SWP Reaches New Moral Bankruptcy, “The horror in Kenya is a direct product of Western intervention. “

Al-Shabab: No Will of their Own, Says SWP.

“The shocking attack on the Westgate shopping mall in Kenya’s capital Nairobi was not just mindless terrorism.”

The SWP goes on to explain in the latest Socialist Worker why the centre was targeted.

“Westgate was chosen for this operation because, as Kenyan socialist Zahid Rajan put it, “It is the venue of choice for wealthy people across the racial divide”. To most better-off Kenyans the malls like Westgate were seen as a haven from the embittered, violent country.”

Apparently Al-Shabab are no so bad.

After the chaos in the early 200s, they restored some kind of government in Somilia

Central authority collapsed in Somalia with the fall of US-backed dictator Mohammed Siad Barre in 1991. Al Shabaab was part of the Islamic Courts movement that restored some kind of government in 2006.

But…

“This was overthrown by a US-backed invasion and the group has since moved to more extreme forms of Islamism. ”

As opposed no doubt to their ‘moderate’ form of Sharia before.

“After the invasion by Kenyan and Ethiopian troops in 2011 it said that it supported the ideas of Al Qaida. Even Rob Wise of the US Center for Strategic and International Studies think-tank comments that it was “a relatively moderate Islamist organisation”, which was driven towards Al Qaida by invasion.

He added that since 2008 al Shabaab has “increasingly embraced transnational terrorism and attempted to portray itself as part of the Al Qaida-led global war on the West.”

Conclusion?

“The horror in Kenya is a direct product of Western intervention.”

Al-Shabab themselves say (Al Jazeera),

The place we attacked is Westgate shopping mall. It is a place where tourists from across the world come to shop, where diplomats gather. It is a place where Kenya’s decision-makers go to relax and enjoy themselves. Westgate is a place where there are Jewish and American shops. So we have to attack them.

And as for the ‘anti-Western’ claims they underline their wish during the attack to kill only  non-Muslims (the majority of Kenyan for a start).

We released all Muslims when we took control of the mall. Witnesses have backed us on this.

Now the SWP may think that Al-Shabab are forces swept into history by Western ‘imperialism’.

They deny them free will – who to kill or not to kill.

Few others will sympathise with  this self-indulgent moral bankruptcy.

Least of those suffering from the Al-Shabab attack on a Kenyan Border post today.