Separating the Kafirs from the Muslims

[Wehrwolfen]

By Bill Warner
September 29, 2013

When the al Shabaab jihadi group from Somalia attacked the mall in Kenya, they gathered the crowd together and asked who were Muslims and let them go. According to the media, they then started killing the non-Muslims who were left. But "non-Muslims" is not the word what the terrorists would have used. No, they would have called them Kafirs. (Actually, they would have called them the Arabic plural of kafir, kuffar. "Kafirs" is the standard English plural form.)

Why did members of al Shabaab do this? Why did they ask the Muslims to leave and keep the Kafirs and start killing them? Let's start with the word "terrorists." Members of al Shabaab are not terrorists; they are jihadists, or mujahedeen. That is what they call themselves.


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Articles: Separating the Kafirs from the Muslims

The word kaffir was used in the former South Africa to refer to a black person. Now an offensive ethnic slur, it was formerly a neutral term for South African blacks. Muslim Islamists use it in the most offensive way too.

 

[waltky]

Payback for Kenya mall attack...

Kenya Muslim Cleric Linked to al-Shabaab Recruiter Is Killed
Oct 4, 2013 ~ Gunmen in Kenya murdered a Muslim preacher associated with an assassinated recruiter for al-Shabaab, the police said, as a probe continues into an attack by the Somali Islamist group in Nairobi two weeks ago.

Sheikh Ibrahim Amor and three others were shot dead when unidentified assailants sprayed their car with bullets near the port city of Mombasa late yesterday, Mombasa county Police Commander Robert Kitur said today by phone. One passenger survived, he said. Amor preached at the same Mombasa mosque, known as Masjid Musa, as Sheikh Aboud Rogo Mohammed, whose murder in August last year in similar circumstances sparked days of riots in the city, Kitur said. Today, security forces fired tear gas to disperse about 200 people demonstrating in the city’s Majengo area after Friday prayers at Masjid Musa and the Salavation Army church in the neighborhood was set ablaze.

Amor and Rogo were “close,” said Kitur. Rogo faced sanctions by the U.S. and the United Nations for fundraising and recruiting fighters for al-Shabaab, the al-Qaeda-linked Somali militant group. Al-Shabaab claimed responsibility for the Sept. 21 attack on the Westgate Mall in the Kenyan capital in which at least 61 civilians and six members of the security forces died. The insurgents had threatened to strike Kenya in retaliation for an incursion by Kenyan forces that began in 2011 to fight the militants, who want to establish an Islamic state in Somalia.

Kenyans gather around a car after a Muslim preacher was killed near the port city of Mombasaa.

Looting Reports

Kenyan authorities are investigating 21 reports of shops being looted during the attack and the army appealed for the public’s help for any information or evidence of misconduct by its forces during the security operation to end the assault. Authorities now suspect four to six attackers carried out the raid, down from an initial estimate of as many as 15, Police Inspector-General David Kimaiyo said in an interview broadcast by KTN, the closely held broadcaster based in Nairobi.

“Our investigations show we had between four and six terrorists in this attack,” Kimaiyo said. “Initially we had given a figure of between 10 to 15. I do not have any information so far that there was any escape from this place.” As many as five militants died in the battle with Kenyan security forces, according the government. At least 28 people are still missing, Kimaiyo said, citing figures compiled by the Kenya Red Cross.

Jewelry, Laptops

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Kenya Riots Over Slain Muslim Cleric Turn Deadly
October 04, 2013 — Four people have died and at least seven have been hopitalized in riots that erupted in the Kenyan port city of Mombasa after gunmen shot and killed a popular Muslim cleric and three of his associates.

Rioters burned tires and set fire to a church in unrest that erupted in the wake of Friday afternoon prayers one day after unidentified attackers opened fire on Sheikh Ibrahim Amor and the three other men as they traveled home after delivering sermons at Musa Mosque. Witnesses say police fired tear gas on Friday and engaged in running battles with Muslim youth in the coastal city's impoverished Majengo neighborhood. Sheikh Amor was viewed as a successor to Aboud Rogo Mohammed, who preached at the same mosque and was accused by U.S. and U.N. officials of having links to the Somali militant group al-Shabab.

Policeman armed with pistol and tear gas patrols while firemen extinguish fire set by rioting youth at Salvation Army Church, Mombasa, Kenya

Rights activists accuse Kenyan security forces of targeting and killing alleged Islamist radicals and terrorist suspects, and riots erupted after Rogo was fatally shot in 2012 on the same road where Amor was killed. Security officials have accused Sheikh Amor of radicalizing young people into terrorism, but police deny killing him, and Mombasa police commander, Robert Kitur, called the situation calm. “They tried to burn some tires but the situation is calm on the ground," he said. "They attempted to burn one of the churches, the Salvation Army, but we have put out the fire.” Local witnesses say police have been deployed to guard churches in areas hit by rioting.

A man throws a bucket of water to put out flames from a tire set on fire in a street by rioting youths, Mombasa, Kenya

Speaking to reporters outside Jamia Mosque in Nairobi after Friday prayers, Al Amin Kimathi, head of the Muslim Human Rights Forum, condemned the killing of the four men and accused Kenyan security forces of being behind the attack. “We say this is savage attack, barbaric to the extreme and patently against all laws of this land and in total violation of all norms and human rights," he said. "We say this is a continuation of the extra-judicial killings that have occurred over the last two years.”

Kenya police say they have not made any arrests in connection with the killing of Sheikh Amor or his associates, but that the investigation is ongoing. Tensions have been high in Kenya since al-Shabab militants stormed a Nairobi mall in a violent attack and subsequent siege that left 72 people dead, including five of the gunmen.

http://www.voanews.com/content/riots-erupt-in-kenyan-city-after-muslim-cleric-slain/1762881.html

 

[waltky]

Al-Shabaab gettin' by on less...

IN KENYA, ATTACKERS USED 'LESS IS MORE' STRATEGY
Oct 5,`13 -- Salim Massebellah had just reached the parking lot at Nairobi's premiere mall. Private guards inspected his trunk, then passed a mirror underneath his vehicle, checking for the exposed wires that would indicate a bomb. That was the weapon of choice of al-Shabaab, the terrorist group Kenyans had been warned might one day target their capital.

Moments later, the shooting erupted. The terrified guards ran, dropping the mirror. It hit the pavement with a clang. Sitting stiffly at the wheel, Massebellah saw the two attackers pass by his car. Each one was holding a single, belt-fed machine gun. What neither of them was wearing was a suicide vest. "They were shooting indiscriminately," said Massebellah. "There was nothing the guards could have done." Experts say the attackers' choice of weapons, including AK-47s and grenades, was decidedly low-tech for al-Shabaab, the al-Qaida affiliate based in neighboring Somalia which is known for their lethal use of suicide bombers. And it's this very decision to use small arms, instead of explosives, that made possible the most deadly terrorist attack in Kenya since the 1998 bombing of the United States embassy, analysts say.

If copied elsewhere, including in Western countries, this style of attack could prove equally difficult to stop, both because public places like malls cannot be protected in the same manner as government buildings, and because security services are trained to detect explosives, not small arms. "My assessment has always been that the day that al-Shabaab lets go of the `Cult of the Suicide Bomber,' we will be in world of trouble," said Matt Bryden, the former coordinator of the United Nations Monitoring Group on Somalia and Eritrea. "It's far more complicated to procure the parts for an explosive vest, as well as to find people willing to be martyrs. I always worried that if you just get guys riding in with AK-47s and grenades, they could do incredible damage," he said. "We have now reached that dangerous place."

CCTV footage retrieved from Westgate Mall shows only four attackers took part in the prolonged siege, though others may have been a part of the Sept. 21 attack and fled, according to a government official close to the investigation who insisted on anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the matter. This handful of fighters easily overpowered the mall's unarmed security guards, killing over 60 civilians and leaving the mall awash in blood. It would be hours before Kenya's notoriously dysfunctional military arrived on the scene in force, leaving petrified shoppers to fend for themselves. At the front entrance of the mall, 37-year-old Mamtaz Jamal ran a promotional table selling creams. That morning she had carefully laid out one of her tubs of milk-and-honey scrub, putting a decorative halo of pebbles around the circular pot. She heard an earsplitting bang, and looked up to see the glass walls of a nearby jewelry shop shattering.

The attackers had lobbed a grenade inside. She ran, looking back just long enough to see that one of the attackers had grabbed a Caucasian man. He was holding him by the back of the neck, forcing him to walk in front, like a human shield. "With his other hand he was shooting," said Jamal. It was as if the fighter was expecting to be met with return fire. But the first men to return fire, including off-duty cops and members of a neighborhood watch group, were using pistols to fight hardened terrorists with automatic weapons.

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MILITARY STRIKE REPORTED IN SOUTHERN SOMALI TOWN
Oct 5,`13 -- Foreign military forces carried out a pre-dawn strike Saturday against foreign fighters in the same southern Somalia village where U.S. Navy SEALS four years ago killed a most-wanted al-Qaida operative, officials said.

The strike was carried out in the town of Barawe in the hours before morning prayers against what one official said were "high-profile" targets. The strike comes exactly two weeks after al-Shabab militants attacked Nairobi's Westgate Mall, a four-day terrorist assault that killed at least 67 people in neighboring Kenya. The leader of al-Shabab, Mukhtar Abu Zubeyr, also known as Ahmed Godane, claimed responsibility for the attack and said it was in retaliation for Kenya's military deployment inside Somalia.

A resident of Barawe - a seaside town 240 kilometers (150 miles) south of Mogadishu - said by telephone that heavy gunfire woke up residents before dawn prayers. An al-Shabab fighter who gave his name as Abu Mohamed said "foreign" soldiers attacked a house, prompting militants to rush to the scene to capture a foreign soldier. Mohamed said that effort was not successful. The foreign troops attacked a two-story house close to the beach in Barawe, battling their way inside, said Mohamed, who said he had visited the scene of the attack. Foreign fighters resided in the house, Mohamed said. Al-Shabab has a formal alliance with al-Qaida, and hundreds of foreign fighters from the U.S., Britain and Middle Eastern countries are known to fight alongside Somali members of al-Shabab.

A Somalia intelligence official said the targets of the raid were "high-profile" foreigners in the house. The intelligence official also said the strike was carried out by a foreign military. Somalia's nascent army does not have the ability to carry out a stealth night-time strike. A second intelligence official also confirmed the attack. Both insisted on anonymity to discuss intelligence matters. Foreign militaries - often the U.S. but not always - have carried out several strikes inside Somalia in recent years against al-Shabab or al-Qaida leaders, as well as criminal kidnappers. A Western intelligence official said it appeared likely that either U.S. or French forces carried out the attack. The official insisted on anonymity to discuss intelligence matters.

In Washington, Pentagon spokesman George Little said: "I decline comment." Another resident of Barawe, who gave his name as Mohamed Bile, said militants in Barawe closed down the town in the hours after the assault, and that all traffic and movements have been restricted. Militants were carrying out house-to-house searches, likely to find evidence that a spy had given intelligence to a foreign power used to launch the attack, he said. "We woke up to find al-Shabab fighters had sealed off the area and their hospital is also inaccessible," Bile told The Associated Press by phone. "The town is in a tense mood."

In September 2009 a daylight commando raid carried out by Navy SEALs in Barawe killed six people, including Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, one of the most-wanted al-Qaida operatives in the region and an alleged plotter in the 1998 bombings at U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that killed more than 250 people. Military raids carried out by troops on the ground carry the risk of a troops being killed or captured, but they also allow the forces to collect bodies or other material as evidence. Missile strikes from sea of unmanned drones carry less risk to troops but increase the chances of accidental civilian deaths.

News from The Associated Press