Background on January 2019 Al-Shabaab Attack in Nairobi

The CTC Sentinel published in July 2019 an article titled "East Africa's Terrorist Triple Helix: The Dusit Hotel Attack and the Historical Evolution of the Jihadi Threat" by Matt Bryden and Premdeep Bahra, both with the Sahan think tank in Nairobi.

The authors point out that the attack on 15 January 2019 of an office complex in Nairobi, Kenya, by al-Shabaab that killed 21 people and injured at least 28 involved Kenyan nationals of non-Somali descent. They conclude that al-Shabaab's longstanding ambition to transcend its Somali origins and become a truly regional organization is becoming a reality, representing a new and dangerous phase in the group's evolution and the threat that it poses to the region.

Kenya 2014 Religious Freedom Report

The State Department has released the Kenya 2014 International Religious Freedom Report.  According to the Kenyan government, Kenya is about 82 percent Christian and 11 percent Muslim.  There are also small minorities of Hindus, Sikhs, and Bahais. 

Religious tensions were high in some areas of the country, usually following attacks by the Somali-based terrorist group al-Shabaab.  Some Muslims, especially ethnic Somalis, stated their communities were the target of government-directed extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrest and detention, and deportation, charges the government denied.  Muslim leaders and human rights organizations stated "Operation Usalama Watch" unfairly targeted Somali and some other Muslim communities.

Islamic Radicalization in Kenya

The latest issue of Joint Forces Quarterly published an article titled "Islamic Radicalization in Kenya" by William R. Patterson, a former social scientist with the Human Terrain System.

The author concludes that Islam is on a track of increasing radicalization in Kenya and groups linked to al-Qaeda and al-Shabaab pose a significant and growing threat to Kenya and to Western persons and interests.