Courcy’s Intelligence Brief

*** Echoes of 9/11 in Islamist warning to Kenya.  Since the Kenyan military began a military operation on 16 October against Islamist militants in Somalia, there has been a string of terrorist attacks against civilian and military targets.  The attacks have been mostly in the northeast and in the capital against military vehicles, police installations, entertainment centres, bus stops, and churches.  Scores of people have been killed and injured in attacks that the government blames on the Somali Islamist group Al-Shabab.

After two attacks on 11 December in Mandera and Wajir, Al Shahab issued a statement saying: “We thank our sustainer [Allah] who enabled some of the mujahideen to carry out bomb attacks on a Kenyan vehicle.  Until we destroy the tall buildings in Nairobi, we will continue targeting Kenya vehicles.”  The reference to “tall buildings in Nairobi” is clearly a reference to the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Centre as well as a warning.

There have been at least a dozen terrorist attacks attributable to Al-Shabab since the launch of Kenya’s military operation in Somalia.  On 28 October, a senior Al-Shabab official, Shaykh Mukhtar Robow, urged militants “to stop throwing grenades at buses and instead focus on massive explosions”. 

*** Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood looks for better ties with Iran.  Isam al-Uryan, the deputy head of Egypt’s Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), the political arm of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), has said that Egypt will improve its relations with Iran under the MB’s influence.  In an interview with the Iranian Fars News Agency published on 8 December, he said: “The Arab Republic of Egypt has returned to the region as an important and great power and will not be under the influence of America and the West.”  However, he added that the MB was “a middle-of-the-road party” and that it wanted to implement sharia law “in a fair manner that will respect human rights and personal freedoms and people’s choice of customs, denominations, and lifestyle”.

*** Turkish president underlines threat to Israel from Arab democracy.  On 11 December Turkey’s President Gul gave an interview in which he argued that the coming of democracy to the Arab world was a serious problem for Israel as it meant that Arab governments now have to take public opinion into account, which is exactly the point that this service has been emphasizing since the beginning of the Arab Spring.  Gul said: “These communities are meeting democracy for the first time.  The moment millions of Arabs start being government by democracy, what citizen is going to tolerate a foreign policy that has no self-respect, one that does not appeal to them?  Not one.”  For Gul, there is only one answer: for Israel to make “an honest peace” with the Palestinians.  He added: “Israel needs to see this.  In its region it used to be on good terms with Turkey.  Now look at it.  Even the Americans are saying ‘we have had enough’.”