Abu Anas al-Shami was known as Omar Yusef Juma'a prior to joining Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's Jama'at al-Tawhid wal Jihad group in Iraq.

Originally from the Palestinian West Bank town of Tulkarm, Abu Anas moved with his family to Jordan, then Saudi Arabia, and later, Kuwait. He obtained an Islamic studies degree at Medina University in Saudi Arabia. He then returned to Jordan to preach Salafiyah theology at an Amman mosque. In the mid-1990's he went to Bosnia-Herzegovina where he truly embraced radicalism. He then returned to Jordan to found a radical fundamentalist outreach center. In the late 1990s, the Jordanian officials shut down an Islamic center that al-Shami had established in Amman on the grounds that it was promoting a fanatical interpretation of Islam.

In 2003, al-Shami joined Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in Northeastern Iraq. He was appointed to the advisory council of al-Tawheed wal-Jihad and soon became Zarqawi's second in command.

Sheik Abu Anas al-Shami was reportedly killed September 23, 2004 by a U.S. missile strike on the car he was travelling in in the west Baghdad suburb of Abu Ghraib.

Other reports indicate al-Shami was captured by U.S. forces and is being held for interrogation.

Al- Shami had been sent by Zarqawi to the Shiite Sadr City area of Baghdad to install an Al-Qaeda team to recruit former Mehdi Army militiamen looking for leadership following Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr’s defeat in Najaf.