On Thursday night, Britain's Channel 4 ran this segment about a young man from London who has been charged in Kenya with plotting to detonate a bomb, among other things.
Jermaine Grant's alleged links with insurgents underlines the fear that some Western men traveling to Africa could form part of a growing al-Qaida presence on the continent.
Also on Thursday, The Associated Press ran a story about Americans rising in the ranks inside of al-Shabab, an Somalia-based insurgent group linked to al-Qaida.
The Associated Press wrote:
A handful of young Muslims from the U.S. are taking high-visibility propaganda and operational roles inside an al-Qaida-linked insurgent force in Somalia known as al-Shabab. While most are from Minnesota, which has the largest Somali population in the nation, al-Shabab members include a Californian and an Alabaman with no ancestral ties to Somalia.
"They are being deployed in roles that appear to be shrewdly calculated to raise al-Shabab's international profile and to recruit others, especially those from the United States and other English-speaking countries," said Anders Folk, a former assistant U.S. attorney who prosecuted suspected al-Shabab supporters in Minnesota.
Officials fear another terrorist attack in East Africa. Kenya announced on Jan. 7 that it had thwarted attempted al-Shabab attacks over the holidays. The same day, Britain's Foreign Office urged Britons in Kenya to be extra vigilant, warning that terrorists there may be "in the final stages of planning attacks."
More than 40 people have traveled from the U.S. to Somalia to join al-Shabab since 2007, and 15 of them have died, according to a report from the House Homeland Security Committee. Federal investigations into al-Shabab recruitment in the U.S. have centered on Minnesota, which has more than 32,000 Somalis.
At least 21 men have left Minnesota to join al-Shabab in that same time. The FBI has confirmed that at least two of them died in Somalia as suicide bombers. A U.S. citizen is suspected in a third suicide bombing, and another is under investigation in connection with a fourth bombing on Oct. 29 that killed 15 people.
Msnbc.com staff and The Associated Press contributed to this report.


In my previous post I forgot to add that he also gets his own cell phone, internet service for his laptop, etc. There were more things also. Sounds pretty much like my life...where's the penalty for the murder?
Perhaps again this shows us all the terrible immigration policies both we and the UK as well as many other European countries have followed and the results. These cowardly muslim traitors should have never been allowed into our countries. And this is certainly another example of the "peaceful muslims" who do nothing, say nothing, hear nothing and take no action to stop violent muslim terrorism. Each day we all learn more and more of the scourge of the hate filled culture known as islam and the singular goal of it's followers; kill all non muslims.