By Gamal Nkrumah The deed is done. Was it the Islamic Army for the Liberation of Muslim Holy Sites? It doesn't really matter who did it. Everyone believes that the culprit is either an Arab or an Islamist militant. What matters is that the political and economic milieu in which African countries operate today make the continent's nations particularly prone to surprise terrorist attacks by groups who have an axe to grind with Western powers generally, and the United States in particular. Tanzanian police working in conjunction with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) arrested six Sudanese nationals, six Iraqis, a Somali and a Turk. All the arrested were neither able to produce passports nor explain satisfactorily their presence in Tanzania. The US Embassy in neighbouring Uganda has been closed down since last Friday for security reasons. Washington has shown considerable interest in Africa in the past two years and, as such, American interests in Africa are tempting targets for anti-American groups, Middle Eastern or otherwise. But, because of the relative proximity of the Middle East and East Africa and the close cultural and economic links between the two regions, the ever-rising flow of refugees, tourists, businessmen and investors to and from the neighbouring regions is unlikely to be stemmed by the attack last Friday on the US embassies in the Kenyan and Tanzanian capitals, Nairobi and Dar es Salaam. Therefore, we can expect more of the same. The American Embassy in Dar es Salaam had been the Israeli Embassy before the US acquired the property. The Israelis say that their own experience of being the target of past attacks made a difference in the way the building was designed and protected. There were 250 dead and 5,000 injured in Nairobi, while 10 people were killed and 75 injured in Dar es Salaam. The dead and injured were mostly innocent African bystanders; 12 Americans lost their lives. In Africa, only on occasion does the seething cauldron of Middle Eastern conflicts fling a spatter of wreckage up over the Sahara, Red Sea and Indian Ocean Rim. The Arabs are actually the major investors in East Africa at the moment. There are growing tourism links between East Africa and the Gulf, and Arab investors have a very high profile in East Africa. In Tanzania, Omanis and other Gulf Arabs of Zanzibari origin account for over half of foreign investment in the country. The problems of East Africa are essentially economic, and the badly hit tourism sector in East Africa could ill-afford this new blow. Besides, it is far easier for a terrorist to infiltrate the security apparatus of an impoverished African state with no access to sophisticated high-tech surveillance equipment. Perhaps with the Arab-Israeli peace process grinding to a halt, the Middle East will become a sideshow with the real action taking place in Africa. A savage battle that flickers and flares between burgeoning interests of American capital in Africa and militant Islamists determined to hit American targets has earnestly begun. Africa is American investors' most lucrative market. The rate of return on capital invested there is over 30 per cent. That compares very favourably with the respective figures for Asia and Latin America -- 13 and 11 per cent. Nevertheless, a deadly game of musical chairs has started in Africa. The busiest intersection in East Africa, downtown Nairobi, was the scene of the worst terrorist act in the region's history. Meanwhile, the Israelis have stolen the show. While the American rescue effort has been severely criticised for focusing on rescuing Americans, the Israelis have been praised. African governments were obliged to accept Israeli assistance in the rescue operation. None of this aid, of course, is ever without strings. But, African countries realise that there is more mileage in this policy. This is not the first time that "Arab" terrorists have struck the Kenyan capital. In 1979, Nairobi's Norfolk Hotel was levelled by a powerful explosion which killed scores of Kenyan employees and a few Western tourists. The Norfolk bombing was claimed by an obscure Arab militant organisation that has never since been heard of, in retaliation for Kenya permitting Israeli troops to refuel in Nairobi just before their raid on Uganda's Entebbe's Airport to rescue hostages aboard a hijacked Israeli El-Al plane. This time round, Israel promptly dispatched a team of 140 military men to assist in the international rescue efforts. The international and local Kenyan media focused on the Israeli team's help, and CNN cameras even zoomed in on Israeli sniffer dogs sporting Star of David harnesses. "Israel has a team which is experienced in evacuating the wounded from wrecked buildings, as was the case with the bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires," explained Brig.Gen. Ilan Hariri, head of the Israeli rescue operation in Nairobi. Investigators suspect the Czech-manufactured deadly explosive Semtex was used in the blasts, and African governments cannot but rely on Israeli and American technical expertise in the investigation effort. "The way an embassy is constructed, the way people can get to the embassy, what construction materials are used... all those things have to be taken into account, without any doubt," explained Zalman Shoval, Israeli ambassador to the US, a seasoned career diplomat who served in Africa in the past. "And I repeat three times: vigilance, vigilance, vigilance." Washington's anti-terrorist foreign policy to date has been formulated by events. And, there are those who want to see Israeli-style preventive strikes against potential troublemakers. There were many differences between the aftermath of Entebbe in 1979 and last week's bombings, but the net effect was the same: the Israelis were widely perceived as smooth operators by Africans, and the image of the Arab as a terrorist was reinforced through the international media coverage of the tragedy. Kenya set up an $8.5 million emergency fund to meet the massacre victims' medical and social needs. Kenyan President Daniel Arap Moi promised to "bring the perpetrators of the heinous crime to book". Tanzanian President Benjamin Mkapa told reporters in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, where he had been attending a summit meeting on the deepening crisis in the Democratic Republic of Congo, "We are going to try to unearth who is behind this. When we do, we are going to take very stern measures." Are African governments going to make scapegoats out of Islamist groups in East Africa? Most observers agree that the likelihood that Kenyan or Tanzanian militant Islamists collaborated in the Nairobi and Dar es Salaam bombings is negligible. A Cairo-based East African diplomat told Al-Ahram Weekly that "the Nairobi and Dar es Salaam bombings were the work of experienced terrorists. It was a carefully planned incident which was carried out by people who did not care about the high civilian death and casualty toll. No local group would have risked the lives of their own people, ordinary Kenyans and Tanzanians. It is the work of foreigners." So far there have been no accusations made against any particular state, even though several Arab and Muslim states have been under suspicion for aiding and abetting international terrorism. Libya, Iran and Sudan are invariably accused of supporting militant Islamist groups in Africa, especially south of the Sahara. Kenya has a special, albeit oscillating, relationship with Sudan that seesaws from strategic ally in the regional political arena and fellow pariah in the Western world (due to their respective human rights record), to sworn enemies because of Kenya's support for the Sudanese People's Liberation Army. Nairobi turns a blind eye to Khartoum's support for the opposition Islamic Party of Kenya (IPK) and other Kenyan Islamist groups precisely because it is operating a very profitable business, managing international food aid meant for Sudanese refugees in Kenya and elsewhere. All relief aid to Sudanese refugees in Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda and displaced Sudanese in the South is brought in through the Kenyan port of Mombasa, an IPK stronghold. Meanwhile, African countries are growing weary of what they see as Arab terrorism. Rightly or wrongly, they denounce what they feel is an unwelcome spillover of Arab conflicts into the African political scene. In the grim aftermath of the Nairobi and Dar es Salaam bombings, African newspaper headlines and editorials speak of little else. "How can they expect Kenya to support their cause? How can they expect us to support their cause if they use such means?" asked Moi. "We don't know who did it, or why, but whatever their motives, whatever their cause, it is utterly discredited by this heinous act."
