The Westgate Mall siege in Kenya has claimed the lives of more than 60
people including the Kenyan president's nephew, at least one Canadian
diplomat and American, British, French and Chinese nationals. Al Qaeda's
affiliate in Somalia, Al-Shabaab, has claimed responsibility for the
siege and it has been reported that a number of the militants involved
in the attack may have been foreign jihadists from Western nations.
If true, does the
phenomenon of Westerners killing Westerners in Kenya represent a victory
for al Qaeda and is this representative of the future of the group's
transnational jihad? Does the radicalization of Muslims in the West pose
a substantial threat to global security and what can be done to stop
it?
Al Qaeda has looked to
inspire Western Muslims to commit such atrocities for years with help
from Anwar al-Awlaki's online sermons and the group's magazine,
"Inspire," which has often praised the actions of Western Islamists in
their own countries and abroad. Most notably, it commended the Tsarnaev
brothers, the alleged Boston bombers as well as Roshonara Choudhary, the
young girl from Newham, east who attempted to murder her local
parliamentary representative. However, Western Muslims fought in the
Afghanistan jihad against the USSR that originally gave rise to al Qaeda
as well as in other conflicts in Bosnia, Chechnya, Iraq and Syria.
In reality, the numbers of Western Muslims abandoning their lives in the
United Kingdom or the United States of America to go and join
Al-Shabaab in Somalia is very small. In order to best analyze this
phenomenon, they should be separated into three distinct groups:
converts to Islam, Western Muslims, such as Abu Usama al-Britani -- a
Briton believed to have been killed in Somalia -- and members of the
Somali diaspora in Western countries.
Converts to Islam are
particularly vulnerable to extremist ideologies and narratives because
of exploitation by charismatic recruiters. Failures of moderate Muslim
communities to welcome converts due to ethnic or regional differences or
to answer the political or theological questions that many new converts
have often led to their adoption by radical groups such as al
Muhajiroun and its offshoots, that invariably have links to Islamist
groups present in hot conflicts.
Under these radical
wings, new converts to Islam are taught a highly politicized version of
Islam that invariably focuses on current conflicts around the world,
spun with an Islamist narrative that exaggerates the importance and
benefits of violent jihad, the need for action against oppressors, or
the moral degradation of Westerners and their societies.
These recruits are
considered perfect for al Qaeda's future goals as, due to the fact that
they are often not targeted for racial profiling and have greater access
in their home countries, they can pass between borders relatively
risk-free. With an estimated 40,000 Westerners currently living in
Kenya, many more visiting as tourists each year, and an area of limited
policing on the Somalia-Kenya border, Western members of Al-Shabaab
constitute a potentially large threat to the country's security.
However, Somalia is not a
particularly attractive destination for Western jihadists. When
assessed in terms of cohesion and integration, Al-Shabaab is one of the
weakest al Qaeda regional affiliates. Due to existing tribal hierarchies
and fault lines, Al-Shabaab has significant infighting and is renowned
for not being accepting of foreigners.
Western Muslim
minorities, predominately from Pakistani and Bangladeshi backgrounds,
therefore face similar issues to white converts when it comes to joining
the jihad in Somalia. The recent killing of Abu Osama al-Britani and
Abu Mansoor al-Amriki (Omar Hammimi), who had purportedly fallen out
with Al-Shabaab's leadership reveals the extent to the lack of cohesion
in the group.
However, for Islamist
groups such as Hizb ut-Tahrir and al-Muhajiroun, this conflict is a
well-established part of the radicalizing narrative, in much the same
way that Afghanistan, Bosnia and Iraq have been, and will continue to
attract Western Islamists with jihadist aspirations. In reality,
Al-Shabaab are fighting a more nationalist struggle, clothing it in
pseudo-religious garments and will continue to fail to engage
significant numbers of Westerners.
The Somali expatriate community numbers more than 100,000 in the United Kingdom, 78% of whom reside in London, according to the Office of National Statistics.
The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development estimates more than 20,000 Somalis reside in the Netherlands and about 89,000 in the U.S. According to Canada's 2011 National Household Survey,
more than 44,000 Somalis live within its borders. This is the most
likely group of Western Muslims to be making trips to Somalia, and, if
Islamists, are those most likely to be accepted by Al-Shabaab.
As communities that are
often criticized for their lack of integration within Western societies
and with some radical community leaders among them, members going to
fight in Somalia has long been a concern for Western security services.
Of greater immediate concern, however, is the Somali diaspora in Kenya,
whom the Kenyan authorities will undoubtedly target in the coming weeks.
Al-Shabaab has shown
itself to be exceptionally capable, both operationally and in terms of
its use of secrecy, and increasingly extreme. According to our sources,
while previously with limited operations outside of Somalia, Al-Shabaab
conducted the preparation for these attacks months ago and had
considerable surveillance in the shopping mall, and is likely delivering
retribution against Kenya for its aggressive pursuit of Al-Shabaab in
recent years.
In whichever way the
Western contribution to Al-Shabaab will be depicted by the group for
propaganda purposes, its lack of cohesion will continue to curb its
effectiveness. The radicalization of Westerners is a significant problem
that must be addressed in the United Kingdom and jihadist tourism is an
issue in which security services are rightfully investing considerable
resources; Somalia is simply the latest destination and not a
particularly fashionable one.
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