OSINT SUMMARY
16th November 2015, Al Shabaab militants executed a prominent Muslim cleric in public between Beledweyn and Jowhar towns.
The cleric identified as Sheikh Abba was paraded by the militants had forcibly invited the public in an open field to come and witness the execution.
The slain cleric who lived in the Bari regional town of Bosasso was captured by the Somali based Al Shabaab militants while on his way to Mogadishu.
The militants forced him out of the public vehicle he was travelling in and provided no explanation of why he was to be executed though Al Shabaab had arrested five pro-ISIS commanders, leading a faction threatening splitting of the Al Shabaab militant group.
The Al Qaeda affiliated jihadists have their own radical clerics and are known to conduct executions on Muslim clerics who preach against their violent extremist ideologies as a way of intimidation and instilling fear to other clerics.
The execution of Sheikh Abba is one among many others that goes unreported clearly showing Al Shabaab is a terrorist group which only knows about killings contrary to what ‘true Islam is– peace’ and its time public in Somalia and broader East African region start working closely with security agencies to defeat terrorism.
