Dancer and TikTok star shot dead outside their home by attacker 'pretending to deliver food'

A social media influencer and dancer has been shot dead outside her home, allegedly by an attacker who was pretending to deliver food.

Om Fahad was killed in Iraqi’s eastern Zayne neighbourhood on Friday (April 26). Fahad, whose real name is Ghufran Sawadi, was shot in her car by a lone person with a gun riding a motorbike, according to local news reports.

Iraq's interior ministry confirmed in a statement that a "woman known on social networking sites" had been killed by "unknown assailants". It added that a "specialised work team" had been set up to investigate the circumstances of her death.

Fahad became well-known on TikTok for sharing videos of herself dancing to pop music while wearing figure-hugging clothes, something which earned her around half a million followers. As a result of her online presence, she was sentenced to six months in prison last year for sharing videos that the court ruled undermined "modesty and public morality".

This followed the launch of a government committee to monitor social media sites for content it deemed offensive and punish those responsible for it.

CCTV supposedly showed the gunman on a motorbike riding past Fahad’s stationary car and then parking behind a nearby wall. The attacker then got off his bike and, still wearing his crash helmet, walked several metres up to the vehicle before firing shots. He then ran back to the bike and sped off. An Iraqi security source told the AFP news agency that the attacker appeared to have been pretending to be making a food delivery. The US-owned Al Hurra news agency, meanwhile, reported that another woman, said to be her assistant Nour al Suwaidi, was injured in the attack.

An investigation has been launched by the authorities into the circumstances of the killing as they try to track down the gunman. There have been no arrests so far in the case.