While traveling through Aleppo in late 1994, Mohamed Atta met a young Palestinian woman named Amal
Atta was visiting Syria as part of an archaeological and town-planning expedition alongside his German university professor, Dittmar Machule, and fellow student Volker Hauth.
Amal was employed at a local urban planning bureau. Because Atta was heavily invested in studying urban planning and the preservation of ancient Islamic architecture at the Technical University of Hamburg, the two spent significant time interacting through their shared professional interests.
Atta became strongly attracted to Amal. The feeling appeared mutual. Amal famously teased Atta's serious demeanor with a half-admiring joke, telling him, "All Egyptians are Pharaohs."
Despite his strong attraction to her, Atta ultimately rejected pursuing a relationship or marriage. Atta confessed that she was simply "too emancipated." He stated with a sense of regret that her modern, westernized lifestyle and independent mindset did not fit the submissive, traditional role he demanded of a woman.
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In late 1999, after returning to Egypt from Germany, Atta entered into an arranged engagement orchestrated by his father and a local family in Cairo.
According to statements later made by Atta's father, the two individuals reportedly liked each other, but the marriage never took place.
Atta was already heavily radicalized and deep into the planning phases of the al-Qaeda Hamburg cell, eventually leaving for Afghanistan shortly after.
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