Singaporean ISIS militant challenges Prince Harry to a fight in new propaganda video
A Singaporean member of the Islamic State terror group has appeared in a recent video challenging British royal Prince Harry to a fight and threatening to send him "to hellfire."
In the three-and-a-half-minute video, a man who identified himself as Abu Uqayl lambasted the prince for coming to Singapore to speak about the London Bridge terror attack.
"To Harry, you come to Singapore and tell such stories to gain sympathy for the London terror attacks? Why don't you come here and fight us if you're man enough, so that we can send you and your Apaches to hellfire?" the militant said as reported by Independent.
Harry, who served in the British Army and flew Apache attack helicopters in Afghanistan, made a two-day visit to Singapore in June, just days after the London Bridge attack, in which three men used a van to mow down a crowd in on the iconic bridge before going on a knife rampage at Borough Market.
During the visit, the prince was seen bowing his head as an Islamic scholar commemorated the families of the seven victims of the attack.
Singaporean authorities have identified the man in the video as 39-year-old Megat Shahdan bin Abdul Samad, who left the city-state in 2014 to work in the Middle East.
"Our security agencies have been aware for some time now of the presence in Syria of a Singaporean, Megat Shahdan bin Abdul Samad, 39, and have been monitoring his activities," the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said in a statement. "It is believed that the person in the video calling himself 'Abu Uqayl' is Shahdan," it continued.
The militant also called on would-be jihadis to fight for ISIS in Asia, the Middle East and Africa.
According to the MHA, Shahdan was in and out of jail between 1997 and 2009 for drug-related crimes, but he did not show any radical tendencies during that period.
During his time in the Middle East, he took up different jobs in tourism and renovation, and tried unsuccessfully to launch his own business.
The MHA noted that during that time, family members who visited him noticed that he had become more observant of his religion and that he had shown signs of becoming radicalized by ISIS' ideology.
In September that year, Shahdan reportedly traveled to Syria to join the extremist group. While he was in the ISIS-controlled territory in Syria and Iraq, he reportedly dispensed religious advice to his family and exhorted them to support the terror group. "None of them is known to have responded to his overtures," the MHA noted.