The Islamic Movement In Somalia

There is very little scholarship on the history of political Islam in Somalia that takes seriously both historical forces as well as the very ideas and internal organization of the Islamic movements. This book reconstructs the history of modern and moderate Islamic movement in Somalia. It covers 50 years of turbulent Somali history, in which civilian governments, military dictatorships, armed opposition factions, and Islamic movements were interacting and shaping the Somali history. It divides Islamic development in Somalia into four historical periods: the Islamic revival (1800-1950), the Islamic consciousness ( 1950-1967), the Islamic awakening (1967-1978) and the Islamic movements (1978-2000).The book provides a detailed and empirically rich narrative of the Islah Movement as a case study which has influenced and made an impact on other Islamist organizations in recent decades. The author provides an insider's view of the Islamic Movement being one of the leaders of Islah.

There is very little scholarship on the history of Islamic development in Somalia which seriously takes into consideration both historical forces and the very ideas and internal organization of the Islamic movements. This book reconstructs the historical evolution of moderate Islamic movement in Somalia using postcolonial perspective. It succinctly accounts for the revival of Sufi brotherhoods since 1800s, focusing on the 50-year period (1950-2000) in which civilian governments, military dictatorships, armed opposition factions and Islamic movements were interacting and reshaping the Somali history. It divides Islamic development in Somalia into four historical periods: the Islamic revival (1800-1950), the Islamic consciousness ( 1950-1967), the Islamic awakening (1967-1978) and the Islamic movements (1978-2000). The book provides empirically rich narrative of the Islah Movement as a case study which has an impact on the social and political developments in Somalia since the collapse of the state in 1991. The author provides an insider's view of the Islamic Movement being one of the leaders of Islah. __________ Abdurahman M. Abdullahi (Baadiyow) was born in 1954 in Somalia. He combines rare skills of being a high ranking military officer (19971-1986) with being an electronic engineer, Islamic scholar and socio-political activist. He obtained MA &PhD in Modern Islamic History from the Islamic Institute, McGill University, Canada. He is one of the founders of the Mogadishu University and currently the Chairman of its Board of Trustees. He was a presidential candidate in the 2012 election in Somalia. Currently, he is the leader of the National Unity Party (Midnimoqaran) and the vice-president of the Forum for Unity and Democracy, the largest political coalition in Somalia that advocates for democratic transformation. Besides his political career and socio-political activism, Dr. Abdullahi is a prominent Islamic scholar and has participated in many academic conferences and published a number of academic papers, book chapters and feature articles in Arabic, Somali and English languages.

There is very little scholarship on the history of Islamic development in Somalia which seriously takes into consideration both historical forces and the very ideas and internal organization of the Islamic movements. This book reconstructs the historical evolution of moderate Islamic movement in Somalia using postcolonial perspective. It succinctly accounts for the revival of Sufi brotherhoods since 1800s, focusing on the 50-year period (1950-2000) in which civilian governments, military dictatorships, armed opposition factions and Islamic movements were interacting and reshaping the Somali history. It divides Islamic development in Somalia into four historical periods: the Islamic revival (1800-1950), the Islamic consciousness ( 1950-1967), the Islamic awakening (1967-1978) and the Islamic movements (1978-2000). The book provides empirically rich narrative of the Islah Movement as a case study which has an impact on the social and political developments in Somalia since the collapse of the state in 1991. The author provides an insider's view of the Islamic Movement being one of the leaders of Islah. __________ Abdurahman M. Abdullahi (Baadiyow) was born in 1954 in Somalia. He combines rare skills of being a high ranking military officer (19971-1986) with being an electronic engineer, Islamic scholar and socio-political activist. He obtained MA &PhD in Modern Islamic History from the Islamic Institute, McGill University, Canada. He is one of the founders of the Mogadishu University and currently the Chairman of its Board of Trustees. He was a presidential candidate in the 2012 election in Somalia. Currently, he is the leader of the National Unity Party (Midnimoqaran) and the vice-president of the Forum for Unity and Democracy, the largest political coalition in Somalia that advocates for democratic transformation. Besides his political career and socio-political activism, Dr. Abdullahi is a prominent Islamic scholar and has participated in many academic conferences and published a number of academic papers, book chapters and feature articles in Arabic, Somali and English languages.

Somalia is often used as an emblem of a collapsed state. This is somewhat of a paradox given that in previous decades the country was one of the most unified states in Africa and one of the first democracies on the continent. In the last three decades however the country has faced enormous challenges including civil wars and extremism in the name of Islam. The book - probably one of the first to link Islam, Islamism and Transitional Justice with the Somali State recovery project - offers unique analyses of these themes and argues that recovering the Somali state will largely be contingent upon the skillful reconciliation between tradition and modernity, Islam and state and between the secular and the sacred.

Since 1991 Somalia has been defined as a failing state, one that lacks an effective central government. The vacuum of power in Somalia, in turn, enabled Al Qaida and other radical Islamic organizations to find allies and refuge in there. Shay's account shows how the presence of radical Islamic entities in the area, alongside local problems and conflicts, has turned Somalia into a focal point in the global war against terror. On June 5, 2006, the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) declared victory in its struggle against the Alliance for the Restoration of Peace and Counter Terrorism (ARPCT), a coalition of U.S. backed warlords. Shortly after their victory announcement, the ICU implemented a Taliban-style radical Islamic rule. The rule of the ICU was brief. In December 2006 they were defeated by a coalition of the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) and Ethiopian forces. In spite of the ICU's defeat, internal conflict in Somalia between the ICU and the interim government of Somalia (TFG), backed by Ethiopia, is still far from concluded. Shay shows how the internal conflict may spill over into other nations, creating a larger regional theater of Jihad. He also provides some ideas on how to prevent the foundation of a new radical Islamic state that could become a haven of the Islamic terror in the Horn of Africa. This volume is instructive in demonstrating the consequences of destabilisation. It will be of interest to foreign policy analysts, regional specialists, and strategists in the war against terror.

In the last three decades, Somalia has been associated with such horrible terms as 'state collapse', 'civil wars', 'foreign intervention', 'warlordism', 'famine', 'piracy' and 'terrorism'. This depiction was in contradiction to its earlier images as the cradle of the human race, the kernel of ancient civilizations, the land of Punt, a homogeneous nation-state and the first democratic state in Africa. So how did things fall apart in the country? This Volume 1 of a two-volume narrative, Dr. Abdullahi explores the history of the people of Somali peninsula since ancient times, the advent of Islam and colonialism, the rise and fall of Somali nationalism and the perspectives of the Somali state collapse. The book uses a unique thematic approach and analysis to make sense of Somali history by emphasizing the responsibility of Somali political elites in creating and perpetuating the disastrous conditions in their country.

Shari'a, Inshallah shows how people have used shari'a to struggle for peace, justice, and human rights in Somalia and Somaliland.

Since early 2007 a new breed of combatants has appeared on the streets of Mogadishu and other towns in Somalia: the 'Shabaab', or youth, the only self-proclaimed branch of al-Qaeda to have gained acceptance (and praise) from Ayman al-Zawahiri and 'AQ centre' in Afghanistan. Itself an offshoot of the Islamic Courts Union, which split in 2006, Shabaab has imposed Sharia law and is also heavily influenced by local clan structures within Somalia itself. It remains an infamous and widely discussed, yet little-researched and understood, Islamist group. Hansen's remarkable book attempts to go beyond the media headlines and simplistic analyses based on alarmist or localist narratives and, by employing intensive field research conducted within Somalia, as well as on the ground interviews with Shabaab leaders themselves, explores the history of a remarkable organisation, one that has survived predictions of its collapse on several occasions. Hansen portrays al-Shabaab as a hybrid Islamist organization that combines a strong streak of Somali nationalism with the rhetorical obligations of international jihadism, thereby attracting a not insignificant number of foreign fighters to its ranks. Both these strands of Shabaab have been inadvertently boosted by Ethiopian, American and African Union attempts to defeat it militarily, all of which have come to nought.