Hot Zone Flashback: African al-Qaida?

In a stunning series of events, a council of Islamists has wrested power from secular warlords in Somalia. Last September, Kevin Sites interviewed the man who now has been tapped to lead the council, hardline cleric Sheik Hassan Dahir Aweys.

NOTE: In this story, originally posted Sept. 27, 2005, Kevin Sites examined Islamic fundamentalism in Somalia, asking, "What will grow from Somalia's anarchy? Have America's tactics boosted the chance for an Islamic state, a base for al-Qaida or both?

That question has been partially answered. In early June, an Islamic council seized power from U.S.-backed secular warlords. And on Sunday, June 25, the council announced that hardline cleric Sheik Hassan Dahir Aweys would head the council. Kevin interviewed Aweys for this article.

MOGADISHU, Somalia - He is nimble on his crutches, moving through the marketplace with a fluid but mechanical choreography of leg and poles.

He didn't see who fired the shot or where it came from, but 18-year-old Noor Malen doesn't believe it was intended for him.

An interview with Aweys» View

It was 1993. He was just a boy, walking the streets near his home. He didn't feel the bullet hit his thigh, but remembers going down, then passing out. The round shattered the bone of his right leg, and doctors amputated it.

"I'm so very angry," he says. "I still have my friends, but nothing else. I can't walk freely, I can't carry things. I probably won't be able to get a job; the only thing I could do is be a watchman."

Like so many others here, frustrated by the violence and chaos of Somalia, Noor believes Islam can save him.

"I'd like to run an Islamic school someday," he says. "I think I would be good at it."

He also wants to see Somalia become an Islamic state, believing it would bring security and stability -- something he's rarely experienced in his young life.

"Things are so difficult here," he says, shaking his head. "There are 20 people in my family and they can't afford to support me. I only eat one meal a day, breakfast, then nothing but water."

Noor is symbolic, experts say, of what is happening in Somalia today. Fourteen years without a functioning central government and warlords' thugs ruling the streets have turned this land on the horn of Africa into fertile ground for Islamic fundamentalism.

Most of the women around Mogadishu observe strict Islamic dress, some covered head to toe, with only their eyes exposed. It's evidence, some say, of the growing influence of the fundamentalists. Before the beginning of the civil strife in the early '90s, dress was reportedly more relaxed.

Osman Hassan Ali Atto is a powerful warlord in his own right and a minister in the fractious and mostly absentee interim Somali government.

Islam in Somalia» View

"If the lawlessness continues," Atto says, "yes, people will turn to religion."

And some of those religious organizations they turn to are alleged to have links to terror organizations like al-Qaida.

The largest and most well-funded, according to the terror watchdog International Crisis Group (ICG), is Al-Ittihad al-Islami, or the Islamic Union. It gained support and power after the fall of Somalia's ex-dictator, Siad Barre, in the early '90s.

It attempted to win over Somalis by providing humanitarian relief, schools and even security in some parts of the country, while at the same time spreading fundamentalist ideology. The United States claims that Al-Ittihad al-Islami is linked to al-Qaida through guns, money and training.

There are suspicions it has been involved in assassination attempts on rival Somali political leaders, the November 2002 attack on an Israeli-owned hotel in Kenya that killed 13, and a rocket attack that same day that narrowly missed an Israeli jetliner.

The United States lists Al-Ittihad al-Islami as a foreign terrorist group and has frozen its assets within U.S. jurisdictions.

Sheik Hassan Dahir Aweys is a leader of the group and was once a colonel in the Somali army. Aweys denies any al-Qaida connections, but does say he wants Somalia to become a theocracy.

"The only reason Western powers say that al-Qaida is in Somalia is because they are afraid that Somalia will become an Islamic state and they will do everything they can to stop that," Aweys says. "I believe there's not even one person in Somalia connected to al-Qaida. We are one clan, one color, one language. We would not accept foreigners (al-Qaida) here."

Aweys, with penetrating eyes and a red, henna-tipped beard, is deeply suspicious of Western journalists. I am just the second to interview him within his guarded compound in Mogadishu.

As I a set up my camera and tripod, he asks me if I am an American -- and a Jew. He looks at me askance, as if I were a spy, but consents to the interview anyway.

I ask him about the March 2005

"The

Interim President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed "also said two years ago there were al-Qaida training camps here. Well, the FBI came here, journalists came here and there were no training camps. It's just not true. We all know each other in Somalia. We would know if al-Qaida was here."

Aweys says he is, however, sympathetic to "jihads" being waged against Western forces around the world.

"If you lock a cat in a room all the time," Aweys says, "what do you think it will do? It's going to fight back."

He says he also supports Somalis who have gone to

"Islam is one body; if you're wounded in one place, you feel it everywhere. We all feel it when Americans kill Muslims," says Aweys. "I know in my heart I cannot accept when they say we must stay outside. Western countries fight to take what they want from us. We won't accept those conditions."

The U.S. response to the potential terror threat in Africa has been serious. In 2002 it created the Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa (CJTF-HOA), a 2,000-strong outpost based in Djibouti.

And according to the ICG, the task force has put some Somali warlords, ex-military leaders and even Ethiopian security teams on the payroll to capture al-Qaida members operating in Somalia. The ICG says that as many as 12 suspected members are either dead or in jail.

In an interview from Djibouti, CJTF-HOA Spokesman Maj. Ron Watrous denied that the task force is involved in these operations. The mission, he said, is limited to humanitarian activities and to helping regional governments bolster their own security forces. The hope is that this will translate into progress in fighting the war on terror not just in Somalia, but in the entire horn of Africa.

"You don't have to physically go into Somalia to have an impact on Somalia itself," Watrous said.

But some critics say the plan is backfiring. They say Somalis -- already deeply suspicious of American intentions after the failure of Operation Restore Hope in 1993 and the 2003 invasion of Iraq -- feel it's a war being waged on Islam, not terror.

It's a problem that the task force acknowledges. "Yes, we are concerned (that the task force is not able to operate in Somalia)," Watrous said. "We do want to be able to communicate more effectively in the region."

In a news article in July, the ICG's Horn of Africa Director Mark Bryden said that U.S. support for factional leaders, surveillance flights over Somalia and the abduction of innocent people sometimes held for weeks is "wreaking havoc over the country... the measures may actually be increasing support for terrorism."

Interview with Atto» View

Even some of America's closest allies, like Atto, are skeptical about the presence of al-Qaida operatives in Somalia.

"I don't believe [it] and I have not seen any al-Qaida cells in this country," says Atto, "but there are certain elements of so-called extremists that are taking advantage of the situation we are in."

In the Bakhaara Market, where I first met Noor, the young amputee, I see evidence of anger toward Westerners and Americans in particular.

Many shake their fingers and shout at me when I try to videotape them as I walk by -- a product of paranoia, an associate tells me. "They think you're going to show their pictures to the Americans, and they could be snatched up."

One older man, speaking in English, stands up when he sees me in the crowd.

"Tell Bush we're ready," he says. "Tell him we're ready to fight."

"Ready to fight, why?" I ask.

"Because he's attacking Muslims in Iraq; he'll come here too," he says.

Some groups like the ICG are encouraging the West to end the capture campaigns in Somalia and support for factional leaders, which adds to the divisiveness, they say. Instead, the ICG says, the West should focus on supporting the interim government that was formed in Kenya in 2004, but has yet to truly take power.

This backing, they say, will do much more to create stability and keep an Islamic extremist terror threat from becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy.

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