Jaysh al-Ayman: A ‘Local’ Threat in Kenya - Jamestown

"The unit’s origins can be traced to the events on June 20, 2013, in Barawi, an ancient Somali coastal town, where differences within al-Shabaab boiled over. Barawi had become al-Shabaab’s operational headquarters after it was forced out of the port of Kismayu by the Kenyan military—Kismayu had served as group’s headquarters since it was established in 2006 (The Standard, July 23, 2017). On June 20, Ahmed Abdi Godane, then al-Shabaab’s emir, was concerned that members of the group’s shura council were accusing him of adopting a murderous strategy that targeted civilians and were preparing to split away from the group.

Two years prior, in 2011, the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) had been strengthened by Kenyan troops. Concerned with how to keep his group intact in the face of an onslaught by a better-armed foe and desperate to reassert his authority, Godane ordered the Amniyat, the group’s elite spy wing, to execute Ibrahim al-Afghani, a member of al-Shabaab’s shura council. Other shura members, among them Mukhtar Robow and Shaykh Dahir Aweys, were also targeted, but escaped and later defected to the Somali government.

In late 2013, following a strategy aimed at fighting a more effective asymmetrical war in Somalia and its neighbors, Godane unveiled two new wings of al-Shabaab—Jaysh al- Usra, which he directed at Ethiopia, and Jaysh al-Ayman, which would target Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania (The Reporter, August 20, 2016)."