Islamic Courts Make a Stand in South Somalia

The New York Times continues its cheerleading for the Ethiopians describing their "heroic" rescue of the UN supported government of Somalia. While this move may well temporarily improve the situation of the government, unless the moderate clerics with the Islamic Courts can be separated from the Al Qaeda allies, there will be no real progress, just a long grueling guerrilla war along the Kenyan border further destabilizing both countries.

A phalanx of Ethiopian tanks and armored personnel carriers chugged toward the last city occupied by Somalia’s diminished Islamist movement, witnesses said today, setting the stage for one final major battle. According to residents along Somalia’s coast, the Ethiopian troops, along with soldiers from Somalia’s transitional government, were preparing to seize Kismayo, a port city near the Kenyan border where the Islamist leaders have holed up.


Sheilk Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, a high-ranking cleric, vowed not to go down without a fight. "I want to tell you that the Islamic courts are still alive and ready to fight against the enemy of Allah," Mr. Ahmed told residents of Kismayo in a speech today. "We left Mogadishu in order to prevent bloodshed in the capital, but that does not mean we lost the holy war against our enemy.” Mr. Ahmed called on Somalis to begin an anti-Ethiopian insurgency, and already several masked gunmen have surfaced on Mogadishu’s streets.


Diplomats in Kenya, though, said that they were talking to moderate representatives of the Islamic movement today, trying to persuade them to back down.


In Mogadishu, the presence of Ethiopian troops continued to spark violence, with supporters of the Ethiopians battling street by street against the remaining Islamist partisans. Gunshots rang out, men and women battled with sticks and rocks and the thick black smoke of burning barricades lifted into the air.