Page 185 - The Winter of Islam and the Spring to Come

HARUN YAHYA (ADNAN OKTAR)
183

be protected from the idola-
ters in Mecca. It was colo- GULF OF ADEN
DJIBOUTI
nized by the British in the
nineteenth century. After SOMALIA
that period the Somalis were ETHIOPIA
condemned to never-ending
wars, conflict, famine and
disease. In 1884, the British
occupied northern Somalia, KENYA
and the Italians the south in
INDIAN
1887, and as in so many other
OCEAN
Muslim countries, this ush-
ered in a period of great cru-
elty and oppression.
Following a long period
of colonialism, Somalia be-
came independent in 1960, and Aden Abdullah was made president.
However, the establishment of a just and stable administration in
Somalia was not permitted. Gen. Mohammed Siad Barre took over the
country in a military coup in 1969, and all political parties were closed
down. Barre saw Muslims as the major obstacle to the socialist order he
hoped to impose, and so he banned all Islamic books, magazines and
newspapers. Numerous Muslim intellectuals and scholars who op-
posed this policy were executed on his orders.
Barre fled the country when fighting broke out in the country in
1991, and there followed a huge civil war. One million or so mainly
Muslim Somalis were forced to migrate to a number of other African
countries.
Under a 1992 United Nations General Assembly resolution, 30,000
U. N. troops under United States command set up a base in the country.
The United Nations came in for intense popular protest from the native
population, and had to withdraw from the country in 1994. They left
more than 7,000 dead behind them, and an even worse state of in
Somalia.