The radical Islamist group of Al Shabaab in Somalia on Friday threatened to "destroy" neighboring Kenya which they accuse of supporting a rival movement. The spokesman for Al Shabaab, Ali Mohamoud Rageh, made the statement in the southern port town of Kismayu as he addressed newly trained Islamist fighters there. Rageh accused the Kenya government of supporting a rival Islamist faction, the Ras Kanboni group, which slip from Hezbul Islam movement after fighting with Al Shabaab over control regions at the Kenya-Somali common border. "We say to the Kenyan government a man in a glass house does not start throwing stones. If you do not stop the troubles you are making (to us) we will destroy your glass house," Rageh told fighters who chanted " Allahu Akbar" or "Allah Is Great." The Islamist spokesman encouraged the fighters to continue what he termed "the Jihad in the way of Allah until the word of Allah is supreme in the whole world", adding it was they who would destroy Kenya. "We are not fighting just for Somalism or clanism but the Jihad in the way of Allah will continue, even if we capture all of Somalia, until the Word of Allah is supreme in the whole world," said the spokesman. Al Shabaab has, since early this year, been fighting the Ras Kanboni group which split from the main Hezbul Islam group led by firebrand cleric Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys after the two sides disagreed over disputes with Al Shabaab regarding control of Kismayu. The Al Shabab Islamist group controls much of south and center of Somalia including large swathes of the restive Somali capital, Mogadishu. Somali government, which has recently been facing internal divisions, controls only parts of the capital and is backed by almost 5,000 African Union peacekeepers who protect important government instillations and senior officials.
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