Western-Zionist Ambitions in the Horn of Africa

Following the collapse of the Eastern Bloc and the emergence of a new American-led international order, Western-Zionist interest in the Horn of Africa has resurfaced. This renewed focus is driven by the region's strategic location, the aspirations of its peoples to break free from the nightmare of foreign hegemony, and the emergence of signs of awareness regarding the importance of this African gateway for spreading the Islamic call throughout the Black Continent.

The Importance of the Region in Strategic Planning

The significance of this region has increased following major transformations within its principal countries (Somalia, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Eritrea) or those neighboring and surrounding it (Sudan, Yemen, Kenya), in addition to the evolution of relations among all these parties, which are linked in turn to international balances and circumstances. The main milestones of this transformation process include Eritrea's independence from Ethiopia (formerly Abyssinia) after 30 years of struggle, foreign intervention under the auspices of the United Nations in Somalia, the establishment of a new political system in Sudan with a clear Islamic project, entry into a democratic experience via parliamentary elections in Yemen following the unification of its northern and southern parts, and the fall of the Ethiopian communist dictatorial regime led by Mengistu Haile Mariam.

Major Transformations

However, these transformations, their regional repercussions, and the interaction of international powers with them cannot be understood without a historical reading of the most important phases the region has traversed. These can be summarized into four major phases: Arab-African coexistence, colonial conquest, the American-Soviet conflict over spheres of influence in the Horn of Africa and Africa in general, and the current phase under the new international order.

Arab-African Coexistence

The East African coasts witnessed the succession of numerous civilizations, and Arabs in turn realized the importance of these regions, undertaking successive migrations driven primarily by commercial objectives during the eras of Omanis, Yemenites, and Hadhramis, and later for religious reasons since the emergence of Islam in the land of the Hijaz. The first Islamic migration, led by Jaafar bin Abi Talib—the cousin of the Messenger of Allah (pbuh)—headed to Abyssinia, the center of gravity of Christianity in Africa during the reign of the Negus. This religious tolerance had a profound impact on civilizational coexistence among various cultural and religious entities spread across the East African coasts. Several historians speak of the consolidation of the ancient relationship between the western coast and the African coast after the emergence of Islam. Ibrahim Tarkhan states in his book «Islam and Islamic Kingdoms in Abyssinia» that the emergence of Islam helped inject new blood into the veins of these relationships, which witnessed remarkable prosperity in early Islam to the extent that Islamic kingdoms were subsequently formed in Abyssinia and the African coast, neighboring Christian rule and coexisting with it.

This coexistence was the prominent fundamental feature during this historical phase extending until the beginning of the 16th century AD, the date of the Portuguese conquest of the East African coasts. In his evaluation of the results of this prosperous historical period, Salahuddin Hafez reviewed in his book «The Superpower Conflict over the Horn of Africa» the manifestations of the Arab-Islamic civilizational resurgence and «the successful, permanent, and continuous intermarriage between Arabs and Africans in Somalia, Eritrea, Abyssinia, Zanzibar, and even Mozambique to the south.» Successive waves of Arab migration and their continuous intermarriage with native Africans left far-reaching impacts in strengthening Arab-African relations over the years, encompassing economic, political, religious, social, and cultural dimensions. Along with the Arabic language and Islam, other manifestations of Arab civilization—such as the architecture of house building, cities, and trade centers, up to the dissemination of centers of culture and science—were transferred to the African coast. These are, of course, the most powerful and enduring impacts of the intermarriage between Arabs and Africans of all time.

Foreign Conquest

With the Portuguese conquest, a new phase began that paved the way for foreign colonialism and upended the balance of power in the region. Among the most dangerous consequences of this phase was the deprivation of the East African coasts at the level of the Horn of Africa and the Red Sea of the important commercial benefits that had primarily accrued to Arab trade centers. This occurred after the historical route of Eastern trade via the Arab homeland toward Europe was diverted to a new route passing via the Cape of Good Hope, discovered by the Portuguese. The new beneficiary of this transformation was the rising European powers, which subsequently became colonial empires that came to Africa to inherit the Ottoman legacy in the north of the continent and on its eastern coasts.

This phase was characterized by intense colonial rivalry among Britain, France, and Italy to expand in Africa and control strategic control areas, passages, and water straits holding sway over international trade routes. It is well known that the geographical and political strategic factor played a fundamental role in shaping internal events and transformations in the Horn of Africa region and the positions of international powers toward them in the direction of entrenching foreign ambitions in the region. Geographically, the Horn of Africa occupies an important strategic location by overlooking one of the main international maritime passages, namely the Red Sea with its southern entrance (Bab el-Mandeb) and northern entrance (the Suez Canal, inaugurated by France in November 1869).

The Berlin Conference of 1884–1885 is considered the decisive turning point in formalizing the European colonial race by setting boundaries for new colonies and imposing a political reality that established varying and different internal power balances in favor of the Ethiopian Empire and at the expense of the Somali party, leaving serious negative effects to this day. Somalia was divided into four parts subject to the spheres of influence of the three colonial powers and the Ethiopian Empire. France occupied northern Somalia, specifically the Afar and Issa region (modern-day Djibouti). After Britain seized Aden in 1839, its armies occupied the Somali coast facing its base in Aden and controlling the southern entrances of the Red Sea. The Italians managed to occupy the coasts of southern Somalia, the entire «Benadir» coast in 1889 from an area located south of the Gulf of Aden down to the city of Kismayo, in addition to occupying Eritrea in 1890. Italy exploited the British-French rivalry and the Egyptian-British preoccupation with the Mahdist Revolution in Sudan to impose its control over the region.

The Colonial-Ethiopian Alliance

What draws attention, however, is the strategic alliance between the European colonial countries and Ethiopia since the era of Menelik II (1889–1913) and subsequently Emperor Haile Selassie. During Menelik's era, Ethiopia's borders expanded to become an empire, incorporating numerous parts of Somali lands, especially Ogaden and Haud. Wishing to gain international recognition for his expansionist ambitions, Menelik sent a famous letter to the kings of Europe informing them of the new borders of Abyssinia, dated April 10, 1891, in which he stated: «If we trace the borders existing today of my empire, I will try, if Allah grants me age and strength, to return this empire to its old borders extending to the Sudanese city of Khartoum and Lake Nyanza.» He added: «Abyssinia has remained a Christian island for 14 centuries amidst an ocean of infidel atheists. If foreign countries located far away—meaning the European colonial countries—have come to partition African lands among themselves, I will not stand by as a spectator.»

Based on these facts, it becomes clear that the backgrounds of this Western-Ethiopian alliance were primarily religious, cultural, and civilizational, and secondarily political. The religious rapprochement between Ethiopia during the imperial era prior to the 1974 coup and the Christian Western powers pushed both parties to ally against the Islamic presence in the region through the partition of the Somali entity and the annexation of what remained of the Islamic kingdoms surrounding it—the Christian Abyssinian plateau that coexisted with its system prior to foreign intervention—including the last Arab-Islamic emirate in the Horn of Africa, the Emirate of «Gomma», which Haile Selassie annexed to his empire in the 1930s.

This alliance was embodied in treaties and agreements between the two parties, such as the 1897 treaty by which Britain handed over the Somali Ogaden after handing over Harar, where the Egyptians had been present. In 1955, Britain handed over the Somali «Haud» region to Abyssinia. In May 1908, Italy and Abyssinia signed a treaty demarcating the borders of the Somali lands occupied by each party. In 1906, an agreement was reached between the European countries and Ethiopia explicitly stipulating support and backing for the Ethiopian Empire and the preservation of its entity and borders, where the signatory European countries affirmed in the fourth paragraph of the agreement their full commitment to preserving the unity of the Ethiopian Empire if it were exposed to any threat.

Thus, Ethiopia entered as a full and direct partner in the European partition of Africa, and Menelik the Ethiopian, creator of the modern empire, donned the same colonial attire as the kings of Europe. His successor, Emperor Haile Selassie, followed the same path and method, placing himself in the position of European leaders, allied with them in both war and peace alike. Just as Menelik had sent his army between 1900 and 1904 to assist his colonial ally Britain in crushing the Mahdist Revolution in Sudan and the Somali revolution led by Mohammed Abdullah Hassan—who began his revolution in 1897—Haile Selassie volunteered to send some of his soldiers as well to assist America in the Korean War as an expression of solidarity in times good and bad. This colonial phase ended by entrenching the division of the region into warring ethnicities and nationalities between Somalia and Ethiopia, and imposing Ethiopian hegemony over a wide sector of Somali lands, with the Ogaden region alone estimated at one-third of today's Ethiopia's area.

International Polarization

True to form, the Western colonial powers were keen to ensure their interests in the region before the departure of their soldiers and the independence of the countries of the Horn of Africa. Thus, the third phase was characterized by the intertwining of the superpower conflict during the past three decades with internal political transformations and the struggle for power among factions with different ethnic affiliations, alongside the conflict between rising national and Islamic regimes and forces.

Amidst the weakness of the European colonial empires following two fierce wars, America emerged, successfully supervising East-West communication lines and control points in the arteries of international trade by establishing military bases and communication bases in Ethiopia and occupied Eritrean lands in exchange for protecting the Ethiopian emperor's regime and granting it all prerogatives to expand in the region. It suffices to note that Ethiopia is among the first African countries to reclaim sovereignty over its lands a decade ahead of the wave of independence in Africa and Asia, facilitated by Western support.

Following Italy's waiver of its rights over its old colonies in light of the Paris Peace Treaties of 1947, Ethiopia reoccupied Ogaden in 1948 following Britain's withdrawal from this Somali region. On December 2, 1950, United Nations Resolution 1090 was issued, stipulating the establishment of an Ethiopian-Eritrean federation, which stated: «Now the General Assembly, in view of the report of the United Nations Commission for Eritrea and the report of the Interim Committee, takes into account:

a. The maintenance of peace and security in East Africa.

a. The maintenance of peace and security in East Africa.

b. The rights and claims of Ethiopia based on geographical, historical, racial, and economic grounds, including in particular Ethiopia's legitimate need for adequate access to the sea; and recognizing that the disposal of Eritrea must be based on its close political and economic association with Ethiopia, recommends that Eritrea shall constitute an autonomous unit federated with Ethiopia.»

Through this resolution, it becomes clear that one of the main reasons for annexing Eritrea to Christian Ethiopia was to secure the latter's access to the Red Sea so that it would have influence and an eye to monitor the Gulf of Aden and Bab el-Mandeb, noting that it also controls the sources of the Blue Nile, Sobat, and Atbarah, which provide 80 percent of the waters of this river.

With the beginning of the 1960s, political developments took place in the region, represented by the independence of Somalia on July 1, 1960, through the merger of two old colonies: British Somaliland and Italian Somaliland, and the establishment of a republic whose first constitution stipulated working to restore its sovereignty and unity by annexing the remaining five regions, namely French Somaliland, the Afars and Issas, the Western Somali Coast, Ogaden from Ethiopia, and the North-Eastern Province of Kenya. One year later, the armed struggle of the Eritrean people was launched following the formation of the Eritrean Liberation Front, demanding the right to self-determination and independence from Ethiopia, which hurried on November 14, 1962, to end the federation and completely merge Eritrea into the empire without the international community moving to protest Ethiopian practices.

Alliances and Counter-Alliances

Faced with Western-American hegemony over major regions in the Horn of Africa, the Soviet Union, in light of the Cold War, sought to gain a foothold in these strategic regions in order to approach energy sources, monitor the movement of global trade, and play the role of a partner in the Arab-Zionist conflict. In a first step, it managed to penetrate the American sphere of influence by signing the first military agreement with the modern Somali Republic in 1961, supplying it with weapons overtly since 1963 at a time when British-Somali relations became tense due to Somalia's insistence on annexing the northeastern region of Kenya, which was still under the occupation of the British Crown.

The Americans realized the danger of the Soviet Union breaking out of its isolation within the Eastern Bloc, and Somalia was a prospective new Vietnam whose front the Soviets attempted to open to exhaust the American effort in the Horn of Africa.

American fears were reflected in Ethiopian positions as Ethiopia exploited its hosting of the Organization of African Unity to influence its decisions and recommendations. African presidents at the first conference of the organization in Addis Ababa in May 1963 rejected the Somali request to recognize the right to self-determination of the Somali regions under Ethiopian and Kenyan control under the banner of «inviolability of existing borders between African states,» as stipulated by the organization's charter. On this basis, the organization intervened to halt the armed confrontation between Somalia and Ethiopia in the Ogaden region in 1964, and both the Soviet Union and America called for resolving the conflict peacefully.

New Balances

However, with the end of the 1960s and the beginning of the 1970s, important transformations occurred in the political map of the Horn of Africa. Faced with the weakness of the Somali civilian government, its reduction of demands for a greater Somalia, and its concession before French colonialism regarding Djibouti, a political crisis occurred in Mogadishu resulting in the assassination of President Sharmarke on October 15, 1969. A military coup took place on the 21st of the same month, through which Siad Barre assumed power and announced the establishment of a republic adopting scientific socialism as a foundational basis in its policy. The new regime threw itself into the arms of the Soviet Union, which provided massive military and economic aid, though the Somali regime also established relations with other parties such as China, Cuba, and Saudi Arabia, especially after becoming a member of the Arab League.

In contrast, Barre's regime entered into a confrontation with the nascent Islamic movement, the most significant milestones of which were the execution of ten scholars in 1975 and the trial of 25 others before the State Security Court on charges of distributing pamphlets and inciting opposition to the new family law that places Islamic Sharia on trial. The Islamic movement stood against the secular communist orientation of the regime and paid a heavy price.

As for the Ethiopian side, the late 1960s and early 1970s witnessed weakness and deterioration in the conditions of the empire, culminating in the 1974 coup, Mengistu Mariam's assumption of power, and the establishment of a radical communist regime in which the Soviet Union found a strategic ally. Mengistu exploited his strong position to launch a counter-offensive on the Ogaden region and, thanks to Soviet-Cuban assistance, managed to defeat the offensive. Mengistu also attacked the Eritrean revolutionary movements starting in July 1978 and occupied the major part of Eritrea. On November 20, 1978, a friendship and cooperation treaty was signed between Moscow and Addis Ababa.

The Ethiopian revolutionary regime stood out by adopting a one-person party system and pursuing a tyrannical policy dubbed the Red Terror, whose victims reached about 25,000 people, a large percentage of whom were Muslims who demanded their religious and civil rights.

The Soviet Union found in this new ally major compensation for the setbacks it suffered in Egypt, Sudan, and then Somalia, following the expulsion of its military experts from Egypt, Moscow being accused of standing behind the coup plotters in Khartoum in 1971, and the shift in Barre's regime toward the West in the wake of the deterioration of Somalia's relations with Moscow during the Ogaden War in 1977 and 1978 and the expulsion of Soviet experts from Mogadishu.

Zionist Infiltration

Since that date, the Horn of Africa region entered into new balances and alliances, and Western-American hegemony returned to the eastern coasts at a time when an important factor emerged, represented by Zionist infiltration into the region and the establishment of strategic relations with Ethiopia as the sole non-Arab party in the region. Zionist and Ethiopian interests converge in monitoring vital arteries, expanding into the African continent, and encircling the Islamic spread.

This international polarization situation continued until the collapse of the Soviet Union and the establishment of a new unipolar international order under American leadership, and the region entered a new phase. Among the most important of these data were the fall of the communist regime in Addis Ababa at the end of May 1991 and the entry of the rebels of the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front and the election of Meles Zenawi as president of the republic. In Somalia, the fall of Siad Barre's regime in January 1991 resulted in a vague constitutional situation marked by fierce conflicts that ended with foreign American intervention under the banner of the United Nations.

On the other hand, a coup took place in Sudan in June 1989, leading to a regime with a clear Islamic orientation, while Yemen entered a new parliamentary experience in which the Islamic Reform Movement emerged, and the Eritrean people succeeded in achieving their independence on May 24, 1991, after 30 years of armed struggle.

Ethiopian-Zionist Alliance

The new Ethiopian regime consolidated its relations with the Western camp and the Zionist entity in exchange for important financial, political, and military aid. On the other hand, a report issued by Quds Press Agency on May 10, 1993, quoting sources in the Israeli Foreign Ministry, stated that «Israel» decided to grant Ethiopia priority status in economic and technological assistance. Peres described the relationship between the two parties, saying: It is historical, geographical, and strategic relations, pointing to the geographical importance of Ethiopia.

This report confirms ancient relations, one of the landmarks of which was the displacement of Ethiopian Jews known as the Falashas, and also confirms the relations of the new Eritrean regime led by Afwerki with the Zionist entity. It spoke of security agreements between the Zionist entity and Afwerki's government, in the light of which "Israel" regained its military bases in the Dahlak Islands, which is considered a threat to the Horn of Africa region, the Red Sea basin countries, and the Arabian Gulf.

Foreign Intervention in Somalia

As for the Somali party, it fell as a result of civil war and famine into the trap of external forces represented by American intervention in Somalia, but this time under a humanitarian cover named «Restore Hope». In a statement to Al-Mujtama magazine, the official spokesman for the Islamic Movement in Somalia, Dr. Al-Dossari, stated that the American intervention in Somalia is nothing but a new crusade to encircle the Islamic world.

All indicators confirm that foreign intervention in Mogadishu is not temporary but rather will be a prelude to other interventions in neighboring regions under the banner of the right to humanitarian intervention. Resolution 794 issued by the Security Council stipulates the mobilization of 40,000 soldiers from 20 countries, including more than 30,000 Americans.

As for Kenya, which was opened by Arabs in the 7th century AD and includes more than 15% Muslims, it is in turn unprepared to return the northeastern region that was affiliated with Somalia, and its policy took steps toward the Western camp while emphasizing the consolidation of the country's Christian identity at the expense of Muslims who suffer from persecution.

Encircling the Islamic World

Through the link between developments in the situation inside the Horn of Africa region and around it, it is observed that the Western-Zionist forces have tightly encircled the Islamic world through the eastern African gateway to prevent the spread of the rising Islamic awakening movement and erect an iron curtain before all attempts at Arab-Islamic rapprochement on the one hand and African Christian and Negroid rapprochement on the other hand.

Consequently, the Horn of Africa region has entered a critical phase in its history where the conflict will shift from a process of international polarization between two camps, Eastern and Western, as existed in the 1970s and 1980s, to a conflict between the Western-Zionist camp and the rising forces demanding liberation from foreign dependency and reconciliation with their Islamic identity.