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Somalia, An Image of Horror Reflected in The Mirror of Terror

By Abdi-Noor Mohamed

Nearly 10,000 people have been killed in murderous mortar attacks in the Somali capital city, Mogadishu. More than 3 million inhabitants were displaced in the outskirts of the city over the past one and a half years following relocation of the weak transitional government with Ethiopian military support and subsequent deployment of African Peace Keepers AMISOM.

One of the most tragic incidents in recent months happened in the past two days, when the African peacekeepers targeted residential areas in retaliation for an attack carried out against them by the Islamic hardliners of Alshabaab.

Alshabaab is a notorious militia insurgent group who have no base of their own as they are thinly scattered in the city using the people as a shield. They have no right to fire at AMISOM while hiding behind innocent populations. Likewise receiving hostile fire from an enemy known to be shooting behind a wall of human shields does not give AMISOM permission to respond disproportionately with superior weaponry.

Who is the referee of war or is it just a war game with no rules in place? Who is responsible for such inhumane war crimes whereby two groups exchange fire in heavily populated settlements wiping away people en masse. In one explosion a mortar took the life of eight persons, all in the same house, all in the same family.

There is blood running everywhere in the streets as people are burning inside this man-made hell. Those who escape the bombs do not necessarily escape death. They might face death in another form, probably in a more torturous way of dying - starvation - as humanitarian aid is being blocked by gunmen who loot the supplies or kill the aid workers to make it impossible to reach the war victims.

Air freighting of food supplies is not an option as the airport is closed with a stern instruction and threat from the insurgents. They vowed that they will shoot down any plane that trieds to land at Mogadishu airport. It is worth mentioning that the airport has mainly served as a military air base for the AMISOM contingents though there were some civilian planes that provided transport service to people fleeing from war or evacuating wounded relatives to locations with better medical facilities.

Sea freight is not possible either. Pirates use speedboats to hijack ships carrying food aid. It seems that every attempt to make sound humanitarian intervention in Somalia is blocked. And a more painful part of the story is that the fact that the whole nation depends on food donations from abroad. I just wonder what will happen to our people when the land routes are closed and roadböocks mounted, when air space is closed and the airport is targeted, when the sea is closed and vessels are attacked, when everywhere is closed and every hope is killed, when every reconciliation conference ends in disaster. This endless war has given us an image of horror reflected in the mirror of terror.

What is going on in Somalia is a real catastrophe and it is absolutely unbelievable to sit back and watch a whole nation sinking into a lake of flames. We can not understand why the world is not waking up to this tragedy of genocide proportions or I guess the world has other priorities far more important than human life being wasted in such a senseless way

Somalia is left in the hands of Ethiopian invaders along with a government that serves the best interests of the enemy and terrorists who hide behind Islamic religion but have an agenda of slavery and oppression. These groups have killed and terrified the people and forced them to run away from their houses. They widowed mothers and made children orphans while they relocated their families to safer areas or have even taken them out of the country.

Apart from the grisly scenes of the latest city bombardments, I have seen today on the internet the picture of a child who is waiting for his mother to bring food but unaware that she was hit by a rocket at Isgoyska Bakaaraha. I tried to speak to that child in a poetic telepathy but I ran short of words to fully express the tragedy engulfed on the life of that poor 3 year old baby boy.

What can we tell that child?

Will it assuage his pain if we tell him that the Ethiopian forces will pull out? Will it bring his tempers to a normal balance if we sing for him a lullaby that says "An agreement is awaiting signing in Djibouti, pending the return of the two Shariffs from Mecca?"

Will it help if we tell him that vessels carrying food aid shall make it safely to the shores of Mogadsishu? will it stop him from crying if we tell him that the European Union is gearing up a new defence measure to combat piracy in the Somalis seas? Will it lend a comforting palm to clean his tears if we tell him that the AlShabaab insurgents want to rule the country by Sharia Law and that is why they are pounding the airport with Hooobiye bombs?

Or will it make sense for him if we say that a new mayor shall be elected soon for Mogadishu so that security will be improved? Or will it help if we tell him that the President has defied the Al-Shabaab threats as his plane made a successful take off from the Mogadishu airport on his way to Addis?

What can we tell this child who only knows two things: His mother and food - which now will not arrive.

I tried to view the Somali politics from any angle and cut it in any measure I can but unfortunately I could not get a piece of logic to appease that child. What can we tell a crying child while peering through a dilapidated shack,staring in the open and feeling an air of starvation steering in his empty stomach.

What can we tell a child waiting for his beloved Mom who has already drowned in the depths of her own blood. What can I tell this child?

Please tell me what I should tell this child?

Abdi-Noor Mohamed is a Somali writer and filmmaker, living in Sweden. Contact him at NewsBlaze.