Harakat al-Shabaab al-Mujahideen, simply known as al-Shabaab, or by its state name, the Islamic Emirate of Somalia, is a transnational Salafi Jihadist military and political organization based in Somalia and is also in a more limited capacity active elsewhere in East Africa. It is involved in the ongoing Somali Civil War as an Islamist group, regularly invoking takfir to rationalize its terrorist attacks on Somali civilians and civil servants. Allied to the Militant Sunni Islamist organization al-Qaeda, it has also forged ties with al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, and al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
A devastating suicide bombing claimed by Al-Shabaab has struck a military recruitment base in Mogadishu, Somalia, killing at least..