TerrorismU.S. Special Forces kill al Shabab leader in Somalia, capture al Qaeda fugitive in Libya
A Navy SEAL team attacked – and, in all likelihood, killed — a senior al-Shabab leader in an early Saturday raid on his seaside villa in the Somali town of Baraawe, 150 miles south of the capital Mogadishu. American officials said the raid was in response to the militant group’s attack on the Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi three weeks ago. This was the most significant raid by American troops on Somali soil since commandos killed Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, a Qaeda mastermind, near the same town in 2009. In a separate raid, U.S. commandos captured Nazih Abd al Hamid al-Ruqhay, known by his nom de guerre, Abu Anas el-Liby, a senior leader of al Qaeda indicted in the 1998 bombings of the United States embassies in Kenya and. The capture ends a 15-year manhunt. El-Liby, since 2000, has been high on the list of the U.S. government’s most-wanted list, and the FBI had placed a $5 million reward on his head.
U.S. Special Forces last night launched two raids against leading terrorists – killing a senior al Shabab leader in Somalia and capturing a leading al Qaeda fugitive in Libya.
Libya
A Navy SEAL team attacked – and, in all likelihood, killed — a senior al-Shabab leader in an early Saturday raid on his seaside villa in the Somali town of Baraawe, 150 miles south of the capital Mogadishu. American officials said the raid was in response to the militant group’s attack on the Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi three weeks ago.
The New York Times reports that this was the most significant raid by American troops on Somali soil since commandos killed Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, a Qaeda mastermind, near the same town in 2009. Nabham was the mastermind behind the 1998 attacks on two U.S. embassies in east Africa.
The U.S. military does not engage in such operations often because of the risk they carry. As was the case with the raid on bin Laden’s villa in Pakistan, such operations are undertaken only when the target is deemed to be of high value.
“The Baraawe raid was planned a week and a half ago,” a U.S. security official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told the Times. “It was prompted by the Westgate attack,” he added.
The SEAL team, in the predawn hours, quietly approached the beachfront house by sea before exchanging gunfire with the militants who were guarding it. The SEAL team accomplished its initial mission, but did not stick around to verify the killing because, one official said, they found themselves in an “extremely hostile environment.” This means that there were more al Sabab militants in the vicinity of the villa than had been anticipated, or that more of them had been able to rush toward the villa, and that the SEAL fighters decided that it might be too costly to stay and fight – and take casualties – only for the purpose of verifying the death of the al Shabab leader.
Another reason for leaving the scene of the fight was fear of Somali civilian casualties: the SEAL unit had sufficient firepower, stationed off-shore, to overwhelm the al Shabab fighters, but at the risk of killing many Somali civilians.
