Published On 16/11/2025
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Last update: 18:11 (Mecca time)
Since the young Egyptian Abdullah Ahmed Al-Homsani graduated from the Faculty of Engineering, he has not practiced any work related to the specialty “nuclear chemistry engineer” listed on his card. However, writing this specialty on his card was enough to spark a great momentum that led to his death in a hideous criminal accident in the Karmouz area in Alexandria Governorate.
Al-Homsani, who worked as a sales representative in a car dealership, was killed by a colleague, following disagreements that broke out between them, after which the perpetrator fired gunshots at the victim, causing injury that led to his death. He fled in his car, and this is what the Egyptian Interior Ministry announced in an official statement.
The branch of the Engineers Syndicate in Alexandria Governorate pre-empted the issuance of the Interior Ministry’s statement that revealed the details of the accident, by issuing a statement that appears to be a statement of condolence to the young man’s family, but the message that can be read from him is that he is trying to calm the state of controversy sparked by the killing of Al-Homsani by denying any connection to “nuclear chemistry,” even if it was written on his card.
The union explained in its statement that the victim is a graduate of the petrochemicals department at a private university, which is a specialty for which there is no separate division in the union, and is integrated with nuclear engineering in the “Chemistry and Nuclear” division, which the deceased was enrolled in. Therefore, he had no relationship with nuclear specializations, even during his studies, as the petrochemicals specialty is considered one of the branches of chemical engineering only.
However, this did not prevent the news from spreading like wildfire, joining one of these stories that derives its momentum from the stories of targeting Arab scientists working in the field of nuclear energy, some of which are surrounded by many exaggerations, but others were completely real, as experts who spoke to Al Jazeera Net said.
A positive dimension that must be invested
Although the state of momentum that accompanied that incident can be read from a negative perspective, which Dr. Abdel Nasser Tawfiq, head of the Egyptian Center for Theoretical Physics, spoke about, which is an attempt to search for a hero that does not exist and a scientific achievement that has not been achieved, it also has a positive dimension that can be exploited, which is that nuclear specializations seem to have an attractive luster in people’s minds.
Tawfiq told Al Jazeera Net, “The negative side of the story is linked to stories of questionable authenticity in Egypt, which were woven in previous eras and exploited politically, and talk about Egyptian scientists who were assassinated by intelligence agencies for being close to this nuclear zone.”
With the exception of Dr. Yahya Al-Mashad, who was assassinated in France because of his work in the Iraqi nuclear program, Tawfiq casts doubt on the authenticity of the other stories, which are not found in the scientific production of their authors with justifications, and makes their authors a target for intelligence agencies.
He added, “I am talking here about the Egyptian scientist Mustafa Mosharafa, whose brother himself denied the story of his assassination, and spoke of a natural death on January 16, 1950, and the scientist Samira Moussa, who died in a traffic accident.”
What is “nuclear” in the first place?
Tawfiq explains that awareness must be made that the word “nuclear” does not only mean military uses, because that is what most people understand, despite the existence of a national project, the “Dabaa Nuclear Reactor,” which primarily aims to employ nuclear energy for peaceful uses, the most important of which is the production of electricity.
He adds, “Such projects will need qualified young people, and I believe that the state of fascination that the word nuclear invokes can be exploited to open many departments in Egyptian universities, with greater awareness that those working in them are immune from any targeting, because they are simply users of the nuclear fuel that is supplied to them with specifications appropriate for peaceful use, and are not producers of it.”
Nuclear fuel qualified for military use is prepared in a way that allows the rapid production of intense and concentrated energy or the production of materials suitable for military use, such as isotopes that can be used in warheads, while the fuel that will be used in projects such as the Dabaa project is designed to generate heat and electricity efficiently and safely, and has not reached the degree of enrichment that would allow it to be used for military uses.
Although the Egyptian “Engineers” statement indicates that there is no stand-alone specialization in Egyptian universities that combines chemistry and nuclear, Tawfiq points out that it is taught as part of the broader specialization, which is nuclear energy. However, in his opinion, this is not sufficient because the specialization of “nuclear chemistry” is closest to the peaceful uses of nuclear energy.
He says, “It is true that some methods of enriching uranium depend on chemical means, which require this specialization. But countries that do not possess enrichment techniques desperately need it for peaceful uses of nuclear energy, including, for example, the production of isotopes for the purposes of industry and scientific research, and the production of radioactive isotopes that play a pivotal role in diagnosing and treating diseases, measuring and monitoring radiation levels, and developing policies to protect workers at nuclear power plants and the public.”
Missing wish
Dr. Maher Al-Qadi, Assistant Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of California, USA, agrees with what Dr. Tawfiq argued, regarding the necessity of investing the momentum created by the accident to strengthen awareness of the peaceful uses of nuclear energy, but he also does not deny that it expresses a citizen’s desire for us to have a nuclear capability.
The judge told Al Jazeera Net, “Recalling the stories of the past in Egypt, which are surrounded by many exaggerations about this incident, is an expression of the citizen’s adherence to the dream of possessing nuclear capability, like countries in the region that suffer economically like us, and here I mean Pakistan.”
He added, “The citizen thought that we had a project that prompted intelligence agencies to target the young engineer, which explains the interest in this incident on social media platforms, and also explains the speed with which its circumstances were revealed and a quick statement was issued announcing the arrest of the perpetrator.”
Although the judge shares this wish with the ordinary citizen, he admits that achieving it is difficult, not because of the science behind uranium enrichment, because that is no longer the problem, but because of the difficulty in possessing the equipment that helps achieve this.
He concludes, “These devices only come from specific places, and simply seeking to possess them is a message that the intelligence services understand that you are seeking to enrich uranium for military uses.”