At this present time we are on furlough until June 2013 in USA. We were traveling yesterday from Kansas City then we heard the news last night in an Email. Please pray for our son Kevin who is working in the Lamu area on the coast. Pray for Kevin’s safety as he travel by road to Mombasa tomorrow to check on the pastors , the work & our mission house. Thank God Kevin took a short cut and went around Mombasa to Lamu when the problems started and knew nothing about it until he reached Lamu. Thank God for his protection. Blessings David & Beckie Smith
Email from Nairobi:
Urgent prayers needed! Please pray for the protection of our churches and pastors in Eastleigh. Several Islamic leaders were killed. Last night, one of the other leaders tweeted:
Two sheikhs #Rogo and #Sameer killed. Its time we too sent several pastors to a mass grave! KILL ANY PASTOR"
Opposition is real and intense. We walked through that area this morning - tension was high.
Email from Mombasa:
hi David, ys there is problm in Msa as there aare riots .shops are closed and general tension.
a bit better today. some churches burned .
will giv u more deteail later.
Email from Mombasa:
Last couple of days has seen some matata in Mombasa ever since they (we don't know who they are ........) bumped off this Sheik Aboud Rogo outside the Pirates access road in Bamburi in broad daylight. This caused a riot up at Saba Saba where the mob (made up mostly of unemployed youth and mukoras) burned 2 Police cars and went on a pillage spree breaking into dukas and helping themselves. The mob collected around Mwembe Tayari and the bus area where they continued with their sheda yesterday. I had heard that the wife had died after having been shot in the leg and beaten up....so it was another excuse for a few more riots which spilled into Kisauni and Bamburi where they burnt down 2 churches. The Nyali Police came to the scene and apparently a handgrenade was thrown at the police vehicle killing either 2 or 3 police. So .Mombasa is full of Islamic cheer........,:)
News
Tension in Mombasa as Al-Shabaab suspect Rogo killed
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The smouldering shell of a government van near the Mewa mosque in Majengo, Mombasa, that was set on fire following the death of Sheikh Aboud Rogo. The preacher was gunned down along the Mombasa-Malindi highway on August 27, 2012. Photo / Laban Walloga
By Nation Reporter
Posted Monday, August 27 2012 at 12:38
Deadly riots broke out in Kenya's main port of Mombasa on Monday after the assassination of a radical cleric linked to Somalia's Al-Qaeda-allied Shebab militants.
At least one person was hacked to death as thousands of angry protestors took to the streets after Aboud Rogo Mohammed -- who was on US and UN sanction lists for allegedly supporting the Shebab -- was shot dead.
"A car behind us aimed at my husband, they shot him on the right side," said his widow Haniya Said, screaming in grief after the killing by unknown attackers.
"One person has been killed, he was slashed to death during the protests," said regional police chief Aggrey Adoli.
Cars were set on fire and two churches were looted in the city -- Kenya's main port and a key tourist hub -- according to an AFP reporter.
"There is chaos in town now, and our officers are on the ground dispersing the rioters to maintain peace," added Adoli. "They are demonstrating against the killing of Aboud Rogo, who was shot by unknown people."
Witnesses said that Mohammed's car was riddled with bullets, and a photograph released by his supporters showed his bloody corpse slumped behind the wheel of a car.
"He died as we rushed him to hospital. Why have they killed my dear husband?" his widow added, before she and her children were taken to the hospital.
Mohammed was placed on a US sanctions list in July for "engaging in acts that directly or indirectly threaten the peace, security or stability of Somalia", specifically for recruiting and fundraising for the hardline Shebab.
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The United Nations Security Council placed a travel ban and asset freeze on the cleric in July, saying he had provided "financial, material, logistical or technical support to Al-Shebab".
He was the "main ideological leader" of Kenya's Al Hijra group, also known as the Muslim Youth Center (MYC), the UN said. The group is viewed as a close ally of the Shebab in Kenya.
Mohammed "used the extremist group as a pathway for radicalisation and recruitment of principally Swahili-speaking Africans for carrying out violent militant activity in Somalia", the UN said.
MYC leader Sheikh Ahmad Iman Ali, in a message posted on Twitter, said: "We are on the right track when our leaders get shahadah (martyrdom)."
"He will remain in our hearts forever," the MYC added, while another message offered the grim warning that the "kuffar (infidels) will pay" for his death.
"The whole city is on fire, there are looters in the streets, cars have been damaged, some have been burnt," said Francis Auma, from the local organisation Muslims for Human Rights.
"An imam in the mosque shouted through the speaker 'blood for blood', and immediately youths started stoning cars," said witness Dennis Odhiambo, whose car was damaged and who was forced to flee into a police station for safety.
The local Muslim Human Rights Forum condemned Mohammed's assassination, claiming it "mirrors" the recent killings or disappearance of others "on the country's terrorism watch list".
Mohammed "repeatedly called for the violent rejection of the Somali peace process", the US Treasury said, noting he had often advocated the use of violence against both the UN and the African Union force battling the Shebab in Somalia.
