Al-Shabaab: who are the jihadists of Eastern Africa and what are their goals?

Al-Shabaab is the most lethal jihadist group in Sub-Saharan Africa, which operates largely in Somalia but is known for its brutal attacks on neighboring Kenya.

Founded in 2006, the group – whose name translates from Arabic as "The Youth" or "Mujahideen Youth Movement "- began as a militant arm of the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), an alliance between Sharia courts in southern Somalia that sought to rival the transitional federal parliament for control of the country.

Al-Shabaab has long been out of the ICU and aims to overthrow the federal parliament with successes sustained by the West alone, making violent suicide attacks and other acts of brutality against "enemies of Islam" among the Christians of the Horn of Africa and Sufi Muslim Population. Involved in ultra-conservative Islam wahhabita, al-Shabaab intends to direct Somalia in accordance with the strict principles of Sharia.

Al-Shabaab initially gained popular support by committing to bring security to a nation that did not have a stable government in 20 years, before losing face when its refusal of international aid made the conditions worse for their people when the earth was hit by drought and famine in 2011.

The same year, Al-Shabaab was driven from Mogadishu by the state of African Union troops – a military alliance made up of soldiers from Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia and Burundi – and from the port city of Kismayo in 2012, a heavy blow from cutting the charcoal through the docks had been a major source of income.

The group has been affiliated to al-Qaeda since 2012 when its former leader, Ahmed Abdi Godane, promised "obedience" to his counterpart Ayman al-Zawahiri in 2012. Gobdane was subsequently killed in an attack by US drones and al-Shabaab it is now led by Ahmad Umar, also known as Abu Ubaidah. He has between 7,000 and 9,000 soldiers at his command.

It is also believed that militias have links to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and Boko Haram in Algeria and Nigeria respectively.

Al-Shabaab has no ties to Isis, however, after rejecting them, a decision that caused a rift between its ranks and led to the formation of a splinter faction, Jabha East Africa, which recognizes the leader of Isis , Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, as the "legitimate Khalifa of all Muslims".

After bringing carnage into the region in the last decade, al-Shabaab is now recognized as a terrorist organization from the United Kingdom, the United States, Norway, Australia, New Zealand and the United Arab Emirates US.

One of his first atrocities was the attack on a restaurant in Kampala, Uganda, on July 11, 2010, designed to coincide with the FIFA World Cup final between Spain and the Netherlands, revenge for the operations of Uganda against it as part of the African Union. Seventy-four people were killed watching the game that night.

Kenya was the victim of most al-Shabaab attacks outside of Somalia, in particular the attack on Westgate's luxury shopping center in Nairobi in 2013 that killed 62 civilians, five soldiers and four masked gunmen and in which the English jihadist Samantha Lewthwaite, fancily nicknamed White Widow was said to be involved.

The Islamists have also targeted the tourist resort of Mpeketoni, the teachers who travel by bus, the workers of the quarries and the Garissa University of the country, where 148 were killed in 2015, most of which Christian students identified among the 700 taken hostage.

When the group ambushed another bus southbound from Mandera to Nairobi later that year, their attempt to use the same tactic was frustrated when the passengers refused to comply with the orders they split into Christian and Muslim groups, an act of courageous challenge that meant the death toll of the accident was reduced to two.

The group also targeted a Kenyan military base near El Adde in Somalia in January 2016, killing 180 soldiers.

His worst attack was the suicide of the truck that made him out of the Safari Hotel in Mogadishu on October 14, 2017, the most devastating in the history of Somalia, which destroyed several neighboring blocks and left 587 dead and 316 injured in the rubble .

This was followed by a 12-hour siege at the Nasa-Hablod hotel in the same city two weeks later, when another 25 were killed after a car bomb opened the doors of the resort and damaged the building in three floors, allowing the entry of armed men. A mother and her three children, one of whom was a child, were hit in the head during the accident.

In his attempts to enforce fundamentalist religious law, al-Shabaab became famous for stoning "sinners" to death. The mother-of-eight Habiba Isak, 30, was executed in this way in the city of Sakow in October 2017 after being accused of being unfaithful to her husband, as well as Shukri Abdullahi, 30, in the Lower Shabelle five months later, accused of bigamy.

The group has also severed the hands of thieves and carried out decapitations in the search for "justice".

Al-Shabaab's latest attacks took the form of a car bomb exploding outside the parliament in Mogadishu in March 2018 and another in the interior ministry four months later, this year 39, last seeing the officials jump out of the windows to escape the armed battle raging in its corridors. Thirteen died together in the two incidents.

This is a further concern for the international community as Somalia's internal security forces do not have control over the country's peacekeeping responsibilities by the strong 21,000-strong African Union by 2020.

The United States, which has 500 soldiers in Somalia, is particularly concerned about the imminent change of guard.

Donald Trump approved a Pentagon plan to increase operations against al-Shabaab in March 2017 and the US military duly carried out 30 air strikes in the country, many by drone, hoping to further weaken the extremists before the handover comes to pass.

One of the strangest aspects of the group’s outlook is its commitment to environmental issues. Al-Shabaab recently made headlines for prohibiting single-use plastic bags on the grounds that they represent “a threat to people and livestock”, an announcement made through its main propaganda outlet Radio Andalus, broadcasting in Somali, Arabic, Swahili and English.

Al-Shabaab has previously spoken out against Somalia’s logging industry for toppling rare trees and denounced Barack Obama for his failure to do more to tackle climate change during his time in office, leading the group to be mocked, with gallows humour, as East Africa’s “eco-friendly jihadis”.