Israel, came to be part of the crew. The UAE attorney general’s investigation covers whether there was any prior planning or direction, state news agency WAM reported.
Investigations are ongoing to determine the circumstances of the incident, the motives and any related connections, as well as to examine physical and digital evidence, he added.
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A FlyDubai aircraft carrying Israelis who experienced an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia is seen parked at Ben Gurion International Airport, near Tel Aviv, Israel. (Photo: AP) 
