Analysis & Commentary
Bush: The Authoritarian Regimes of the Arab World Will Fall
President George W. Bush predicted Tuesday that the remaining authoritarian regimes in North Africa and the Middle East are unsustainable and will give way to movements driven by the quest for freedom and human rights.
Pakistani Jihadists Reported in Northern Mali
Over the past two months, Tuareg rebels, backed by Islamist terror groups such as Ansar al Dine, al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, and Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa, have seized control of northern Mali.
Al-Qaeda is Down, but Far From Out
The numbers tell the story: America’s counter-terrorism campaign is gradually shifting from Afghanistan and the tribal areas of Pakistan to Yemen, Somalia and other parts of Africa.
UNESCO Funny Business
Surely Comedy Central’s The Daily Show meant well when it sent comedian John Oliver all the way to Africa to file a report savaging the United States for defunding the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.
Biggest Story of 2011 for Me? The Uncertainty of the “Arab Spring”
The dramatic protests and revolutions that swept across Muslim countries throughout the Middle East and North Africa in 2011 were the biggest story of the year. This is a story -- or rather a multitude of stories -- of heroism and tragedy set against the backdrop of realpolitik.
British Shabaab Operative Killed in Airstrike in Somalia
Shabaab said that a British national who was "from the early people who came to jihad in Somalia" was killed in a US drone airstrike. The slain operative was a senior al Qaeda leader in East Africa.
America’s 4-Prong Strategy for Somalia
After years of strategic drift in Somalia, the U.S. appears to have developed a new strategy for this battle-torn country. This four-part approach, which is based on our research and confirmed by U.S. government sources
Review: ‘Rock the Casbah’
With the Arab Spring still unfolding, former Washington Post reporter Robin Wright’s latest book puts the popular uprisings that have swept the Arabic-speaking Middle East from North Africa and the Levant to the Persian Gulf in the context of a larger movement: counter-jihad.
As The West Lets Down Its Guard
Is the West drawing the curtain on Ares’ toils? Will the 21st centurywitness an end to Western military engagement? There is an argument to bemade for the end of war in the West. Western societies have by and large banished war among them, live in peace with each other, and enjoy...
Book-TV’s After Words
Pirates from Somalia made international news with the capture of an American cargo ship in 2009 in eastern African waters and later the murder of four retirees sailing around the world. Mr. Bahadur discloses who some of these men are and why they say they became pirates.
Al Qaeda in the Horn of Africa
Jon Huntsman made an interesting comment the other day. He said the al Qaeda terrorism sweeping the world these last decades represents the collapse of old regimes much as collapse swept old Europe and the Ottoman Empire a hundred years ago.
It’s Madness to Raise Foreign Aid While Cutting Back At Home
The recent announcement by British Prime Minister, David Cameron, that Great Britain was pledging an extra £110 million in foreign aid to North Africa got him on the wrong side of several British tabloids, including the Daily Mail and the Daily Express.
US is Right to Give Aid to Somalia, Despite Risk of Helping Al Shabab
The answer to the crisis would seem to be aid from the outside, but control of southern Somalia by al Shabab, an Islamic militia designated as a terrorist group by the US State Department, poses a legal and political wrinkle.
The Secret War in Somalia
Writing in the Nation this week, Jeremy Scahill revealed that the CIA is running "a counterterrorism training program for Somali intelligence agents and operatives" at Mogadishu’s airport and also using a secret prison in the beleaguered Horn of Africa nation.
Somalia’s Drought, America’s Dilemma
The Horn of Africa is currently wracked by what seems to be its worst drought in 60 years, with tremendous humanitarian consequences.
US ‘Extends Drone Strikes to Somalia’
Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, a counterterrorism expert at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, told Al Jazeera that the attack in Somalia emphasised America's new approach to counterterrorism, which favours "surgical strikes".
The Battle for Libya: Implications for Africa
As battle lines crisscross between the rebels marching west to overthrow him and loyal military units taking the offensive against rebel-held towns in the eastern Libya, Colonel Muammar al-Qadhafi's fight for survival is being generally viewed through the optic of the shifting sands of...
A New Chapter for Africa
On Sunday, Southern Sudanese in their millions flocked to some three thousand polling stations set up not only in Sudan, but around the world to the accommodate the far-flung diaspora, to cast their ballots in an exercise that for many represents the emotional culmination of a struggle that...
Turkey’s Return to Africa
In the end, neither the superabundant expressions of support voiced by donor nations for the ramshackle “Transitional Federal Government” (TFG) of Somalia nor that regime’s corresponding utter lack of promise – President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed spent the week preceding quarreling...
AFRICOM: Terrorism and Security Challenges in Africa
AFRICOM is not merely a post-Cold War experiment to respond to the security challenges of the twenty-first century, but also a much-needed updating of the internal structural framework that has long handicapped efforts by the U.S. military to build bilateral and multilateral partnerships and...
