Anti Israel and Ethiopia protest in Somali capital

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Anti Israel and Ethiopia protest in Somali capital
Fri. August 11, 2006 08:35 am.

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Mohamed Abdi Farah

(SomaliNet) Mass rally against the Israeli raids on southern Lebanon and Palestine in Middle East has been held in Somalia capital Mogadishu on Friday.

Hundreds of Islamist supporters have gathered at the Tarabunka Square in south of Mogadishu after the Friday prayer in protest against the aggression of Israel on Lebanon and Palestine and also the continuing intervention of Ethiopian troops into Somalia.

Residents from several districts of Banadir province participated in todayÂ’s protest, organized by religious men.

People were chanting anti Israeli and Ethiopia slogans ‘down the Zionists’ ‘down Ethiopia’.

“We are expressing our deepest sadness to the massacre by Zionists on the Muslim people in Lebanon and Palestine and we are in favor of Hizbulahi fighters for their strong resistance on Israel,” one of the protestors said. “We beg God to give our Muslim brothers the upper hand.

Islamic officials and other religious people have attended the demonstration denouncing Israeli raids and mass killings of women and children in the Middle East. They expressed their full support for Lebanesse and Palestinian resistance.

The Islamic authorities asked for immediate stop of Israeli attacks on Lebanon and Palestine and also Israel should withdraw from the southern part of Lebanon, amid Israel continues its bombardments on Lebanon.

In the rally, people cast their total objection to the presence of Ethiopian troops in some parts of Somalia particular in Bay and Bakol regions in southwest Somalia.

Earlier, the US government reached out its Ethiopian ally not to allow Somalia to come safe heaven to terrorist groups.

Washington had expressed its concern over the immediate rise of Islamists in Somalia soon after the Islamic courts took control of Somalia capital, Mogadishu and other key parts in the south following heavy and bloody clashes in the capital in which the US backed warlords – once influential actors in the politics - were defeated. Islamic Courts deny the US accusations that they link to Al-Qaeda.

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Leader of Somalia's militant group Islamic Council, Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, addresses residents of Mogadishu this week.


Manage Alerts | What Is This? MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) -- More than 2,000 people gathered after Friday prayers for a pro-Lebanon rally organized by Mogadishu's new fundamentalist rulers, calling for holy war and chanting "Down with the enemies of Islam, wherever they are!"

Yusuf Ali Siad, one of the organizers, said the protest was sparked by the monthlong conflict between Israel and Lebanon that has killed more than 800 people, mostly in Lebanon.

"We must sympathize with our brothers in Lebanon," Siad told The Associated Press. "It is compulsory to join the holy war."

The demonstrators also shouted slogans against the United States and neighboring Ethiopia, which is Somalia's longtime enemy.

A similar protest was held in neighboring Kenya, drawing about 300 people to Nairobi's main mosque. The protesters, most of them young men, carried signs saying "Israel Stop Killing Our Brothers and Sisters" and "End America's Terrorism of Army Invasion in Iraq."

Somalia has not had an effective central government since warlords toppled longtime dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991 and then turned on each other, plunging the country into anarchy.

As Islamic militants seized the capital and much of southern Somalia in recent months, the country's virtually powerless official government could only watch helplessly.

The Islamists have been imposing strict religious courts, raising fears of an emerging Taliban-style regime. The United States accuses the group of harboring al Qaeda leaders responsible for deadly bombings at the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998.

The conflict in Somalia has sent an average of 100 Somali refugees streaming into Kenyan refugee camps every day, according to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.

"If the current rate of arrival continues, we can expect another 12,000 refugees by the end of the year," the UNHCR said in a statement. The Dadaab camps in northeast Kenya already have some 134,000 refugees, mostly Somalis.

Somalia's government was formed two years ago with the support of the U.N., but it has failed to assert power outside its base in Baidoa, 255 kilometers (150 miles) from Mogadishu.

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