How did Mohammed Merah become a jihadist?

Mohammed Merah had plenty of stamps in his passport, according to French intelligence officials. He traveled through at least seven Middle Eastern and central Asian countries on his way to Afghanistan in 2010.

It was a meandering journey that might have been a metaphor for a young man in search of a purpose and identity. But it's also clear that by then he had been exposed to a variety of jihadist influences.

The 23-year-old Frenchman was shot dead last Thursday after being cornered by police in Toulouse. By then he had murdered seven people in a series of gun attacks.

As more details emerge about his short and troubled life, French security services are examining family and local influences on Merah, as well as trying to establish who he may have met during that trip to Afghanistan and another two-month visit to Pakistan in 2011.

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Merah certainly never made any attempt to disguise his travels. While in Pakistan in October of last year, he even contacted a French intelligence official who wanted to interview him about his previous journey, saying he was there to look for a wife.

"As soon as I get back, I will contact you," he told his contact, according to Bernard Squarcini, the head of DRCI -- France's domestic security service.

After being hospitalized with hepatitis upon his return, Merah eventually sat down with French investigators, bringing a USB drive with photographs of what he said was his touristic journey across the regon.

But as the standoff unfolded in Toulouse last week, Merah told a very different story -- boasting to French police that he had been trained by al Qaeda in Waziristan, the tribal area of Pakistan where many European jihadists have gone. Merah said he had been trained by a solo instructor rather than in a camp because he would have stood out as a French speaker. But he also said there were other French militants in Waziristan, according to Squarcini.

He also claimed that "brothers in Pakistan" had supplied him with funds, helping him buy what he said were 20,000 euros (about $26,600) worth of weapons for his attacks. French police believe it is more likely he raised the funds through a series of temporary jobs and petty crime.

But who, if anyone, trained Merah? Was his rambling confession during the siege the invention of a young man with what his attorney calls signs of a "dual personality?" Or did his skill as a gunman suggest training somewhere?

"He's a Janus, two-faced. You have to go back to his broken childhood and psychiatric troubles. To carry out what he did smacks more of a medical problem and fantasy than a simple jihadist trajectory," Squarcini told the newspaper, Le Monde.