Algeria
Ham, Anthony. “The new face of al-Qaeda”. The Age, January 30, 2013: “With the kidnapping and murder of more than 30 Western hostages at a gas facility in the Algerian town of In Amenas earlier this month, the man who ordered the attack – a one-eyed Algerian terrorist named Mokhtar Belmokhtar – may have emerged as the man most likely to fill that void.”
Bahrain
The New York Times. “Bahrain News — The Protests”. Updated January 7, 2013: “With Saudi Arabia, the conservative bulwark of Bahrain’s ruling Sunni minority, on one side, and Iran, the aggressive champion of the Shiite majority, on the other, the question for Bahrain is whether a reconciliation process can stop the unraveling.”
Chad
Ehrenfeld, Rachel and Ken Johnson. “Al Qaeda Metastasizes in Africa and the Middle East.” Economic Warfare Institute Blog, American Center for Democracy, January 21, 2013: “Quietly and effectively the Pentagon and the CIA, with the use of U.S. Special Forces, armed Habre’s men, and hundreds of “Desert Chariots” – Toyota trucks with mounted machine guns – and light mortars made a mysterious appearance in the BET. They destroyed Qaddafi’s force at Ounanga Kebir, and within days chased Qaddafi’s Legion from northern Chad. They never returned. The region remained quiet (except for the usual decades-old internecine ethnic battles) until Qaddafi was killed in 2012.
Now, as Qaddafi had anticipated, the Arab Islamists who were suppressed by and feared Qaddafi, are posing a growing threat to Chad, and are training Islamist recruits who will be used to destabilize the government. They already been active in the Sudan’s Darfur region.”
Djibouti
U. S. Department of State. “Djibouti Country Specific Information” section “Threats to Safety and Security”: ” In particular, al-Shabaab poses a threat to U.S. citizens in Djibouti. After Djibouti announced it would join the AMISOM peacekeeping mission to Somalia, al Shabaab threatened to retaliate by launching attacks inside Djibouti. al- announced that it had formally merged with al-Qa’ida in February 2012.”
I’m being arch with Djibouti.
I wanted a “D”.
And I don’t know when State’s travel advisory was last updated.
Al Shabaab has been harried by an amalgam of agencies and armies through 2012, and may not be where it was in February of last year. On the other hand, they’re doing well enough in the field to pull this kind of stunt: ”
Al-Shabaab leaders said the deaths were an accident since the perpetrators intended to scare the youths and disburse the crowd, not kill them, according to Abdullahi Farah, a 25-year-old El Bur resident. Based on al-Shabaab’s interpretation that the two fighters were responsible as citizens and not soldiers, the militants ordered elders from the two fighters’ clan to pay punitive damages to the victims’ families in the form of 200 camels.
The clan refused to pay the damages because of the unjust nature of the order. But on January 12th, al-Shabaab arrested 17 clan elders, releasing 14 of them six days later after they agreed under duress that the three remaining elders would stay in al-Shabaab custody until the 200 camels were paid.
Source: Adam, Ali. “El Bur elders forced to pay damages for al-Shabaab killings.” Sabahi, January 28, 2013.
“E” will be easier.
Egypt
CBS News. “Egypt protests, violence continue in spite of President Morsi declaring state of emergency.” January 28, 2013: “The main opposition coalition rejected Morsi’s call for national dialogue to resolve the crisis, demanding that he first make deep concessions to break what opponents call the monopoly that Islamists have tried to impose on power. The National Salvation Front said it wouldn’t join any dialogue until Morsi forms a national unity government and begins work to rewrite parts of the Islamist-backed constitution.”
“F” really is hard. Impossible.
Guinea-Bissau
Strategy Page. “Al Qaeda in West Africa.” August 12, 2010: Counter-terrorism officials are increasingly concerned about Islamic terrorists joining forces with drug gangs. This is a problem in Afghanistan (where heroin producing gangs fund the Taliban) and Lebanon (where drug gangs work with Hezbollah). The latest point of contact is West Africa, where the African nation of Guinea-Bissau is cooperating with cocaine smugglers. Because of the South American drug gangs using Guinea-Bissau as part of their new smuggling route to Europe and the Middle East, West Africa is becoming a new source of income for al Qaeda, which guards the drug shipments moving north to European and Middle East markets. ”
While I’m sticking to Muslim-majority states on this post, it’s fair to note that the business of the Islamist terror business operates in many realms, abstract or spatial, in which what they do may be put together in secrecy. Back rooms and remote regions suffice. In the article cited, the path worked out for cocaine-based funding looks like this: Columbia –> Guinea-Bissau –> North African ports –> Europe.
“H” must go with “F” (unless I reach for the “Hashemite Kingdom” to rush the order — not a chance unless someone brings to my attention a very, very cool “J” Out There).
Iraq
Global Security News. “Shia Muslims Slaughtered in Mosque in Iraq: Fresh Carnage in Nigeria and Syria.” January 24, 2013: “In the latest attack in Iraq it is reported that at least 42 Shia Muslims have been killed inside a mosque. Yes, the same Islamists which demonstrate over a ridiculous film or cartoon, are the same Islamists which don’t mind killing Muslims in a mosque and destroying countless numbers of Korans.”
To round this entry a bit, enjoy — not the right word — these recent headlines:
“Deadly car bombings strike around Iraqi capital, Baghdad,” January 22, 2013.
“Suicide bomber kills 22 at Iraq Shi’ite mosque,” January 23, 2013.
“Two blasts, suicide attack kill 17 in Baghdad,” January 22, 2013.
Jordan
The New York Times. “Jordan”: “King Abdullah has long faced critics among urban liberals and Islamist fundamentalists who have called for change in the country’s political and economic systems. But public protests have been occurring outside of cities in tribal areas, which are part of the monarchy’s most supportive base.”
None but the king, it seems, stands between reform-minded Muslim Brotherhood, who want more Islam and subsidy, and reform-minded secularists, who want a voice that counts. Sadly, King Abdullah’s stance may be wobbling some between the forces of the medieval and those of the modern.
“In Mafraq (east of Amman), one man was killed and three more were injured, after being trampled in a fight between the supporters of two tribes, where firearms were used. This has prompted the authorities to deploy a large number of gendarmerie and guards at the city entrances and main streets, in anticipation of further violent clashes.
“In Ma’an, south of Amman, riots killed one and injured two more Wednesday evening, a day after preliminary results were announced. The city is still experiencing widespread riots that have continued since the early hours of Thursday morning, when vehicles and public institutions were burned.”
——-
I may have to get through this in two or three parts.
If there’s a point beyond noting how really bad it is with these very few but telling news items gathered in one blogger’s space, it might be that we can see it all but perhaps not engage it all: “The Islamic Small Wars”, as I have called them for some years now, may be “low intensity” in the military lingo, but a brush fire consuming a prairie might be called “low intensity” too when in fact the thing is huge.
As noted in my note on “shimmer”, the spatial or horizontal distribution is not the vertical or cultural distribution.
My associate Tammy Swofford has set as a theme for Islam-as-Borg the notion of “rising as one man” (“rise as one man”), but we have differed quite on that, for I’ve been more inclined to perceive a body of humanity associated with a religion in turmoil, and those doing the killing (and marketing cocaine and heroin to keep themselves in arms, or perhaps just ore comfortable) have very nearly at their mercy those who embrace the Koran while hating them.
It’s the not yet having fully risen to that challenge that might be most abysmal for and within the targets and victims of that aggression and its attendant narcissism and sadism.
In the more spirited anti-Jihad circles, the zealots thinking mirrors its counterpart, to wit, “if you are not Al Qaeda, you must not be Muslim — therefore you must be something else.”
Perhaps “modern” will suffice.
More importantly, perhaps this intense differentiation aligned with fear and hatred that some have hardened in their hearts won’t prevail in the definition of who is a Muslim, a Christian, or a Jew or what is Christian, Islamic, Jewish.
For the time being, molding a part of language corresponding to observation may be considered a part of “shimmer”.
While that back channel chatyping takes place, the carnage within the Ummah and associated with the Islamist presence everywhere will continue, in fact or in threat, as a constant, reliable security distraction for the whole world, but most of all for the most vulnerable and affected Muslim-majority regions.
Next: “K”.
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