Tag Archives: Kenya

Hotel Attack Shows Al Shabaab Maintains Terror Capability Despite Setbacks

Al-Shabaab blasted their way into the compound of Maku-Mukarramah Hotel in Mogadishu last Friday afternoon. Four gunmen stormed the very popular hotel filled with government officials shortly after a suicide bomber detonated a car filled with explosives at the gate. An unknown number of government officials were taken hostage within the hotel. It is speculated that Al-Shabaab was conducting an operation targeting what they consider to be the “apostate” internationally backed government in Mogadishu. The following was released by the Al-Shabaab spokesman Sheikh Abdiasis Musab on Friday afternoon:

“We are behind the Hotel Maka Al Mukaram attack, and fighting is still going on inside.”

It is reported that the death toll had risen to at least 21 people, including the death of Somalia’s ambassador to Switzerland. Police had the building surrounded and were not able to advance any further due to heavy gunfire coming from the roof of the hotel. Somali Special Forces arrived, stormed the hotel and caused the surrender of all four Al-Shabaab extremists that had control over the hostages. Somali Government spokesperson Ridwan Abdiwali confirmed the apprehension of all 4 Al-Shabaab members.

This attack was in retaliation for the capture of an Al-Shabaab commander, three other jihadists, and the successful raid of an Al-Shabaab hideout in Northern Mogadishu by security forces on Thursday, a senior Somali intelligence officer said.

The Al Shabaab leader in question is believed to be responsible for several high profile bombings and assassination attempts.

This coordinated attack is the latest in Al-Shabaab’s effort to reclaim Mogadishu and the surrounding towns ever since being driven out by African Union forces with assistance from United States. Despite major military setbacks in 2014, Al-Shabaab remains a constant threat in Somalia, capable of carrying out high profile attacks despite lost territory.

Last month, Somali’s deputy prime minister was injured during the detonation of a Vehicle Borne Explosive Device outside the Central Hotel in Mogadishu. Shortly thereafter, a suicide bomber targeted a separate hotel killing four people.

In September 2013, Al-Shabaab stormed the Westgate Mall in Nairobi, detonating bombs and shooting civilians that led to the death of 67 people. The Westgate mall had been built as an Israeli symbol of new prosperity in Africa. The jihadists who raided the mall were hand-picked by the late Al-Shabaab chief Ahmed Godane.

Al-Shabaab gunmen stormed a quarry in Kenya executing 36 non-Muslims in December 2014.

These attacks confirm the accuracy of a U.N. report issued in July that suggested Al-Shabaab “had shifted its strategic posture to asymmetrical warfare in both urban centers and the countryside.”

Despite having U.S. and allied forces having successfully targeted a number of Al Shabaab senior leadership in recent months, the jihadist group continues to maintain the ability to carry out substantial, coordinated attacks both in Somalia proper and cross-border in Kenya.

Kenya Seeks Negotiations With Al-Shabaab; Terrorist Group Considers Offer

In the wake of a March 13 attack targeting the convoy of a Kenyan state governor, for which Somalia-based Islamic terrorist group Al-Shabaab claimed responsibility, Adan Bare Dualle, the Kenyan national assembly majority leader, has asked to negotiate with the militant group to stop any further attacks on Kenyan soil.

Gunmen attacked the convoy of Ali Roba, governor of Mandera in northern Kenya, along the Kenya-Somalia border. While Mr. Roba was unharmed, three police officers and a regional elder were killed, at least six others were injured, and a vehicle was hijacked.

This incident is the most recent of numerous other terrorist acts carried out by Al-Shabaab both in Somalia and neighboring Kenya. The Islamist group has declared a jihad against Kenyan authorities and heavily targeted the country since the beginning of this decade when Kenya started training and fighting alongside Somali troops to fight Al-Shabaab.

It appears that Dualle, who is an important figure in Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta’s government, has had enough of the violence. He has asked Al-Shabaab to stop attacks in Northeastern Kenya, where many Somalis live, and said Kenya is ready to negotiate.

It is unclear what the exact terms of a negotiation would be beyond Al-Shabaab ceasing terrorist activity in Kenya, but the jihadist organization has said it will continue attacks while Kenyan troops remain in Somalia. Dualle told BBC Somalia, “We tell our Al-Shabaab brothers whatever you demand in Somalia is yours, but leave us alone in Kenya.”

Al-Shabaab responded positively to Dualle’s proposal, indicating the group would examine the offer and be open to a dialogue, but only if this negotiation plan was the official position of the Kenyan government. It seems unlikely, however, that potential negotiations would change the situation on the ground for Al-Shabaab or the Kenyan government.

Kenyan Pastors Ask for Firearms in Midst of Al-Shabaab War

Last week in Mombasa, Kenya, gunmen shot and killed George Karidhimba Muriki, assistant pastor of the Maximum Revival Ministries Church, outside of the Mvita Primary School. Those who killed the pastor are believed to be members of Al-Shabaab, an al-Qaeda-allied Islamist terror group based in neighboring Somalia.

In the wake of this attack, Kenyan pastors have publicly called for the right to carry firearms to defend themselves against “religious opponents.” This request for arms is not new as Bishop Lambert Mbela of the Redeemed Gospel Church lobbied for the same cause in 2013 after the killing of two other pastors. This time in 2015, MacDonald Kitwa and Jeremiah Goodison, two other Kenyan church members, joined Mbela to meet with Mombasa Deputy County Commissioner, Salim Mahmoud, to discuss the gun issue. But Alice Wahome, a member of the Administration and National Security Committee in Kenya’s National Assembly, rejected the pastors’ plea to bear arms citing a likely increase in lawlessness throughout Kenya as the reason.

It is unclear how this “right to bear arms” debate will end, but it is apparent that religious fighting in Kenya will only intensify. The militant Al-Shabaab group has waged war against the militaries of Kenya, Somalia, and the African Union for years now. The Islamic extremist group has political ambitions for Kenya, but no matter what the political situation, the religious motivation will remain.

Kenya became a more central focal point of this conflict at the beginning of this decade when its military starting training Somali troops to combat Al-Shabaab’s presence in Somalia. Later, Kenyan troops crossed the border to meet with Somali military officials and sent personnel to directly assist in Somalia’s struggle with Al-Shabaab. As a result, the Islamic extremist group has declared a jihad against Kenyan authorities and those Kenyans who are not Muslim and would not adhere to the imposition of Sharia law.

What makes this conflict more difficult for Kenya is that about 10% of its population is Muslim, some of who are influential clerics actively helping Al-Shabaab. Some of these individuals preach Al-Shabaab’s talking points that they are right to wage this war against Kenya and to use terror tactics and other violence against civilians. Many young Muslims in Kenya are being indoctrinated in this way and are at least sympathetic, if not actively helping, Al-Shabaab. Beyond religious zealotry, Al-Shabaab found a simpler way to reach local Muslims: money. They have bribed young Muslims in poor areas to join their cause.

Thus, Kenya is facing both an internal and external security problem. There is the threat on the other side of the border in Somalia where Al-Shabaab is based (and, of course, coming into Kenya to carry out attacks), and a homegrown problem where the substantial-enough upcoming generation of Kenyan Muslims are being radicalized. Bribing those Muslims who live in poor neighborhoods does not hurt in this endeavor, either. Kenya is facing a complex situation, and unless the authorities can better combat terror, locals may seek their own means to defend themselves like the Kenyan pastors’ request for arms.

Charlie Hebdo Began a Month Ago for Kenya

In terms of body counts, Africans suffer the most in the jihad against the West.

In this third day of mayhem since the attack on the Charlie Hebdo editorial office, media outlets have learned more about the al Qaeda links and personal networks of the Kaouchi brothers who carried out the executions.  We are all watching how different parts of Western society try to process and explain the nature and motivations of the Al Qaeda connected attacks.  In the interest of being specific, Cherif and Said Kaouchi in their minds, were executing justice under the system of law they were raised to understand as moral.  They were not crazy.  They were behaving rationally within a belief system in which the freedom expressed by Charlie Hebdo is defined as an injustice.  The editors at Charlie Hebdo were executed being found in violation of Islamic Law by assets of al Qaeda.

Politicians and media pundits describe the attacks on a spectrum ranging from ‘retaliation against the secular war on Muslims in France’ to ‘an attack against civilization, freedom, and Western values.’  Those who take the trouble to be precise, do a fair treatment on political Islam or Sharia law.   Here is the problem.  As pundits and media on the left and right recount the short list of such attacks against the West, they include the series of car attacks on crowds in France, the hostage crisis in Sydney, the lone shooter at the Canadian Parliament, and the Synagogue slayings in Jerusalem.  These are mostly places which are geographically in the West. Yet, 2000 Nigerians were slain by Boko Haram this past week.  In late November of last year, just over a month ago, al Shabaab gunmen boarded a bus and shot and beheaded those who could not cite the Koran or answer Koranic trivia questions.  Twenty eight Kenyan lives were taken specifically because they were not Muslims.  Then, a week later, thirty six quarry workers were shot and beheaded after being sorted out and exterminated as non-Muslims.  The front lines of Western civilization are in Africa and the war is hot.

The media coverage of Kenya’s counter terrorism efforts often betray an elitist or even racist double standard in the European press.  They portray al Shabaab’s recruiters of Kenyan youth as victims of authoritarian government, giving them the false legitimacy of moral equivalence.  The fact is that many African democracies find themselves in a bloody terrorist war amidst other challenges of governance without the benefit of inheriting a secure and stable democracy from long dead ancestors as their critics in the press do.  The fact remains that the likes of Said and Cherif Kaouchi are causing tragic suffering on a large scale in Kenya, Nigeria, Sudan, South Sudan, Algeria, Libya, Uganda, and Somalia.  The victims of the jihad in Baga, Nigeria, and Mandera, Kenya should be mourned by the West alongside the satirists of Charlie Hebdo.  Their deaths equally symbolize the threat to freedom everywhere.

United Nations Convoy Targeted by Al-Shabaab

A day after the group slaughtered 36 quarry workers in the Kenyan town of Mandera, Al-Shabaab carried out a car bomb attack against a United Nations convoy near the airport at Mogadishu. Although no United Nations officials were injured or killed, a Somali military intelligence officer was killed as he attempted to stop the truck carrying the explosives as well as other innocent bystanders. The airport is used as a hub for several international diplomatic missions. It is where several U.N. staffers are housed, and is a base of operations for nearly 22,000 African Union troops. Sheik Abdiasis Abu Musab, the Al-Qaeda linked terror group’s military operations spokesman stated the following after the group claimed responsibility for the attack, “Our Mujahideen (fighters) based in Mogadishu have today targeted a convoy of foreign mercenaries and their apostate allies nearby the airport.” In February, the group carried out a similar attack on another United Nations convoy, this one killing six people including Somali security guards.

Al-Shabaab is seeking to establish a Somali state that adheres to a strict interpretation of Islamic law, better known as Shariah. However, in the past year alone, Al-Shabaab has been very active in East Africa as well. Last month, Al-Shabaab ambushed a bus in route to Nairobi and killed 28 passengers who refused to recite verses of the Quran. In September, Ugandan police arrested 19 suspected members of the group who were believed to be preparing to execute suicide missions in Kampala in retaliation for Uganda’s assistance in targeting the group’s deceased leader Ahmed Godane. Al-Shabaab vowed to step up its attacks in retaliation for Godane’s death, and has been doing so with no end in sight.

Kenya’s Fourth Generation War with Al Shabaab

The war between Al Shabaab Islamists and the conventional militaries of Kenya, Somalia, and the African Union is a fourth generation war.  It is part conventional, part terrorism, and part propaganda.  It is also primarily religious though it has political trappings.  Why such a distinction?  The religious goals and the violent goals will remain whether the political goals are ever met or not.  The media reports raids on Al Shabaab fighters as military operations.  Al Shabaab attacks against Kenyan civilians are reported as terrorist attacks.  However, the scope and dimension of the conflict also plays out in other forms such as legal, cultural, and religious.

The language of ‘generational warfare’ allows military strategists to have an approach for new categories as new dimensions to the nature of violent conflicts evolve.  Terrorism, political protest, information warfare, and ideology are some of the categories that emerge in the blurry lines between fourth and fifth generational warfare.  In an extensive breakdown of the present and future centers of gravity in warfare, Lt. Col. Stanton Coerr in the Marine Corp Gazette penned back in 2009 that radical Islam would be the unifying force for fifth generation warfare violence.  As the Islamist’s war plays out in Kenya, analysts and the media alike shouldn’t lose site of the fact that the broad context is still in the simplest category, a war.  Violence and killing will be countered.

In 2012, Aboud Rogo Mohammed was killed in a drive by shooting.  Rogo was a major figure in the Muslim community, sanctioned by the UN for supporting Al Qaeda militants, and the lead recruiter of Kenyan youth for Islamist violence whether for Al Shabaab or Al Qaeda.   Rogo was the primary ideological leader of Kenya’s al-Hijra group, or the Muslim Youth Centre, which is a close ally of al-Shabaab.   Kenya’s police don’t have a legal framework to identify those like Rogo as legitimate military targets and it is believed by his followers that his assassination was an extra-judicial killing.

In fact, Rogo’s successor Abubaker Shariff Ahmed (who went by the name Makaburi meaning ‘grave digger’) argued that Kenyan civilians are legitimate military targets and promoted the recruitment of Kenyan youth to Shabaab and Al Qaeda as both legitimate military activity and proper Islamic practice.  Makaburi believed there is no ‘moderate Islam’ and truly moderate clerics have been assassinated for preaching against violence in Kenya by Al Shabaab.  Makaburi met a similar fate to Rogo in April 2014.  The old Cold War term, ‘dupe’, best describes journalists whom, today, headline stories of this type as ‘death squads of a shadow war.’  Such characterizations are understandable but insufficient in context.

Recent, violence has broken out in Mombassa as police pursue a policy of raiding the late Rogo’s mosques, calling them crime scenes as the mosques serve to hide weapon caches.  One person was shot while trying to throw a grenade at the police.  In retaliation, mobs of youth committed random acts of murder with machetes.

On Saturday, November 22, Al Shabaab soldiers hijacked a bus in the province of Mandera, Kenya near the border of Somalia.  Al Shabaab claims the bus attack was retaliation for the crack down on the mosque recruiting centers.  All non-Muslims passengers were shot in the head.  Like the Westgate Mall attack, where those who could recite the Koran or name Mohammad’s niece were spared, this action caries an ideological and religious message and communicates religious intent.  In response to the Mandera attack, civilians in the region are fleeing to a local air base and demanding that the government evacuate civil servants.  Kenyans in Nairobi are protesting in the street for improved security.

In June, attacks on the town of Mpeketoni and Mporomooko on the eastern coast killed 60 people.  In Likoni, terrorists raided a church and killed six people.  They left a bullet lodged in the head of two-year-old baby.  Despite such a season of violence against civilians in Kenya, the western media consistently runs headlines on the heavy handedness of Kenya security forces and often gives ink and microphones to all who either defend al Shabaab or criticize police and military action so long as they identify as human rights activists.  Such intensity of violence in their own communities will likely never allow the Kenyan government to satisfy western media in its security practices.  This will intern serve Al Shabaab’s media apparatus.  Al Shabaab’s human rights dupes will use the legal system to limit tactical options for security forces.  Kenya’s efforts to strive for rule of law will suffer for trying to establish security in the midst of a fourth generation war.