Manchester: The Luciferians (11) Chose 22 to Satisfy Their Blood Thirst

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በ ማንቸስተሩ ሽብር ህፃናቱ ለሰይጣን መስዋዕት ከመደረጋቸው በፊት ይህን የ አርያና ግራንዴ እና አቤል ተስፋዬ ቪዲዮን ሳይ ነበር

ሰኞ፡ ሜይ 22፣ (አቡነ አረጋዊ) 22 ህፃናት በማንቸስተር ለሰይጣን መስዋዕት ህነዋል። ብዙዎቹ ህፃናት ከወላጆቻቸው ጋር ነበር አሬናው ውስጥ የነበሩት። ከአራት ዓመታት በፊት ልክ በዚህ እለት ነበር የእንግሊዙ ወታደር፣ ሊ ሪግቢ መንገድ ላይ በሙስሊሞች የታረደው። እስልምና ከሰይጣን ነው!

ሰኞ ዕለት እረፍት ወስጄ ነበር፤ ስለ ድምፃዊ አቤል ተስፋዬ (The Weeknd)

አንዳንድ መረጃዎችን (ቪዲዮዎቹ ላይ ቀይ መስቀሎችን ያስገባል)ስሰበስብ የጣሊያኖች ዝርያ ከአላት አሜሪካዊት ዘፋኝ፡ ከ አሪያና ግራንዴ (23 ዓመቷ ነው)ጋር ያወጣውን ይህን ቪዲዮ እመለከት ነበር። አጋጣሚው የሚገርም ነው። 22 ሺህ የሚሆኑ ህፃናት በኮንሰርቱ ላይ እንደነበሩ ይገመታል፤ እያንዳንዱ ተንቀሳቃሽ ስልክ ያዥ ነው፤ ታዲያ ለምንድን ነው እስካሁን የቦንብ ፍንዳታውን የሚያሳይ አንድም ቪዲዮ ያላየነው?

ነፍሳቸውን ይማርላቸው!

— አቡነ አረጋዊ ስለ ቆሼ ሠፈር አሳዛኝ ሁኔታ አስቀድመው ጠቁመውኝ ይሆን?

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The GCC Is Expanding To Eritrea, And It’s Not Good For Ethiopia

Add to it the Qatari soldiers that have already been present on the ground for a few years to “mediate” the border dispute with Djibouti, and the most important members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) have unexpectedly converged in what many might think to be among one of the most unlikeliest of places. While it may have been difficult to foresee this happening, in hindsight it actually makes quite a lot of sense, and contrary to the conventional assessment that this is about Yemen, the argument can be made that it’s also just as much about Ethiopia as well. Unbeknownst to many, Qatar is the “ox driving the cart” in this case, and whether they like it or not, the rest of the GCC states will be reluctantly forced to follow its destabilizing lead if Doha decides to throw Ethiopia into chaos.

The research expands on the briefing first laid out by South Frontand should be seen as a continuation of their original work. It begins by setting the context for what’s been going on along the Horn of Africa lately and how the GCC’s military advances fit into the larger context of recent history. The piece then investigates the levers of influence for how Qatar could destabilize Ethiopia as well as its radical ideological motivations for doing so. Finally, the article concludes with a scenario study of how Qatar could engineer an Unconventional War to bring down Africa’s next up-and-coming power.

The Crowded Coast

Geostrategy:

The Horn of Africa is one of the most geostrategic regions in the world due to its location along the Bab-el-Mandeb strait that connects the Gulf of Aden with the Red Sea. In a broader context, one can say that it’s one of two maritime chokepoints (the other being the Suez Canals) that link Europe with South, Southeast, and East Asia, and until the Northern Sea Route becomes operable sometime in the next decade, all sea-bound trade between the EU and these corners of Eurasia must transit through its narrow passage. As could be expected, this makes control over the strait a heightened prize for any power or combination thereof, and it’s not for naught that most Great Powers scrambled their navies to the region over the past decade ostensibly to “combat piracy”.

Come One, Come All:

What was really happening was that the US was trying to militarize the waterway under the auspices of countering “Somali pirates”, which it must be reminded, were bogeymen that were blown completely out of proportion by the Western mainstream media for premeditated geopolitical ends. The US wanted to create the conditions where the rest of the world would accept the continuous presence of its fleet operating in these strategic international waters, but precisely because their legal status, it meant that any other fleet could do the same thing on identical grounds, which is exactly what happened. While the UK and French navies were obviously there to support their American ‘big brother’, Russia, China, India, and Iran also sailed their ships there too, but for the purpose of both watching the West and symbolically showing that they won’t allow NATO to completely control this space.

The Strategic Illusion:

While the “pirate” hype has largely died down and the multilateral naval positioning over the Bab-el-Mandeb has markedly subsided since its frenzied height in the late 00s, the importance of the strait obviously hasn’t changed, and the American-initiated competition over its control merely took on another form and amphibiously migrated landward. The US joined its French partners in Djibouti by moving into Camp Lemonnier in 2001 (Paris never left the country after independence), thus giving it an on-land presence from which to project naval power if it chose to do so. It also opened up “anti-terror” facilities in Yemen during this time as well, but just like with the Djibouti base, these could also achieve the dual purpose of influencing the strait. With both of these power nodes already occupied by the US prior to the “anti-piracy race”, it might seem strange why America started such a game in the first place, but more than likely, it did so as a manifestation of the “exceptional” hubris of the Bush Administration that was also continued during the early reign of his successor.

Thus, while the non-NATO states may have felt they somehow lessened the US’ control over Bab-el-Mandeb by placing and then removing their navies from the Gul f of Aden, it was all just a carefully crafted illusion (one which hopefully resulted in the multipolar states acquiring some degree of useful information about the Western fleets). The US still retained its positions in Djibouti and Yemen, albeit without the ability to directly apply the same amount of force had its naval presence still been there in the same capacity, so nothing really changed in a simple strategic sense. That status of affairs would remain until the Yemeni Revolution finally succeeded in casting off the American- and Saudi-installed government in early 2015, which dramatically led to the US having to evacuate its military personnel from the country. For the first time since the end of the Cold War (when the Soviets had a naval base in Aden), the US didn’t’ fully control the Bab-el-Mandeb, and the strategic panic that this produced is partly why Saudi Arabia made the fateful and ill-planned decision to invade Yemen.

Bab-el-Mandeb And The War On Yemen:

The Saudis and their lackeys have succeeded in blockading the Yemeni coast and conquering Aden, thus returning most of the unipolar world’s control over their lost ‘real estate’ in this ultra-strategic region, but capitalizing on their unofficial casus belli to make sure that they can indefinitely retain control there, the GCC decided to ‘jump the pond’ to the Horn of Africa, hence its interactions with Eritrea and the contracting of Amara’s ‘services’. In a sense, Eritrea is envisioned as being the Gulf’s “back-up Yemen”, a friendly territory under its proxy influence from which punitive measures can be launched against the people of Yemen if they ever do succeed in once more nearly liberating the entirety of their country.

So long as Eritrea is under the GCC’s sway, then from a strategic-logistical standpoint, the Yemeni War of Independence will be all the much harder to win because the Saudis’ and their bloc have a ‘rear guard’ base almost directly abutting the country. The GCC’s actions in Eritrea can thus be seen as a type of “double insurance” in making sure that as many of the Yemenis remain under the Gulf boot for as long as possible, with such an unnecessary strategic consideration being seen as coming from a position of fear and weakness on their part, not strength. They fear the Yemeni militias so much that they’re preemptively creating this ‘rear guard’ supply and logistics facility in Eritrea “just in case” a counter-offensive one day manages to unsuspectingly cripple their occupying forces.

It’s appropriate at this juncture to take stock of all the international military forces currently present along the Horn of Africa. The Saudis and Emiratis now have a naval presence in Eritrea, and as South Front reported (and which was verified separately this summer), the UAE is also seeking to open a naval base in Berbera along the northern coast of Somalia in the breakaway Somaliland region. The US and France have an on-ground presence in Djibouti, but they’re also joined by the Japanese, which opened their first military base abroad since World War II in 2011 under the opportunistic ‘justification’ of “anti-piracy”. They might, however, soon be joined by China, if the rumors of Beijing eyeing the country for its first overseas base are true. China could of course call upon the convenient slogan of “anti-piracy” to justify any possible forthcoming presence, but no matter what its stated grounds for doing so are, such a base would serve the additional purpose of safeguarding the Chinese-financed Djibouti-Addis Ababa railroad to the fastest-growing economy in the world and the headquarter state of the African Union.

Gulf Interests Move Inland

Now’s a good time to elaborate more in-depth about the continental African interests that the Gulf States seek to pursue through their partnership with Eritrea. To be more specific, it’s better to look closely at Qatar’s geopolitical objectives in this case, since the tiny emirate ironically leads the regional pack in its preexisting involvement in East Africa.

Eritrean Backgrounder:

This coastal state is one of the world’s newest, having gained its independence from Ethiopia in 1993 after fighting a three-decade-long war to achieve it. Peace came only after the government in Addis Ababa, at that time run by a military entity known as “The Derg”, was dissolved in 1987 and its leader Mengistu Haile Mariam was ousted in 1991 by a coalition of ethno-centric rebel groups. Due to the near-continuous fighting that took place on its territory, post-independence Eritrea was a wreck, but President Isais Afwerki helped to achieve stability and elevated living conditions, as attested to by journalist Andre Vltchek who visited a year ago. Nevertheless, the economy is in dire straits and Eritrea is largely isolated from the world community, partly due to the border disputes it has with all of its neighbors, and also because of successful Ethiopian lobbying against it. According to Ethiopia, Eritrea supports a variety of anti-government rebel groups and even has links to Al Shabaab in Somalia.

The Qatari Connection:

The last point is extremely contentious and has never fully been proven, although to clarify a bit, a Wikileaked US diplomatic cable quoted the Somalian President accusing Qatar in 2009 of using Eritrea as a financial conduit for Al Shabaab. Considering Doha’s support to other terrorist groups such as ISIL, this doesn’t seem implausible, and it might even be that rerouted Qatari funds channeled through Eritrea (which might have received a modest cut) could be to blame for why Ethiopia would allege that its nemesis was aiding terrorists.

No matter what shape it takes, Eritrea’s direct or indirect links to Al Shabaab are one of the reasons why the UNSC initiated an arms embargo on the country in 2009 that was just renewed last month. In this connection it’s relevant to remind one of Qatar’s role in the region, and it’s that it was asked to deploy “peacekeepers” along the Eritrean-Djibouti border by each of their governments in 2010 to assist in “mediating” their border dispute. One can cynically suggest that this provided nothing more than the perfect cover for Qatar to continue supporting Al Shabaab, which as was mentioned above, it had already been doing for some time. The reason Qatar supports this terrorist group is because it’s basically a regional franchise of ISIL, and a faction of Al Shabaab had just pledged allegiance to its Arab “brothers” late last month. These two groups pursue the same radical Islamic goals that Qatar has been patronizing for years through its sponsorship of the Muslim Brotherhood, and ISIL and Al Shabaab are pretty much the more visibly militant and globally notorious arm of the Brotherhood in this respect.

The Afro-Eurasian Caliphate:

To get a fuller grasp of why Qatar is promoting terrorism in East Africa, one should understand the macro-regional context of Doha’s ideological ambitions. The peninsular pipsqueak uses its financial largesse to flex power disproportionate to its tiny size, and it manifests this through support of a hodgepodge of ultra-extreme Islamic groups, all of which are classified as terrorists by Russia: the Muslim Brotherhood; the Taliban; ISIL in Syria, Iraq, Libya, and Sinai; and Boko Haram. Each of these terrorist groups is active in a certain geographic area, with the only ‘missing link’ being the southern vector, ergo the ideological/militant ‘necessity’ of Al Shabaab. Altogether, these terrorist organizations represent the ‘foot soldiers’ of a transnational caliphate project that Qatar and its US ally would like to see expand all throughout the central pivot of Afro-Eurasia, the “Greater Middle East” of Central Asia, the ‘conventional’ Mideast, North Africa, and East Africa. While its current prospects of success have dramatically dimmed ever since Russia’s anti-terrorist intervention in Syria, it still remains possible for Qatar and the US to actualize some aspects of this grand strategy in certain corners of their operational theater, which in this context is the Horn of Africa.

Double-Sided Chaos:

The introduction of “managed chaos” to the region via the Qatari-supported Al Shabaab terrorist group serves two main purposes. The first one is to pressure Ethiopia, which the US may feel more inclined to do if the country moves more solidly in a pro-Chinese direction in the future, and the second is to perversely use the presence of Al Shabaab to deepen its security relationship with Ethiopia by being the arsonist-firefighter that creates a problem and then ‘helps resolve’ it afterwards. It’s useful to recall that the US contracted Ethiopia to invade Somalia in 2006 in order to destroy the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), a precursor of Al Shabaab, which thus strengthened the partnership between the two. Also, by keeping Islamic terrorism alive in Somalia, to whatever extent it’s present at a given moment, the US can keep the ‘justification’ open for selectively intervening in the country with drone strikes or commando raids, thus entrenching its presence in the region and turning the criminal into the ‘cop’.

The Enemy Of My Enemy:

Rewinding the focus back to Eritrea, Asmara is passively tolerant of Qatar’s Al Shabaab patronage because it could supplement its grand strategic goal of destabilizing Ethiopia. To explain, Ethiopia has previously intervened in Somalia against Islamic terrorists before and subsequently occupied the country, and the idea that its forces could continue to do so again in the future, and thus be bunkered down in another potential quagmire and spread thin in critical (and rebellious-prone) interior regions, excites Eritrean strategists. Furthermore, as will be explained more fully in the third section, there’s the potential for Al Shabaab terrorists to become the “freedom fighter” figureheads for the Somali population in Ethiopia’s eastern provinces, formally the Somali Region but also known as Ogaden. Eritrea’s most important objective is to have ethno-centric regions inside of its former colonizer achieve independence in the same manner that it did – through prolonged and militant struggle against the central government – so that its rival can never be in a position to threaten it again (let alone exist in its current state). If the Somali region just so happens to be the spark needed to set the whole federal haystack alight, then so be it, as Asmara’s reckoning goes, whether its Qatari-supported terrorism that initiates the destructive domino effect that they expect or an indigenous ethno-centric uprising.

The Big Picture:

To bring everything together in a more simple understanding, Qatar has taken the lead in destabilizing the Horn of Africa out of ideological and unipolar-loyalty reasons, and it’s using its “legal” presence in Eritrea to facilitate this. The War on Yemen provided the other main GCC states of Saudi Arabia and the UAE with a ‘plausible justification’ for also ‘getting in on the action’, knowing just as well as Qatar does that Eritrea is a ‘double-hinged’ state that can be used to simultaneously project maritime and continental influence, with the latter case being against Ethiopia.

Concerning the GCC’s newest geopolitical target, it’s one of the world’s most promising emerging economies, and from a Gulf perspective, it could also be useful in satisfying their African-directed agricultural and construction-outsourcing needs. Placing their forces in Eritrea, Ethiopia’s arch-rival and hated foe, is designed to put pressure on the rising, albeit potentially unstable, continental power and thus make it more amenable to whatever their forthcoming grand interests may be. Also, by making Eritrea an integral part of their regional military architecture, the Gulf States are essentially declaring that any aggression against it would also endanger their own interests, thereby blanketing Asmara with a de-facto security guarantee and altering Addis Ababa’s perceived existing strategic balance of power (which it had earlier assumed was relatively even).

By itself and approached from a purely geopolitical standpoint, it’s theoretically possible for Saudi Arabia and the UAE to maintain this new status quo between Eritrea and Ethiopia (perhaps even exploit it and each of those two states to their own advantage if shrewd diplomacy is applied), but the presence of Qatar, the ‘loose cannon’, means that the entire arrangement is inherently unstable and subject to sudden change. Qatar has proven itself much more prone to impromptu outbursts of rhetorical rage than any of the other Gulf States, and its comparatively younger leader (only 35 years old) is much less versed in the art of statecraft than his peers. Being so hot-headed and already harboring an inferiority complex vis-à-vis his larger and more mature neighbors, Qatari Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani is inclined to give the full terrorist ‘go-ahead’ whenever he feels like it (or if he ‘thinks’ it would be of strategic use for him), meaning that a Qatari-sponsored Islamic destabilization of Ethiopia cannot at all be discounted, and must be astutely prepared for by the country’s authorities.

Towards The Unconventional War Scenario

GCC Support:

The final section of the research discusses the Unconventional War scenario that Qatar could help engineer alongside Eritrea and Al Shabaab (one of its ideological ‘children’, it could be argued) to throw Ethiopia into chaos. Once this process begins, Saudi Arabia and the UAE could be expected to assist Qatar and this scenario to some extent, knowing that Doha is much too tiny and inexperienced to ever fully control the larger developments that it helps to unleash (the “Arab Spring” Color Revolutions are a case in point), and they thus want to be in a position to gain as much self-benefit from what may turn out to be an irreversible course of events. Correspondingly, with these self-motivated interests in mind, they could act as force multipliers in their own way for advancing the chaos that Qatar created, thereby ushering in a chain reaction that could lend crucial and ultra-destructive force to the scenario that will be discussed.

Consequences:

The full consequences of Ethiopian chaos won’t be discussed in the scope of this article, but they can be assumed to have the risk of virally spreading through parts of the North and East African regions (since Ethiopia is of the latter but capable of influencing the former through its border with the rebellious Blue Nile state of Sudan), and would at the very least impact the country’s 95 million or so citizens to an undetermined extent (to say nothing of the transnational social implications). Also, with China’s economy becoming more dependent for growth on trade with Africa, any significant disruption in Ethiopia, Beijing’s prized partner nowadays, could directly ripple back to the East Asian giant and negatively affect it to a degree, all depending of course on the preexisting level of Chinese-Ethiopian trade. The higher that Ethiopia rises in terms of international significance (be it diplomatic, economic, military, etc.), the harder its fall could be and the further the aftershocks would travel across the globe, thus suggesting that the (US-advised) Qatari destabilization of Ethiopia could be timed to achieve maximum effect depending on its relationship to various actors (in this case, likely China) at the given moment.

Identity Cleavages:

The greatest and most imminent threat to Ethiopia lays in the sphere of ethno-separatism, the sentiment of which has continued to boil even after the Cold War-era civil war was brought to a close. Part of the reason for this is that Eritrea’s independence set a dangerous precedent for the militant representatives of the country’s disaffected ethnic groups, which it seems include just about every single one of them in some capacity or another (even the dominant Oromo and Amhara pluralities). The reason for this is that Ethiopia is a hyper-eclectic country with a wide array of identities within its federal structure, and in such a situation, it’s always difficult for any governing authority (let alone what some rebel groups allege is the present Tigrean-dominated one) to strike the perfect balance between each of them and leave everyone satisfied. This preexisting state of divisive affairs was utterly exacerbated by the Ethiopian Civil War that broke out against The Derg, where ethnic-affiliated rebel groups banded together in order to overthrow the central governing authority. The militant comradery that developed within each identity community as a result heightened the self-awareness that each of them felt about their differences and thus made a post-war federal structure the only realistic means of keeping the country together, especially after Eritrea’s successful secession in 1993.

The identity divide was so entrenched in Ethiopia after the civil war that the new federal units were formed around ethnic affiliation. Here’s a map of them as taken from Wikipedia:

The CIA World Factbook lists the ethnic proportions as being “Oromo 34.4%, Amhara (Amara) 27%, Somali (Somalie) 6.2%, Tigray (Tigrinya) 6.1%”, followed by a multitude of others that compose minimal percentages. Altogether, these four groups form a little less than three-quarters of Ethiopia’s population, mostly concentrated in a north-south belt stretching between Tigray, Amhara, western Oromia, and northeast Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples Region.

Adding another crucial demographic layer to Ethiopia is the percentage of Christians (Ethiopian Orthodox and Protestant) and Muslims in the country, which is 62% to 33.9%, respectively, or almost 2:1. The following map demonstrates the geographic divide over religion and shows how this has a distinct overlap with certain federal units:

Afar and Somalis are a very small minority of the population and by themselves cannot account for the 33.9% of Muslim adherents in Ethiopia, and as the above map indicates, many believers in this religion live intertwined with Christians in Oromia, the most populous region. By itself and with the absence of context, this isn’t anything particularly relevant to Ethiopia’s stability, but recalling how Qatar and its Saudi ally have been front and center in provoking a clash of civilizations through their support of Islamic terrorism, this demographic factor becomes perhaps one of the most important of all. Al Shabaab in Somalia is pretty much one of Qatar’s proxy creations, just as ISIL is, and its proximity and ethnic overlap with the Somali Region is a definite cause for concern.

Unconventional War:

The Basics

Taken together, a Qatari-orchestrated jihadist-separatist war emanating from the Somali Region could prove to be the catalyst that sets off a whole conflagration of nationwide conflict. This initial Unconventional War has a very real risk of occurring due to the doubly second-class status that Somalis feel they are afforded due to both their ethnicity and Muslim faith. Al Shabaab’s terrorist war in neighboring Somalia actually began as an Islamic-tinted national liberation movement in response to Ethiopia’s 2006 occupation, but it rapidly descended into the jihadist nightmare that lay at the core of its proponents’ true vision. Although it showed its true colors and most undoubtedly scared away many possible supporters that would have otherwise flocked to it for its originally marketed national liberation agenda, it still commands some indigenous support inside Somalia, thus raising the risk that it could also do the same amongst the Somali community in Ethiopia that might still consider itself occupied (or be led to think in such terms).

Carving Out The Caliphate

The concept here is that Qatar would use jihadism to radicalize separatist Somalis in getting them to become diehard supporters of the cause, holding out the carrot of a Greater Somalia if they’re successful. This irredentist dream would neatly overlap with Qatar’s own of creating a proxy caliphate in the Horn of Africa, but it also places limits on the primary geographic area of focus for its terrorist campaign. However, with the nature of terrorism inherently being that it knows no borders, it’s of course possible that attacks could take place in the densely populated and centrally positioned Oromia Region, which could have the effect of sharpening the Christian-Muslim divide in the area and prompting copy-cat and reprisal attacks. The destructive chain reaction that this might set off could only realistically be put to rest by a heavy-handed military response, albeit one which may scare investors right out of the country and lead to Western condemnation. In and of itself, whether or not the jihadist-separatist war succeeds in its stated goals, it would still accomplish what might have been the indirect (perhaps even actual) objective all along of weakening Ethiopia and possibly even China’s position in the continent depending on the degree of closeness and importance that Addis Ababa occupies for Beijing by that time (which is expected to be ever increasing).

Eritrea’s Strategy

Regardless of whether or not Qatar ever goes forward with the previously described scenario, that won’t in any way prevent Eritrea from continuing with its own, as it bases its national security on keeping the Ethiopian military distracted and divided through its support of ‘stand-alone’ and unified rebel movements so that it can’t ever solidly converge against the country. Eritrea would like to one day liberate the city of Badme that Ethiopia has refused to cede to its control after the Algiers Agreement ended their bloody and stalemated 1998-2000 war and a Hague border commission ruled that it’s Eritrean territory, and it might be using its support of various rebel groups as a means of pressuring Addis Ababa into acceding to its international legal obligation.

Eritrea’s Tactics

Asmara’s aspirations are to assist neighboring Tigray Region fighters in their quest for independence, mirroring Eritrea’s own, in order to create a buffer state that would insulate it from any future aggression from the rump Ethiopian state. At the same time, however, Eritrea also has ties with rebel groups operating deeper in the country, and if significant battlefield coordination can ever be maintained between Eritrea and the Oromo separatists (the ethnic group of which is the most populous and geographically central in the country), then it would go a very long way towards giving Asmara a lever with which it can trigger serious damage to Ethiopia’s national unity. Some Oromo might be attracted to the nationalist rhetoric coming from their militant-separatist counterparts that allege that the group is being exploited to support the minor peripheral ethnicities, and any visible “Tigrean-dominated government” crackdown on their civilian representatives might add credence to this belief. Eritrea might even ‘get lucky’ if the current tribal violence in South Sudan motivates a spillover effect into the neighboring Southern Nations, Nationalities, and People’s Region (home to 45 different ethnic groups) or Gambela Region that ‘naturally’ creates the state-fragmenting process that it and Qatar and looking to achieve for their own respective ends.

Doha’s Double-Crossing

On a final note, concerning any strategic Eritrean-Qatari collaboration in a future destabilization campaign against Ethiopia, the potential exists for Doha to stab its ‘ally’ in the back if its jihadist campaign is ‘too successful’. Eritrea might ironically be even more susceptible than Ethiopia is to an Islamic terrorist campaign because it has a similar proportion of Muslims that are also living in a similar economically challenging environment, and thus, might be ripe for ideological-religious manipulation under the ‘proper circumstances’. Additionally, the Muslim Afar living in the east partially represent Eritrea’s version of Ethiopia’s ethno-religious identity overlap that the latter has with the Somali Muslims, thus potentially leading to the same type of strategic vulnerabilities in this scenario. This factor could also be used by Qatar to manipulate Eritrea and keep its leadership in check, just in case the improbable happens and for whatever reason it decides to turn its back on its new patron.

On the flip side of things, so long as Asmara remains a loyal client of the Emir (which doesn’t seem set to change since it desperately needs the money and diplomatic support), it shouldn’t have anything to worry about. Eritrea is also much smaller than Ethiopia in both demographic and geographic terms, so it’s a lot easier for the state to exercise supervisory control over what’s going on and nip the jihadist process right in the bud before it fully blooms. However, as chaotic processes always prove themselves to be time after time again, once the genie is let out of the bottle, it’s impossible to stuff it back in, and even if Qatar doesn’t plan for it to happen, the jihad it unleashes in Ethiopia could also infect Eritrea in no time.

Concluding Thoughts

While it may not seem like it at first, the GCC’s military-logistical move into Eritrea is predicated just as much on influencing Ethiopia as it is about dominating Yemen. The Saudis and Emiratis may have just recently incorporated Eritrea into their coalition framework, but Qatar has been cultivating close ties with Asmara for the past 5 years as part of its “mediation” role in resolving the Djibouti border dispute, which incidentally saw it deploy 200 troops to the country. This means that the Muslim Brotherhood-espousing state is in a position to project its ideology throughout the region and intensify cooperation with its Al Shabaab proxy in nearby Somalia. The Saudis and Emiratis may initially be adverse to Qatar ‘rocking the boat’ in the region until after they’ve already tapped all of its economic benefit (which could take decades), but given Doha’s emotional- and ideological-driven foreign policy, it might do just that because it senses a ‘good opportunity’ here or there for furthering its self-interested geopolitical project.

In such circumstances, the GCC wouldn’t be able to indefinitely hold out the threat of Islamic-inspired terrorist destabilization as a means of blackmailing the world’s fastest-growing economy and one of Africa’s up-and-coming powers, but would have to reluctantly join in the Qatari-initiated unrest so as to secure whatever benefits they can while there’s still the ‘opportunity’ to do so. The ethnic, social, and religious cleavages already prevalent (and even overlapping in some cases) in Ethiopia provide more than enough domestic ‘gunpowder’ for a strategically placed spark to set the whole powder keg aflame, with the only fail-safe solution being for Addis Ababa to overwhelmingly respond with military force. Such a reaction might predictably scare away the investors that are needed to keep the ‘Ethiopian miracle’ alive, and the combination of capital outflow plus military suppression (no matter how justified it may seem) might further exacerbate the domestic differences in the country and place them in a perpetual process of worsening, up to the point of the country approaching the geopolitical abyss of dissolution along preexisting ethnic-federative lines.

Any disruption of Ethiopia’s stability could also be used as an indirect means of attacking Chinese interests in Africa, since Beijing has invested billions in helping the country rise and is expected to become increasingly dependent on its African economic partnerships in order to sustain its own growth at home. Large-scale unrest in Ethiopia could thus offset China’s plans for cooperating with the country on a high-level strategic basis, and it would thus lose not only a crucial marketplace for its goods or an attractive investment destination, but also its place in influencing the African Union right at its headquartered source in Addis Ababa. Therefore, many layers of intrigue blanket the possibility that Qatar may lead the GCC into a proxy confrontation with Ethiopia, be it out of its own regard or acting on behalf of American ‘advice’, which could see the Gulf using the country of Eritrea alongside Al Shabaab jihadists to dislodge China from its most important foothold in Africa.

Source

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የኡጋንዳ ተወላጁ ሙስሊም በክርስቲያኖች እርዳታ በተዓምር ከሆዱ እባብ ወጣለት

የታመመው ሙስሊም መላው ሰውነቱ ለብዙ ሰዓታታ መርበድበድ፣ መንቀጥቀጥና እንደ እባብ ዝልግልግ ማለት ጀመረ፤ ከዚያም አይኖቹን ፍጥጥ አፉን ክፍት እያደረገ እንደማስታወክ ይለዋል።

ከዚያም ወደ ጠንቋዮችና የእስላም ቃልጮች ለፈውስ ይወሰዳል፤ የመስጊድ ኢማሞቹም እስላማዊ ጸሎቶችን የያዘ ወረቀት እንዲያቀራ ሰጡት፡ ነገር ግን ቤቱ ሲደረስ ምንም መፍትሄ ሳያመጡለት ሲቀሩ፤ ባቅራቢያው ወደአለው ቤተክርስቲይን አመራ። እዚያም የቤተክርስቲያን አገልጋዮቹ እነዚህን የእስላም ፀሎት ወረቀቶች ከግለሰቡ ነጥቀው አቃጠሏቸው። በዚህ ወቅት የታመመው ሙስሊም ግለሰብ ከክርስቲያኖቹ ጋር በኢየሱስ ክርስቶስ ስም አብሮ ፀሎት እንዲያደርግና እስላም ሆኖ በቆየበት ኑሮው ከሠራቸው ኃጢዓቶች ንስሐ እንዲገባ ሲደረግ አንድ ትልቅ እባብ እየተዝለገለገ ከጉሮሮው ውልቅ ብሎ ወጣ። ግለሰቡም እስልምናን በመተው ክርስትናን ተቀብሎ ጽኑ የቤተክርስቲያኗ አገልጋይ ለመሆን በቃ።

ምንም እንኳን የዚህ የመሲሐዊ አይሑድ አስተምህሮ ከኛ ጋር ትንሽ ለየት የሚል ቢሆንም፡ ዋናዋና ሀሳቦቹና ነጥቦቹ ግን በእኛም ቤተከርስቲያን ዘንድ በየጊዜው የሚንጸባረቁ ናቸው። ይህ አስደናቂ ታሪክ ለክርስቲያን ወንድሞቻችን እና እህቶቻችን ማንቂያ እንደሚሆን ወይም የወገኖቻችንን አሳች የቀደመው እባብ ዲያቢሎስ ባቅራቢያቸው እንደሚኖር፤ ለሙስሊም ወገኖቻችን ደግሞ እንደ ማስጠንቀቂያና መረጃ ተደርጎ ሊወሰድ ይችላል።

ዋና ዋናዎቹ ነጥቦች፦

• የእስልምናው አላህ እና የክርስቲያኖች አምላክ ኢየሱስ ክርስቶስ ሁለት የተለያዩ አማልክት መሆናቸውን

• ግለሰቡ ውስጥ በእባብ መልክ የተቀበረውን ጋኔን አዋቂ የተባሉት የእስልምና ሸሆችና ቃልቻዎች ማውጣት እንዳልቻሉና ማውጣትም እንደማይችሉ

• የሙስሊሞች አላህ ሰይጣን ነው፤ እስልምና ከሰይጣን ነው። ሰይጣን ደግሞ ሰይጣንን ወይም የራሱን ጋኔን አያወጣም፡ አያጋልጥም። ለዚህም ነው፤ በእስልምናው ዓለም በ አላህ ወይም መሀመድ ስም ጋኔን ሊያወጡ የሚችሉ፣ የሚያድኑና የሚፈውሱ ሰዎች የሌሉት፤ አላህ አይፈውስም፣ መሀመድም ፈውሶና አድኖ አያውቅም። ሰይጣን ሰይጣንን አያወጣም!

• እባብ ሰይጣንን ነው የሚወክለው። ይገርማል! “አላህ” የሚለው የአረብኛ ጽሑፍ ልክ በእባብ ወይም በዘንዶ ቅርጽ ነው የሚጻፈው። ያው ሰይጣን ማንነቱን፣ ምን እንደሚሠራ/እንደማይሠራ ፣ የት/ ከማን ጋር እንደሚገኝ እራሱ እየነገረን ነው።

• እያንዳንዱ ሙስሊም ውስጥ ይህ በእባብ የተመሰለ ጋኔናዊ መንፈስ እንደሚኖር

• ጣረሞት ላይ ወይም ለቀብር ተዘጋጅተው የነበሩ ሙስሊሞች ሁሉ ገሃነም እሳት ገብተው እንደነበርና በመጨረሻም ክርስቶስ እንዳወጣቸውና አድኖም እንደመለሳቸው

• ሙስሊሞች፡ ልክ እንደ ቃየል በሥራ ብቻ ለመዳን በማሰብ እግዚአብሔር የማይወደውን ግድያ ለአላሃቸው እንደሚፈጽሙ፤ በዚህም ለሰው ልጅ ሁሉ ደሙን ያፈሰሰውንና እንደ በግ የተሰዋልንን ኢየሱስ ክርስቶስን እንደማያውቁት፣ እንደሚክዱት፣ እንድሚያስቀይሙትና እንደሚያስቆጡት። በመላው ዓለም፡ የጌታችን የክርስቶስን ስቅለት፣ ሞትና ትንሳኤ የማይቀበል ብቸኛ አምልኮት እስልምና ነው። ሌሎቹ ባያምኑበትም፣ መሰቀሉን ግን ሁሉም በታሪካዊ ጽሁፎቻቸው መዝግበውታል

• እስላሞችም የሰው ልጆች ናቸውና ልባቸውን ንጹህ አድርገው እንደ አብርሃም ከለመኑ በክርስቶስ ደም የመዳን እድል አላቸው፡ ግን ጊዜው በጣም አጭር ነው፤ በተለይ ለሙስሊም ኢትዮጵያውያን፤ ምክኒያቱም ክርስቶስን አላወቅኩትም፣ ከታጋሹ ሕዝበ ክርስቲያን ፍቅር አላገኘሁም፣ ወንጌልንም አልተወዋኩተም ማለት አይችሉምና።

ከዚህ ቪዲዮ ጋር በተዘማደ፦

• ያለ ምላስ ከተፈጠረው ልጅ ሆድ 24 እባቦች ወጡ

• የረር ጽርሃ ሥላሴ ተዓምርና ምስጢር

ከ 5 ዓመታት በፊት በአዲስ አበባ ቆይታዬ ወደ የረር ሥላሴ ሄጄ ይህን ቪዲዮ በስልኬ ቀርጬ ነበር። “ከልጁ ሆድ 24 እባቦች ወጥተዋል” ። እንደሚታወቀው የረር ሥላሴ በተለያዩ ግለሰቦች፡ በተለይም በሙስሊሙ ቃሲም ራዕዮች አማካይነት መገኘቷን እናስታውሳለን። በዚህች ቤተክርስቲያን መምህር ግርማም ጋኔኖች ያወጡ ነበር፤ በአካባቢውም ብዙ ተዓምራዊ ሁኔታዎች እስካሁን ድረስ ይከሰታሉ።

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The Kings Of The Earth Have Committed Fornication And Are Drunk With The Wine (OIL)

That’s exactly what we learn from President Trump’s visit to Babylon, Saudi Barbaria. They are all drunk, and Mammon is, indeed, well and truly in charge.

Don’t expect saints or saviors coming out of the ‘developed’ world. It looks like only Jesus Christ will deal with the wicked of this ignorant world.

Nobody seems to ask where the little prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Bin Abdulaziz Alsaud of Saudi Barbaria was during President Trump’s visit to his country? You remember last year? Fake prince Alwaleed who owns (34.9 million shares of Twitter’s common stock) – more of Twitter than co-founder – declared Donald Trump, ‘a disgrace to America‘ on Twitter – the same twitter which President Trump uses quite frequently.

With the world’s largest oil reserves, Saudi Arabia is literally holding the West to ransom. They are spreading their Wahhabi form of Islam and funding education facilities throughout the Western world. All the major universities now rely on oil money to prosper. From Arabia too we have UAE and Dubai ports which now control the gateway to many Western nations with the obvious ability to corrupt. Many would like to see the demise of Saudi Arabia and its corrupting influence, and maybe they will if prophecy comes true.

Both Revelation chapters 17 & 18 mention Babylon and we see “Fallen, fallen is Babylon” [Rev 18:2]

Trump’s Saudi Islam Speech Will Not Bind Islamic State’s Progenitors

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Donald Trump goes to Saudi Arabia and the world awaits his much-trailed Islam speech. And what a mighty fine speech it was. The President of the United States boldly reiterated his notorious “Islam hates us” line and rebuked the House of Saud for spawning Wahhabism, fostering terrorism and abusing the human rights of thousands of its own citizens. called Islam one of the world’s great faiths, lauded King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud for his decency and shared values, and rebuked Iran for murdering its own people and fuelling the fires of sectarian conflict and terror. In the long history of great theo-political analyses of good and evil, this speech missed the mark on so many levels that it scarcely merits any analysis. But President Trump did leave Riyadh with arms and defence contracts worth $350bn, which is good for jobs in the United States of America, if evil for the poor starving people of Yemen, not to mention the wider world increasingly infiltrated and infected by the murderous Salafist ideology.

“If we do not stand in uniform condemnation of this killing – then not only will we be judged by our people, not only will we be judged by history, but we will be judged by God,” the President said, as he conveniently omitted to condemn the root cause of “this killing”, of which historian Tom Holland reminded us in his Channel 4 documentary ‘ISIS: The Origins of Violence‘:

There are things in the past that are like unexploded bombs that just lie in wait in the rubble, and then something happens to trigger them. And there are clearly verses in the Quran and stories that are told about Mohammed that are very like mines waiting to go off – Improvised Explosive Devices. And they can lie there maybe for centuries and then something happens to trigger them and you get this.

‘This’, of course, being the mass slaughter, murder, torture and the unimaginable barbarism which accompanies the Wahhabi quest to eradicate all decadence, heresy and idolatry. But President Trump pussyfoots around this fons et origo: “This is not a battle between different faiths, different sects, or different civilizations,” he (now) says. “This is a battle between barbaric criminals who seek to obliterate human life, and decent people of all religions who seek to protect it. This is a battle between Good and Evil.”

And while he’s dancing with a sword and participating in some strange occultic orb seance with the Saudi King, he does not utter a word against the Wahhabi sect, whose view of the Islamic faith and human civilization is the key to understanding this evil. Nor does he mention Saudi human rights abuses – you know, those men and women (and sometimes children) who are imprisoned, tortured, beheaded or flogged for blogging. Yet the President does identify this:

But no discussion of stamping out this threat would be complete without mentioning the government that gives terrorists all three – safe harbor, financial backing, and the social standing needed for recruitment. It is a regime that is responsible for so much instability in the region.

He then discloses: I am speaking of course of Iran.

Seriously, the leader of the free world visits Saudi Arabia – which not only harbours thousands of ‘Allahu Akbar’ jihadists but founds and finances extremist mosques all over the world for the greater glory of Allah – and he castigates Iran. How bold, principled and righteous of him. Saudi Arabia may not be united in its appreciation of Muhammed ibn Abd al-Wahhab, the founder of Saudi-Salafist Wahhabism, but there is no denying that Saudi Arabia leads the world on the export of terrorism, and that many Saudis applaud the fact that ISIS is fighting Iranian Shiite fire with Sunni fire.

Saudi Arabia manifests a certain theo-political schizophrenia: there is the 18th-century radical, extremist strand of Saudi identity which inclines toward Wahhabi takfir puritanism (which not only excommunicates the infidel, but chops of men’s hands, hangs raped women and throws gays of tall buildings), and then there is the 20th-century diplomatic, moderate Saudi identity, dripping in black gold and drowning in petrodollars (which is the one which successive US presidents [if not the whole Western world] believes to be progressive and ascendant). This is the one with which President Trump has just signed the biggest arms deal in history.

Unfortunately, he appears not to understand (or is afraid to articulate) that theological jihad and takfiri purification have been syncretised into a global movement of conservative Saudi Islamic devotion, the objective of which is world domination – a global caliphate.

You don’t usher in an era of world peace and religious harmony by helping to finance an ideology which believes Mohammed in 7th-century Medina was the best of times. And you can’t educate Muslims on the nature of good and evil when so many of the words which come out of your own mouth are base, ignorant, divisive and offensive. The medium is the message.

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— Trump’s Visit To Arabia And Welcoming Erdogan Is Fulfilling Bible Prophecy Where Many Will Join The Antichrist (Examine Biblical Prophecies Never Considered Before In This Incredible Research)

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Is Europe Committing Suicide? Because It Has Lost Faith In Historic Christian Values

Controversial Book Claims Elites In Uk And The Continent Are Encouraging Mass Immigration Because They’ve Lost Faith In Historic Christian Values

A couple of days ago, I saw TV footage of the outspoken Labour MP Jess Phillips on the campaign trail, seeking re-election in her suburban Birmingham constituency.

She was asked which issues voters mentioned most often on the doorstep. Ms Phillips did not miss a beat.

‘Immigration comes up…’ she said thoughtfully. And then, as if remembering herself, she started talking about bin collections instead.

It was, I thought, an enormously revealing moment. For there is no issue so potentially dangerous as immigration. Many people have intense feelings about it, and many feel unable to raise them publicly.

Even in private, self-consciously tolerant people discuss immigration very tentatively, if at all.

The shadow of Enoch Powell — the Birmingham-born Tory who was cast into the wilderness after his controversial speech in 1968 about ‘rivers of blood’ (a phrase he never actually used) — still hangs over the debate.

A few years ago, I was at a lunch in London, sitting next to the former editor of a national newspaper and the editor of one of Britain’s best-known magazines, both of them highly educated and liberal-minded people. The subject turned to immigration.

‘It’s gone much too far,’ one said. ‘You’re quite right,’ said the other, ‘but of course you can’t say so.’

The journalist Douglas Murray has no such qualms. Best known for his acerbic columns in the Spectator magazine and his prize-winning book on the Bloody Sunday inquiry, he has just hurled a literary hand grenade into the debate about immigration and identity in today’s Europe.

Indeed, the opening lines of his new book, The Strange Death Of Europe, could hardly be more incendiary.

‘Europe is committing suicide,’ Murray writes. ‘Or at least its leaders have decided to commit suicide… As a result, by the end of the lifespans of most people currently alive, Europe will not be Europe and the peoples of Europe will have lost the only place in the world we had to call home.’

The causes, he thinks, are twofold. First, our political leaders have knowingly colluded in the ‘mass movement of peoples into Europe’, filling ‘cold and rainy northern towns’ with ‘people dressed for the foothills of Pakistan or the sandstorms of Arabia’.

Second, he believes Europe’s intellectual and cultural elites, including those in Britain, have ‘lost faith in its beliefs, traditions and legitimacy’. Crippled with guilt, obsessed with atoning for the sins of empire, they have lost sight of the historic Christian values that their people expect them to defend.

As a result of their deluded utopianism, Murray thinks, Europe is ceasing to be Europe. Indeed, he believes that European culture as generations have understood it — the culture of Michelangelo and Mozart, Shakespeare and Goethe, Dickens and Wagner — is doomed.

‘Instead of remaining a home for the European peoples,’ he writes, ‘we have decided to become a “utopia” only in the original Greek sense of the word: to become “no place”.’

You will not be surprised to hear that Murray’s book has gone down badly with the bien-pensant types at The Guardian, whose reviewer described it as ‘gentrified xenophobia’ and a ‘slightly posher’ version of ‘naked racism’.

In its way, that verdict tells you all you need to know about the intellectual blinkers of the liberal intelligentsia.

Even so, at the risk of being accused of xenophobia by The Guardian — which would admittedly put me in crowded company — I believe he has penetrated closer to the heart of our current discontents than legions of liberal academics.

For one thing, it is refreshing to get some honesty about the historically unprecedented nature of immigration into Europe in the past 70 years.

In case you need reminding, the figures for Britain alone are simply mind-boggling.

Between 1997 and 2010, for example, the last Labour government allowed a staggering 2.2 million people to settle in this country, the equivalent of two Birminghams.

Under David Cameron, the Tories promised to reduce immigration to the tens of thousands. Yet the latest figures show that annual net migration is about 273,000, roughly a city the size of Hull arriving every year.

It is worth noting, by the way, that mass immigration has always been immensely unpopular. When I wrote a history of Britain in the Sixties, I could hardly fail to notice that even back then, at least seven out of ten people were dead against it, as shown by the deluge of approving letters that greeted Enoch Powell’s supposedly toxic speech.

Maybe his admirers were wrong; maybe they weren’t. But whatever your own view of immigration, there has never been an issue on which the political class has so consistently gone against the wishes of the British people.

At this point in the argument, your standard liberal academic would typically interject to insist that Britain has always been a nation of immigrants. We all come from somewhere else anyway, they say, we are all mongrels, so how dare we close the gates to a few more?

But as Douglas Murray shows, this is a shameless rewriting of our past. For most of our history, we have never been a nation of immigrants. Even the most famous influx in our history, the Norman Conquest, involved a tiny population transfer, the equivalent of no more than 5 per cent or so.

As much as the BBC and other news organisations like to pretend that Britain has always been a beacon of diversity, the plain fact is that until the mid-20th century the massive, overwhelming majority of the people who lived here had been born here. Look at photo after photo from late Victorian London and the uniformly pale faces stare back at you.

The arrival of the French Huguenots in the 1680s, often cited by apostles of diversity, involved about 50,000 people, all of whom were white and Christian.

And although the Irish migrants who arrived in the 19th century faced more than their fair share of prejudice, our islands’ interlinked histories meant they were far from complete outsiders.

Liberal-minded types often find this embarrassing. Either they try to rewrite our history, relentlessly playing up the presence of tiny minorities of Africans and Asians, or they peddle a caricature of pre-Fifties Britain as a grey, boring place, which desperately needed an injection of immigrant colour.

This is not just a British hang-up. As Murray writes, European liberals love to paint their own societies as ‘slightly boring or staid places’. They write as if ‘there is a hole at the heart of Europe which needs filling and without which we would otherwise be poorer’.

(By the way, this is something they would never dream of saying about countries such as Bhutan or Burkina Faso. Nobody ever suggests that what these unforgivably monoracial countries need is an influx of migrants from Surrey.)

As a superbly damning example, Murray gives us the views of the impeccably liberal Fredrik Reinfeldt, Sweden’s Prime Minister between 2006 and 2014, who enjoyed the dubious reputation of being the ‘Scandinavian David Cameron’. He was a passionate advocate of mass immigration. Swedish people, he once said, were ‘boring’, while national borders were ‘fictional’ constructs.

And in a perfect illustration of what Murray sees as the European elite’s chronic self-flagellation, Mr Reinfeldt even declared that ‘only barbarism is genuinely Swedish. All further development has been brought from outside’. 

This would have come as a shock to the Swedish playwright August Strindberg, the film director Ingmar Bergman and the members of Abba, not to mention their countrymen who invented the seatbelt and the pacemaker.

In any case, the results of Mr Reinfeldt’s liberal utopianism have been staggering. With just 10 million people, Sweden has taken in more refugees per capita than any other country. In 2015 alone, it accepted 180,000 incomers — more than the population of all but the three largest Swedish cities.

In recent months, the relationship between immigration and crime in Sweden has become hugely controversial. This is thanks largely to Donald Trump’s comments about ‘riots’ in Sweden based on a report on Fox News, which blamed an alleged breakdown in law and order in the country on an influx of migrants over the past 20 years.

But as Murray suggests, the really telling story is surely the rise of the far-Right Sweden Democrats — a nationalistic, anti-immigrant party that has come from nowhere to lead the opinion polls for the past two years. And this not in Thirties Germany but in 21st-century Sweden, ostensibly one of the most contented, tolerant and egalitarian societies on Earth!

It would, I think, be unforgivably lazy to blame this on the supposed racism of the great unwashed, as liberal intellectuals love to do.

In fact, almost every indicator shows that old-fashioned, poisonous prejudice has virtually died out, not just here in Britain, but across much of Western Europe.

Whatever The Guardian might think, Murray himself is not racist. Indeed, he writes movingly about the plight of the thousands of refugees who have paid up to $1,500 (£1,150) each to travel on dangerous boats across the Mediterranean. As he remarks, any decent person should want to help them, not to ‘push them back into the sea’.

Continue reading…

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New Video Shows Erdogan Watching His Armed Thugs Beat Protesters, Journalists in Washington DC

Erdoğan’s security detail were allegedly involved in the fights. The police did their best to stop the skirmish.

The video shows Turkish President Erdogan watching as his armed thugs beat protesters and journalists in Washington DC.

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National Geographic Traveller | City life: Addis Ababa

Lofty and leafy, with ancient sprawling markets and shiny modern skyscrapers, Ethiopia’s capital is a surprise package with a curious past

Four men are approaching at speed, consuming with ease the gradient under their feet offered by Mount Entoto. They’re all wearing the same uniform, the same expression of concentration and focus, and for a second, I wonder if they’re coming for me. But they continue upwards, fluorescent trainers padding the tarmac, exercise tops stretched tight over limbs and torsos. I follow them with my eyes, until they glide around a corner and the eucalyptus treeline claims them, never once slowing their pace as they race towards their futures.

A quartet of slight teenagers, they’re a symbol of Ethiopian aspiration. And they have every reason to be pushing themselves on this 10,500ft peak, which frames Addis Ababa. Long-distance running is firmly established as a route to better things in Ethiopia. The proof lies two miles up the road amid shady paths and tasteful accommodation. Yaya Village opened in 2011 as a mixture of four-star hotel and training camp for athletes seeking to hone their fitness at altitude. It’s partly owned by superstar runner Haile Gebrselassie, the (now retired) Ethiopian master of the marathon, who won two Olympic gold medals and set 27 world records. The young men who overtook me will be dreaming of achieving even a fraction of the glory amassed by a legend who’s considered one of the greatest ever sportsmen, and of taking the tape in New York, Dubai, Sydney and the other major cities where he won.

Just the thought of their relentless stride pattern is enough to snare my breath — although the discernible thinness of the oxygen at this elevation doesn’t help. Two steps behind, my guide Yohannes Assefa giggles. “Come on,” he says. “Just by getting off the plane, you’re seven years younger than you were yesterday. This little hill really shouldn’t be an issue.”

He’s referring to the Ethiopian Calendar, which, by dint of the Orthodox Christian tradition in the country, lags three quarters of a decade behind conventional diaries — 11 September, the next New Year’s Day, will usher in Ethiopia’s version of 2010.

But, this quirk of the clock is not the only unusual thing about Addis Ababa. For one, it’s Africa’s highest capital, floating at 7,700ft in the Ethiopian Highlands (to put this in context, Kathmandu in Himalayan Nepal goes about its day at ‘just’ 4,600ft). This makes for a greenness and coolness of climate at odds with the still prevailing though inaccurate image of Ethiopia, bequeathed by Live Aid and the famine of 1983-1985, as a place of dust and desolation. In fact, the sun keeps its fiercest rays holstered throughout the year, rarely shifting from its groove of 21-23C, and the wet season of June to September contributes to the leafiness by treating Addis to four months of deluge.

Then there’s its age. Addis Ababa is a child, disgorged onto the map as recently as 1886 by the Ethiopian emperor Menelik II, who wanted a capital befitting his status as a ruler of a rapidly expanding domain. Gazing down from Mount Entoto, I can see that this youthfulness translates into another expression of Ethiopian aspiration. Modern structures thrust upper storeys into the sky, sunlight glinting on their windows. At their feet, people mill about — the city’s official population figure is 3.4 million, but the real head count is likely to be much closer to seven million. These residents spill out into the different districts — the central area of Piazza, where museums and churches supply a distinct grandeur; the Downtown core of Urael, with its bars, hotels and clubs; upwardly-mobile Bole, with its priapic towers of desirable apartments; and Merkato, a near-endless sprawl of alleyways where some 13,000 merchants make up Africa’s biggest city market.

This urban jam has been sugared of late by the opening of the Addis Ababa Light Rail. Although funded by Chinese money, the first rapid-transit system in sub-Saharan Africa sings a song of a 21st-century Ethiopia. Its two lines were launched in 2015, dissecting the city east-to-west and north-to-south via 39 stations and 20 miles of track. It has prised 200,000 people a day from the traffic queues — although Bole International Airport, on the south-east edge of the centre, is becoming increasingly equipped to bring in more people. When I pass through its arrivals hall, I’m impressed not just by the size of the new terminal currently taking shape, but by the feast of possible destinations listed on the departures board. London and New York are there. So are Dubai, Tokyo, Los Angeles, Sao Paulo, Shanghai and Cape Town. Addis Ababa is becoming a hub, and it wants you to know it.

All this makes it a city where you might be tempted to linger, perhaps even for a long weekend. Plenty of travellers visit Ethiopia every year, but few take a good look at its capital, preferring to head out to the rock churches of Lalibela and the UNESCO-listed ancient obelisks of Axum. While this may be understandable, I decide to drag my heels.

Now, there’s every chance that I’m lost. Yohannes and I have delved into the labyrinth of Merkato, and, sure-footed on home soil, he has briefly marched out of sight, leaving me with two feasible turnings and the thought that I’m Alice in a wonderland maze not of clipped hedges, but of many traders and stallholders. These twin paths seem to be stacked with every piece of ephemera you could imagine. There are discarded car batteries and remote controls divorced from their televisions. There are yellow plastic cans, which once contained cooking oil. There are various screws, bolts, nuts and second-hand padlocks. There are sheets of salvaged corrugated metal, fearsomely sharp at the edges, carried on tops of heads, forcing passers-by to duck unless they want to lose theirs.

Then comes the voice. “You’re British, yes?” There’s an irony to the fact that the man making the enquiry is wearing a fake Arsenal football shirt, but I nod in response. “I think there’s nothing for you here,” he says. It’s not a hostile comment; it’s even delivered with a smile. It’s more an acknowledgement that this four square mile tribute to the idea of one person’s trash being his neighbour’s treasure isn’t meant for tourists. He clinks together two of the empty glass soda bottles he sells as water carriers, and grins again. “This is not Marrakech,” he says. “You’ll not buy pricey bracelets and carpets here.”

He’s correct. There’s nothing for tourists in Merkato. And yet, in another sense, there’s everything: a glimpse of how Addis Ababa’s economy has worked for decades — nothing is without value — is as worthy as any souvenir. I ask him, in curiosity, how much his bottles cost. He smiles again, still friendly, but the meaning is clear: ‘Don’t waste my time.’

Local Specialities

If Merkato is Addis Ababa at any moment since 1886, Urael is rather more tied to 2017. There’s an upbeat vibe to both Mickey Leland Street and Namibia Street, watering holes anticipating the evening. A crowd is forming outside cocktail haven Shebeta Lounge as I amble the former — but I’m aiming for the latter, specifically 2000 Habesha Cultural Restaurant, a whirling dervish of a place. Inside, an international clientele — local diners, European expats, a set of Somali businessmen — is seated around tables, listening to the house band plucking rhythms and harmonies from their one-string, bass-like masinko and five-stringed kirar instruments. The menu offers an array of Ethiopian dishes, including gomen besiga (cubes of beef and spinach, baked in a clay pot) and bozena shiro (yellow peas slow-cooked with beef and onions). The atmosphere is fuelled by carafes of tej, Ethiopian honey wine, its bittersweet taste serving to disguise its potency. By the time I dash to the Ghion Hotel, seeking a performance by Mulatu Astatke, the 73-year-old musician who’s seen as the father of ‘Ethio-Jazz’, the night has taken on a woozy quality. The music that emerges from this darkened room— echoes of New Orleans, but with a rumbling beat that’s entirely African — enhances the mood, and the air seems to thicken with each key change.

In such a context, it’s hard to imagine Addis Ababa as a city squashed under jackboots. But its happy mood conceals a 20th century pockmarked by despair. The famine that sent rock stars scurrying to Wembley Stadium in 1985 was caused, in part, by the brutality and administrative incompetence of the Derg — the Soviet Union-backed military dictatorship which ‘ran’ Ethiopia between 1974 and 1991. This oppression was but a delayed second course to a vicious starter: the six years (1935-1941) when Ethiopia (then known as Abyssinia) was occupied by fascist Italy, and Addis Ababa, as the centrepoint of resistance, suffered the brunt of Mussolini’s anger.

Both epochs can be revisited here. The former is detailed at the Red Terror Martyrs’ Memorial Museum in central Kirkos, which replays the nightmare with grim precision via the torture instruments, dusty coffins and photos of some of the regime’s half-a-million victims. The latter is kept alive via two memorials: Yekatit 12 Square is host to a column which salutes the estimated 30,000 Ethiopians who were massacred by their conquerors on 19 February 1937, in response to a failed assassination attempt on the Italian leader Rodolfo Graziani; while, just over a mile away on the edge of Piazza — on a roundabout on Fitawrari Gebeyebu Street — a giant statue remembers the sacrifice of Abune Petros, a bishop who was executed by the occupiers in 1936 for publicly and repeatedly denouncing their presence.

Yet, if you wish to step back into Addis Ababa’s story, you cannot do so without encountering one particular character. Emperor Haile Selassie defined Ethiopia’s 20th century, governing from 1930 to 1974 (with the exception of a five-year exile during the Italian fascist period). While he was arguably no saint, he was charismatic to the point of inspiring religious devotion — the Rastafari movement in Jamaica still considers him a messiah. And he left his imprint on the city. His palace (in Piazza) is now marooned on the campus of Addis Ababa University and has been refitted as the Ethnographic Museum. But amid some intriguing artefacts, including art depicting Ethiopia’s first fight with Italian colonialism, the victorious Battle of Adwa in 1896, you can detect the grandeur. Selassie’s bedroom is preserved as a statement of majesty, even if the size of the bed betrays his lack of stature.

He also haunts the National Museum, just to the south — his colossal throne another emblem of royal power. It’s mighty enough to almost eclipse the prime exhibit, the skeletal remains of ‘Lucy’, a woman who strode the Ethiopian landscape 3.2 million years ago, as one of the mothers of mankind. She was discovered in a lake bed in 1974, a great year for humanity’s knowledge of its roots, but a bad one for Selassie, who was deposed by the Derg amid soaring inflation and unrest. His demise was unseemly. He was imprisoned, then reportedly died of ‘respiratory failure’ in August 1975, according to state media of the day. It wasn’t until 1992 that his bones were found below a concrete slab in the palace grounds.

Still, Selassie had the last laugh: he was re-buried with much pomp in November 2000 at Holy Trinity Cathedral, the Orthodox bastion he founded in 1931. Athletes stream past the gates as I near it; again, all sweat and application, oblivious to the magnificence of the building behind the fence. But, Ethiopia’s imperialists, you can be certain, are not. Their fallen champion slumbers in style within; his mausoleum an enormous exercise in cold marble.

Before I cross the threshold, I’m drawn to one particular grave outside. Here’s another Addis Ababa idiosyncrasy. The headstone serenades the soul of Sylvia Pankhurst, the suffragette and friend of Selassie’s, who moved to the city in 1956 and died there four years later. Clearly, my interest in her once again denotes me as British, for I’m approached by an elderly worshipper. We swap strands of conversation, until he drops the pertinent question: “So, Brexit — is it fine for you, or not?” When the UK’s current political affairs are a topic for discussion in a country once the subject of world concern, you know times have changed.

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Google Translates „Trump„ as „Descend„ / „Impeach„ in The Ethiopian Language

ETHIOPIC = AMHARIC

DONALD TRUMP = ዶናልድ ይወርዳልና – which means „Will Descend„ or „Will be Impeached„. In no other language have I found similar translations for the word/name, TRUMP. TRUMP = ይወርዳልና. Unbelievable!!

Let’s see in the sentence, „President Donald Trump will visit Saudi Arabia„ “ፕሬዚዳንት ዶናልድ ይወርዳልና ሳውዲ አረቢያ ይጎብኙ ይሆናል” (pirēzīdaniti donalidi yiweridalina sawidī ārebīya bemegobinyeti yihonali)

We know these translations are mostly inaccurate, but this one is, indeed, astonishing.

Now, President Donald Trump is descended from German and Scottish ancestors. And the former FBI director, Robert Mueller – whose ancestry also includes German and Scottish – would serve as special counsel to oversee investigation into allegations of Russian meddling in the 2016 President Election and ties between President Trump’s campaign and Russia.

Look at the calendar, pay attention to the timing of events. The Luceferian deep state is attempting to impeach President Trump by all means. Will it do it with Robert Mueller’s nomination? Will they allow Babylon Saudi Barbaria to do the dirty work, so that it would be nuked back to the stone age? Two birds with one stone!

Please Mr. President, be careful, you’re stepping into a pit of vipers.

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SHOKING VIDEO: Turkey Erdogan’s Bodyguards Brutally Attack Armenian Christian Protesters in Washington DC

Let the world see and learn how savage and barbaric the Turks are. If they do this, as guests, in a free country, imagine how they treat Christians and Kurds in their savage country.

A demonstration outside the Turkish Embassy in northwest Washington led to nine people being injured, and two arrested. UNBELIEVABLE!

This is MINGBOGGLING, INSANE! Turkish Bodyguards with guns attacking people in Washington DC! Just SHOKING! And the police is watching how they beat unarmed people. OUTRAGEOUS!

The Antichrist beast believes the world belongs to it. The inbreed Turks are attacking Armenians and Kurds, kicking and hitting women and innocent protesters – as if they are still in Turkey. Only cowards attack older men and women, only cowards attack in a number 50 vs 10.

COWARD Turks

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