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Terrorism- actuality

 

Analysis

Al-Qaeda in the Maghreb (AQIM) has claimed responsibility for the attack at a hotel in Grand Bassam, Ivory Coast. The attack itself did not set any precedent. After all, radical Islamists have operated in the African continent since the 1998 bombing of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attacks as retribution for President Clinton’s campaign in Somalia in the early 90s (Restore Hope). Those attacks marked the beginning of the jihadist drift into the Sahel region from the Sahara. Indeed, the current wave of Islamist violence and AQIM itself have their very roots in the Algerian civil war that began in 1992.

Who are Al-Shabaab?

Adan Garaar, mastermind of Al-Shabaab's deadly raid on Nairobi's Westgate mall in 2013, was reportedly killed last month in Somalia by a U.S. drone strike. But the group hasn't missed a beat.

In November, it ambushed a bus in Kenya, killing everyone who couldn't recite verses of the Quran. Last week, the group raided a hotel in Mogadishu, killing a Somali diplomat and others. And earlier this week, Uganda's lead prosecutor in the trial over an Al-Shabaab massacre in Kampala in 2010 was shot dead, according to The Guardian.

This week, the Kenyan air force bombarded two al-Shabaab camps in Gedo, a Somali region on the border with Kenya. The number of kills is not known, nor is it clear what role they played in the attack in Garissa University, but it’s Kenya’s first military response after the bloody attack that killed 148 students on April 2.

The Kenyan military was retaliating against yet another brutal attack against civilians. About six months earlier, on June 16, 2014, Kenya was rocked by another brutal mass murder. On that occasion, al-Shabaab raided two hotels in the coastal town of Mpekotoni where people had gathered to watch the World Cup. Nearly 50 people, mostly civilians, were massacred by machine gun fire. The list of al-Shabaab attacks is so long that only the most recent and heinous are remembered. In Kenya everyone remembers the tragic afternoon of Saturday September 21, 2013, when al-Shabaab broke into the Westgate mall in Nairobi, killing 67 people, including 13 foreigners, and injuring 200. Somalis remember as well because, less than two months ago, militants attacked the Central Hotel in Mogadishu, frequented by Somali government officials.

Who is Al shabaab

Al-Qaeda

Terrorism

 

 

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