LA CHAUMIERE RESTAURANT, DJIBOUTI – Wanting to help your neighbour going through a hard time may be ‘neighbourly’ but it can invite terrible consequences.
They say good fences make good neighbours. I guess this appeals to our territoriality as humans, always wanting to make sure we all know what belongs to whom. We have a long history of making lines on maps – even if these lines make no sense of facts on the ground. We just want to put our markers down and woe to those who ignore them!
So what do we do when the neighbours are in trouble? Do we turn a blind eye and hunker down, pretending not to have seen or heard anything? Or do we offer our assistance?
What if the neighbour is dealing with a terrorist group?
This has come up a lot in recent years in eastern Africa, especially Somalia where the Islamist terrorist group Al Shabaab has been wreaking havoc for almost two decades. Somalia has been more or less a failed state for three decades and is nowhere near able to handle these terrorists on their own. So the neighbours (primarily Kenya and Uganda under the auspices of the African Union) have intervened, as has Djibouti, a tiny statelet on the Red Sea
So what happens when the terrorists target the foreign state to warn against ‘meddling’ in the affairs of others?
On this day in 2014
Al Shabaab claimed a suicide attack on the Chaumiere Restaurant in Djibouti in which one patron was killed and 14 Europeans and an undisclosed number of locals were injured. A man and a woman blew themselves up at a restaurant which was packed with Western military personnel (Djibouti is a former French colony and serves as a base for several military counter terrorism ops in the region).
As part of the ongoing Jihad against the Western-led Crusade against Islam, Harakat Al-Shabaab Al Mujahideen forces have on Saturday night carried out a successful operation against the coalition of Western Crusaders based in Djibouti.
Al Shabaab statement
Many believed that the attack was linked to Djibouti’s ongoing military deployment in Somalia, where its troops make up part of the the African Union mission (AMISOM) force. Kenya and Uganda have also suffered Al Shabaab attacks. There is a price, you see, for keeping the neighbourhood safe – and free from terrorism.
Read More Today in Terrorism
May 31, 1906: Spanish anarchist bombs royal wedding
On May 31, 1906 a Spanish anarchist threw a bomb hoping to hit King Alfonso XIII, killing 24 and wounding more than 100.
May 30, 2009: Anti-government group bombs TV station in Ecuador
On May 30, 2009 two pamphlet-bombs exploded outside an Ecuadorian TV station and ministry: no victims or significant damage ensued.
May 29, 2016: ISIS uses chlorine gas in terrorist attack
On May 29, 2016 35 civilians were wounded in an ISIS attack using rockets containing chlorine gas in Iraq’s Nineveh Province.
