Ainashe.net

Jeffrey Gettleman of the New York Times sent a dispatch from the Somali caiptal and says:

The trouble started when government soldiers went to the market and, at gunpoint, began to help themselves to sacks of grain last week. Islamist insurgents poured into the streets to defend the merchants. The government troops took heavy casualties and retreated all the way back to the presidential palace, supposedly the most secure place in the city. It, too, came under fire. Mohamed Abdirizak, a top government official, crouched on a balcony at the palace, with bullets whizzing over his head. He had just given up a comfortable life as a development consultant in Springfield, Va. His wife thought he was crazy. Sweat beaded on his forehead.

“I feel this slipping away,” he said.

By its own admission, the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia is on life support. When it took power here in the capital 15 months ago, backed by thousands of Ethiopian troops, it was widely hailed as the best chance in years to end Somalia’s ceaseless cycles of war and suffering.

The TFG has been a life support for far too long…It is time for it to accept failure and disband.

Click here to view the article on NY Times.

Somalis are running away from their country in despair, unfortunately, there is no place for many of them to go. Above picture shows Somali women heading to the closed Kenyan (Somali NFD) border.
Copy Right: Al Ahram Weekly-AFP.

Anna Husarska of the International Rescue Committee says:
Somalia’s internal conflict is propelled by a combustible mix of religion, politics and clan rivalry. Civilians are killed daily in Mogadishu, there are roadside bombs and mortar attacks, and politicians and journalists are targeted. Making matters worse, the country has suffered this year from both floods and drought. This combination of insecurity and natural disasters has displaced huge numbers of people and caused suffering on a scale painful to behold. According to the most recent UN figures, 400,000 people, or roughly one-third of Mogadishu’s population, have fled the city.

She continued by saying:

Yet Somalia still rarely gets into the headlines. This partly reflects the near impossibility of gathering news. Few foreign journalists venture in — it is too difficult and too dangerous for them to work inside the country — and local reporters are harassed by the authorities. And, even when there is news, the world’s capacity to absorb bad and sad stories from yet another hellish place is limited.

I agree entirely with Ms. Husarska that the world is comply ignoring the tragic events taking place in Somalia. I think it is time the world to wake up and help poor Somali to put their lives together and restore some sort normalcy.

Click here to view the article on Taipei Times through Project Syndicate.

Ramzy Baroud writing for the Pan Arab Al Jazeera Television Network says:

The people of Somalia are enduring yet another round of suffering as Ethiopian forces wreck havoc in the capital, Mogadishu. Apparently in response to an attack on one of its units, and the dragging of a soldier’s mutilated body through the city’s streets, an Ethiopian mortar reportedly exploded in Mogadishu’s Bakara market on Nov. 9, killing eight civilians. A number of Somalis were also found dead the following day, some believed to have been rounded up by Ethiopian forces the night before.

Ramzy Baroud went on by saying:

Of course, one cannot realistically expect the international community to take on a constructive involvement in the conflict. Various members of this community have already played a most destructive role in Somalia’s 16-year-old civil war, which fragmented a nation that had long struggled to achieve a sense of sovereignty and national cohesion.

He concluded by saying:

This situation leaves Somalia once more under the mercy of foreign powers and self-serving internal forces, foreshadowing yet more bloodshed. Our informed support is essential now because the Somali people have suffered enough. Their plight is urgent and it deserves a much deeper understanding, alongside immediate attention.

It looks like that Somalia is finally getting the attention it deserves from the Arab world.

Click here to view the full article on Arab News.

The Gulf News reports:

As Arab efforts to stop the war intensified, the UAE yesterday called on Ethiopia to withdraw its troops from Somalia. The appeal was made by Mohammad Hussain Al Sha’ali, Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, during a meeting in Abu Dhabi with Mahmoud Ahmad Jaz, an envoy of Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, who delivered a message to President His Highness Shaikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan. Voicing the UAE’s concern over armed hostilities in Somalia, Al Sha’ali urged Addis Ababa to “halt this war” and called for “the withdrawal of foreign forces from Somalia,” WAM reported. He urged Somalia’s neighbours to “encourage reconciliation among Somali factions”.

Click here to view the full report

The South African News 24 reports:

Kenya plans to hold talks with Somalia’s embattled Islamic leaders in a bid to end escalating fighting with Ethiopian forces backing government, said diplomats on Wednesday. The talks in the Kenyan capital Nairobi on Thursday “will seek ways to urgently end the conflict”, said a diplomat, requesting to remain anonymous. The diplomat said that the Islamic courts leadership has confirmed participation. Asked if Ethiopia and the Somali government would participate in the talks, the diplomat said: “We will deal with only those whom we can manage.”

Click here to view the full dispatch.

The Australian ABC Online reports:

The Arab League and the African Union have called for Ethiopian troops to be withdrawn from Somalia immediately. Ethiopian troops are said to be only 30 kilometres north of the capital Mogadishu. Speaking after a joint consultative meeting the chair of the African Union commission, Alpha Oumar Konare, said the three organisations wanted to see Ethiopia’s troops withdrawn from neighbouring Somalia immediately. Mr Konare told journalists at the African Union headquarters that they wanted all parties to cease hostilities and return to peace talks. The Somali Ambassador to Ethiopia, Abdikarin Farah, said it was down to the governments in Baidoa and Addis Ababa to decide when the troops would leave.

Click here to view original article.

Leoul Mekonen, Sudan Tribune

It is clear that the Somali Islamists are enemies to the US but arming and supporting a dictatorial regime with the notion of supporting the enemy’s enemy will not bring positive outcome to the US as well as Ethiopians… It is lunatic to think that the Ethiopian army will crush the Islamists. Instead it will raise the patriotic spirit of Somalis and even those who have had negative attitude towards Islamists will prefer to join them. Any Somali who hates the Islamists will not necessarily like the presence of Ethiopian troops in Somalia but be compelled to join the jihadists when their airport is bombed by Ethiopian aircraft.

Samuel Makinda, Kenya’s Nation

Ethiopia’s invasion is unlikely to bring peace and order to Somalia, or to assist the transitional government to establish an effective administration. Any external force that abandons an inclusive approach and sides with one group against another, is bound to exacerbate insecurity.
If there is fear that the Union of Islamic Courts might invite al-Qaeda terrorists, Ethiopia’s invasion and defeat of the Islamists will not prevent Al-Qaeda operatives from using Somalia.

Editorial on Kenya’s Nation

While it would be silly to reduce the conflict to a mere contest between the ‘Islamist’ Somalia and ‘Christian’ Ethiopia, this religious appendage is appealing to both sides. What the world is witnessing is a resurrection of old tensions between Ethiopia and Somalia, now fanned by proxies… The lifting of the arms embargo on Somalia places the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development, the African Union and the UN in a precarious position as the Somali crisis threatens to escalate into a regional conflict.

Editorial in Algeria’s La Nouvelle Republique

The situation in the Horn of Africa is worrying. No-one predicted this dangerous turn of events. In one week, what was to be a simple internal conflict between the radical Islamic Courts and transitional government, backed by the United States, has gone regional, involving three countries. The explosion in this strategic part of the Horn of Africa will not only last but also spread to other sub-Saharan Africa regions already plagued by devastating conflicts. What is strange is the ’smug’ silence from the Western powers. The easy solution is to use this war as part of the global war against terrorism; if this is the case, we can expect to see another Hundred Years’ War.

Pan Arab Al-Arab Al-Alamiyah

The crushing Ethiopian attack achieves an old dream for Addis Ababa of invading Somalia which stands as an obstacle between it and the Red Sea, especially after Eritrea become independent and started controlling the coast connecting Ethiopia to the sea.

Pan Arab Al-Quds Al-Arabi

The Islamic Courts forces are made up of a group of clean and pure believers who wanted to bring an end to bloody chaos sustained by warlords and militia leaders. It managed to expel highway robbers and the Mafia gang. However, the US, which tore apart the unity of Somalia, overthrew its government, blew up its stability and starved its people, was not pleased with this achievement and moved in to overthrow the courts.
Ethiopia will pay high price for its interference in Somali affairs. Disorder will prevail in Somalia, which will become a safe heaven for Islamist groups from inside and outside Somalia, with the help of the Somali people this time round. Will [Ethiopian Prime Minister] Meles Zinawi succeed in Somalia, in achieving what his masters in USA failed to achieve in Iraq?

Hanan Hamad in Syria’s Tishrin

Ethiopia is repeating Washington’s experiment in Iraq: ‘Self-defence’ but on others’ territories. This flagrant interference in the internal affairs of an independent country that is a member of the Arab League and UN will continue until the mission is completed. Again, the Arabs fail to defend an Arab country against a foreign invasion.

MUSIB NU’AYMI IN IRAN’S ARABIC AL-VEFAGH

Some see Ethiopian interference in Somalia war as a product of US directives. The Islamic and Arab grouping failed to do anything while watching the Western invasion sweeping the Horn of Africa. No doubt the US and its Western allies are the key beneficiaries from the Darfur crisis, the Somalia war and any possible tension in any other spots, because these crises will distract attention from the defeats incurred by the US in Iraq, Lebanon and Palestine.

Basim Sakjaha in Jordan’s Al-Dustur

We have a new war in the region. This is an historic opportunity for Ethiopia to reach the sea and cut Somalia into two. The international situation is propitious as Washington, the commander of the world, supports an Ethiopian-Somali war to get rid of the Islamic Courts. Ditto the regional situation, as Saudi Arabia and the Arab Gulf countries do not want a neighbour like the Islamic Courts which constitute some kind of safe refuge for extremist Islamic forces.

Editorial in Saudi Arabia’s Al-Riyad

A new river of blood is flowing in Somalia. Ethiopia interfered in Somalia because it does not want a neighbour similar to the Taleban and al-Qaeda. The war could have broken out with the express approval of major countries.

Editorial In Yemen’s Al-Thawrah

If this war moves towards regional attrition, the security of the entire region could fall victim to the adventures of some parties.

Source: BBC Monitoring
BBC Mintoring selects and translates news from radio, television, press, news agencies and the internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages. It is based in Caversham, UK, and has several bureaux abroad.

Click here to view the full dispatch on Xinhuanet (The Chinese News Agency).

You may also click here to view the full statement.

The European Union’s Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid, Louis Michel, condemned Monday the escalating battles in Somalia. Speaking in Brussels, he was quoted as saying:

I express my deepest concern on the reported involvement of foreign forces in Somalia and urge all external players to refrain immediately from intervening militarily in Somali affairs and provoke further violence.

Click here to view the full dispatch.

Xinhuanet; the Chinese news agency reports:

In a press release, the AL, of which Somalia is a member state, expressed apprehension and regret over maintaining armed clashes between the two sides at war, which has left thousands of Somalis homeless.

Click here to view the full dispatch.

Stephanie McCrummen of the Washington Post Foreign Service writes:

War or no war with Somalia, Mulunesh Abebayhu wants out. Out of her teaching job, where Ethiopian security forces constantly harass her because of her political views. Out of this city, where hundreds of protesters were killed by police bullets after disputed elections last year. And, if she can manage, out of this country that she believes has plunged into the abyss of dictatorship at the hands of its prime minister, Meles Zenawi, a staunch ally of the United States in the vulnerable Horn of Africa.

“He confuses the Westerners so that he can keep ruling,” said Abebayhu, 54, an opposition member arrested along with an estimated 30,000 others in the sweeping post-election crackdown last year. “Our party does not believe in this war. Our priority is to eradicate poverty, not go to war. Meles knows this war is a way for his system to survive.”

Click here to view the full article.

In an interview he gave to Al-Jezeera Television yesterday, President Isaias Afwerki reiterated that Eritrea did not send troops to Somalia.

Click here to view the full article on Shabait.com

Apee Ojulu editor of Gambela Today writes:

There has been a sort of unanimity among various advisors in Prime Minister Meles Zenawi government that in an all-out-war they will defeat the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC) within few days. Zenawi’s Foreign Ministry warning to the UIC that his administration “will not tolerate an Islamist regime in neighboring Somalia” is an indication of that confidence (see MCT, /22, 2006). But hubris is not a military strategy to win a war. It is a risking scheme. Having mechanized forces, countless warplanes, weapons, backing of the international and capacities to destroy every house in Somalia do not prove to win the war. Recent war between Israeli mechanized army forces against a lesser tech wired Iranian and Syrian backed Hezbollah forces have proven this, that technology is not the only mean to win wars. American involvement in Iraq is the other. Both conflicts have proven public support is the key to military success in guerilla wars, not traditional military power alone.

Mr. Apee Ojulu concluded by saying:

Zenawi might have his envisioned his gamble in Somali civil war as an important strategic decision to extract more monetary from Americans, divert attentions of both domestic and international from his authoritarian rule and prolong his regime. Likely outcome of that conflict may come at a price of losing very elements that has kept alive and embolden the already emboldened opposition parties at his expense.

Click here to view article on the Sudan Tribune.

The Norwegian Newspaper; Dagbladet has a long analytical report.

Click here to view the full report. Please note that the article in Norwegian only. Please also note that graphic picture on display.

In an editorial the Dubai based Khaleej Times newspaper says:

WITH Ethiopian military incursions into the Somalian territory, in the name of fighting Islamic militants, the situation in the Horn of Africa is getting increasingly dangerous. Regional peace is under serious threat. And it looks like Somalia, one of the hotspots of the continent, would now be used for a proxy war between largely-Christian Ethiopia and its bitter rival, Eritrea, a nation that backs the Islamists.

The paper continued by saying:

Ethiopian incursions are now undermining these efforts. Amid the rolling in of the Ethiopian tanks and the air strikes that followed, the bitter memories of the past two wars have come to haunt the people. Prime Minister Meles Zenawi’s stand that his government has a ‘legal and moral obligation’ to support and defend Somalia’s government is dangerously flawed.

The paper concluded by saying:

The best solution to Somalia’s problems is allowing the country to solve its own problems. Interference from Ethiopia or other nosey neighbours and big powers will only exacerbate the crisis.

I could not agree more! I hope more Arab and Muslim papers will flow suite by highlighting the plight of our people.

Click here to the full editorial on Khaleej Times.

Melez Zenawi the Ethiopian Prime Minister made it clear to everyone that he wants Somalia annexed by forces.

Mr. Zenawi was quoted as saying that:

Our patience was considered as weakness and we were forced to go to war and the alternative left to us is to speedily bring the war to a successful and victorious end in the shortest time possible.

Well, this sounds like a twisted logic! Somalia did not invade Ethiopia.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports:

The aerial and ground assault was the first open admission by Ethiopia’s Christian-led government of its military operations in Somalia, where it has been supporting a weak interim government threatened by forces loyal to the Islamic clerics who control the capital, Mogadishu, and much of the rest of the country.

Click here to view the full report.

The Toronto Globe and Mail newspaper reports:

Nearly 200 troops serving Somalia’s weak Western-backed government defected to the Islamic courts movement, an Islamic official said Sunday, as both sides braced for impending war. Sheik Mohamed Ibrahim Bilal, head of the Islamic court in the Al-Bayan region, said the troops switched sides there late Saturday. Sheik Bilal told the Associated Press by telephone that the former government soldiers “are ready to be incorporated into the Islamic courts forces.” The court movement has promised to launch a holy war Tuesday unless troops from neighbouring Ethiopia, who are supporting the government, leave Somalia. Islamic fighters have surrounded the southern Sudanese town of Baidoa, the only town the government controls. Al-Bayan, where the defections are said to have taken place, is about 80 kilometres from Baidoa.

This is a major political and security setback for the TFG and their Ethiopian masters. However, the Islamic Courts forces should not make any military movement that the other side could perceive as an attack. They must hold their fire for now!

Contrary to what Col. Cabdullahi Yuusuf said, there is still a room for dialogue.

Click here to view the full report

Click here to view a full transcript of interview with Melez Zenawi, the Ethiopian Prime Minister.

Terrence Lyons of the Center for Preventive Action wrote a report titled: “Avoiding Conflict in the Horn of Africa: U.S. Policy toward Ethiopia and Eritrea”.

The entire report (PFD format) can be downloaded free of charge by clicking here.

Simon Tissdall of the Guardian newspaper writes:

Watching Somalia right now is like standing on a beach, waiting for a category five hurricane to hit. The storm is approaching fast, there seems little that can be done, and the ensuing destruction will be terrible - and far-reaching. The looming Somali cataclysm threatens to spark a regional war, suck in east African and Arab actors, and create a dangerous new theatre in the polarising, global contest between western power and Islamist jihadism. Somalia has the potential to make Darfur look like a little local difficulty.

Mr. Tisdall went on by saying:

Three outcomes were possible at this juncture, the western source said. One was that UN-backed, on-off talks between the UIC and Baidoa government resumed, the African protection force deployed, and a “proper political process” got underway. Another, less improbable scenario was that Ethiopia used its military superiority to secure Baidoa and “clobber” some UIC training camps, enabling the government to negotiate from a stronger position. But a third, nightmare outcome was that “the Ethiopians do the full monty, go in in strength, and get stuck”, the source said. That could lead to spreading, al-Qaida-fuelled guerrilla warfare akin to Iraq, Sudanese-style Arab-African conflict, and ultimately, pressure for direct western intervention.

Click here to view the full analysis on the Guardian.

David Gollust of Voice of America wries:

In a bleak assessment of the Somali situation, Assistant Secretary Frazer says radicals including al-Qaida figures have taken control of the Islamic Courts movement, and that it may be too late for a plan approved by the U.N. Security Council earlier this month to stabilize the situation. On December 6, the Security Council approved a resolution granting an exemption to the U.N. arms embargo on Somalia to allow an East African military mission to enter the country and shore up the country’s Transitional Federal Government (TFG) based in Baidoa which is under siege from the Islamic Courts. Uganda has agreed to take part in what is termed a protection and training mission by the regional Intergovernmental Authority on Development, IGAD, but the process of assembling the force has been slow. In a talk with reporters, Assistant Secretary Frazer said the United States has lent diplomatic support to the effort, but that it may be too late to achieve the objective of Resolution 1725 - to bolster the transitional government in order to prompt the Union of Islamic Courts to return to talks on the country’s future: “It could possibly be too late,” said Jendayi Frazer. “And I think we need to be very clear that the Africans believe they asked for these two and a half years ago. When the TFG first went back to Somalia from Nairobi, they asked for this exemption. And so there are some African countries that will definitely state that we waited too late.”

Click here to view the full article on Dehai.

Sheikh Yusuf Mohamed Siad “Inda’ade”; the defense chief of the Somali Islamic Nationalists issued an ultimatum and asked Ethiopian troops to leave all Somali territories that they currently occupy within a week or face an all-out war.

Personally, I do not believe that war should be rushed to as it only brings misery and bloodshed. In addition, the TFG is so weak and powerless that it is only a matter of time before it collapses under its own weight. Hence, toppling it by forces will only create more chaos.

Peace must be given a chance!

Sheikh Yusuf Mohamed Siad “Inda’ade”; (on the right).
Copy Right: Shabelle Media/Reuters News Agency.

Sayid Qutb; the intellectual father of radical political Islam wrote:

In summary, anything that requires a touch of elegance is not for the American, even haircuts! For there was not one instance in which I had a haircut when I did not return home to even with my own hands what the barber had wrought, and fix what the barber had ruined with his awful taste.

Does this mean that Sayid Qutb’s rejection of Western values stems from the fact that he got a bad hair cut in Greeley, Colorado, while he was a visiting scholar in United States in 1948-50? I am not so sure but some are saying so!

Click here to view full article on Rolf Putts website.

The Spero News reports:

A large deployment of forces is underway along the border between Kenya and Somalia. The Kenyan armed forces were widely deployed along the border with the Gedo region (extreme south of Somalia) and particularly at the El-Wakh border pass. “Military troops, police and armoured vehicles are massed at the El-Wakh village in Kenya”, said this morning a local correspondent of a top Mogadishu radio. Residents of villages of the Gedo region along the border confirmed the troop movements on the other side of the border, specifying that the first reinforcements began arriving in the zone shortly after the militants of the Islamic Courts on September 25 seized the city of Kismaayo.

It looks like that Somalia is under attack from many fronts!

Click here to view the full article on Spero News

The Economist Magazine reports:

Eyewitness reports on Monday October 9th suggested that “several hundred” Ethiopian soldiers, perhaps three battalions, had entered the small town of Burhakaba, well inside Somali territory. There have long been reports of Ethiopian troops at the town of Baidoa, 65km to the north, where a UN-recognised (but not widely Somali-recognised) transitional government sits. And there have been regular and credible reports of Ethiopian military planes landing on dirt strips up and down the country. Ethiopia has claimed, not very convincingly, that it has no soldiers inside Somalia. In fact it seems that the soldiers were sent in as a response to an approach by Islamist forces, soldiers under the control of a de facto government in Mogadishu, known as the Islamic courts, to within 20km of Baidoa late last week. There has been no fighting, yet. The Islamists were undermanned in the town and retreated without a shot being fired. But such calm is unlikely to last. Burhakaba is a strategically useful forward base for any attack on Mogadishu. Islamist leaders have vowed to take back the town; some unconfirmed accounts say they already have.

Click here to view the full article.

Copy Right: The Economist

The Malaysian News Agency (Bernama) reports:

Somalia’s powerful Islamist movement declared “holy war” against neighboring Ethiopia after a Muslim-held town near the seat of the weak government fell to Ethiopian and Somali troops. A day after warning of a regional war if Addis Ababa does not withdraw from Somali territory, the Islamists escalated their rhetoric, vowing to repel Ethiopian soldiers in a tacit warning to the transitional government. “From today, I am declaring jihad against Ethiopia, which has invaded our country and taken parts of our homeland,” said Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, chair of the executive committee of the Supreme Islamic Council of Somalia (SICS). “The jihad is on from now (and) application of that will be directed by the supreme council,” he said in Mogadishu, which the Islamists seized in June and have used as a base to expand through most of south and central Somalia.

War is not the solution to Somalia’s tragic political conflict. However, Ethiopian invasion of Somalia must not be allowed to happen at any cost! Somalia must be allowed to exist as a free nation. Hence, Ethiopia must respect Somalia’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Click here for the full article