Mullah Muhammad Omar (Pashto: محمد عمر, romanized: Muḥammad 'Umar; c. 1950/1962 – April 2013) was an Afghan Islamic revolutionary who founded the Taliban and served as the supreme leader of Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001. After he and his government were ousted by the United States in 2001, he went into hiding and avoided capture until his reported death from tuberculosis in 2013.

Born into a religious family of Kandahar, Omar was educated at local madrasas in Afghanistan. Following the Soviet invasion in 1979, he joined the Afghan mujahideen in the Soviet–Afghan War. He served as an important military general during several skirmishes and lost his right eye in an explosion. Afterward, the Soviets withdrew in 1989 and the communist rule of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan was toppled in 1992, prompting a civil war in Afghanistan. He initially remained quiet and continued his studies, but his disapproval of the practice of bacha bazi and other fasad in the country prompted him to take part in the civil war. In 1994, Omar formed the Taliban along with religious students in Kandahar. The Taliban emerged victorious in the civil war and established the First Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, with Omar serving as the country's emir.

Omar formed an Islamic state that was headed by the Supreme Council and that enforced sharia. The state faced a period of food shortages, refugee crises, economic downturns, and devastated infrastructure, all of which caused by the twenty years of continuous warfare. Omar's regime coincided with the September 11 attacks, which were carried out by the extremist organization al-Qaeda. The United States accused the Taliban of harboring al-Qaeda and invaded Afghanistan in October 2001, with the aid of several countries and militant organizations, including the Northern Alliance. The Taliban's government was ousted by December 2001. Omar fled his hometown, concealed himself in Zabul, and delegated operational control to his deputies. Under his command, the Taliban launched an insurgency in 2004. Although Omar was the subject of a decade-long international manhunt, he remained hidden for the rest of his life. He died of tuberculosis in 2013, which was not revealed to the outside world until 2015.

Omar remains largely popular amongst the Taliban, who view him as a key freedom fighter that defended Islamic principles against the spread of Western culture in Afghanistan. On the other hand, he has been criticized for his strict government and his extremist views.