El-Ali town is situated in southern Somalia, 90 km south of Beledweyn city and it used to be the regional hub for the Italian colony (military, police and courts) due to its strategic position and closeness to the Ethiopian border with Somalia. It is inhabited by indigenous people called (Derisame – Haji Gargelis, and Ali Wasuge people)
El-Ali Indigenous People
@courtesy – Somali News Agency
The indigenous people of El-Ali are camel herders and have special way of dressing up with two simple pieces of clothes, which cover the shoulders and the lower party of the body as skirt and their preferred colour is white, and they grow their hair very long to make it afro style. They play traditional dance called (Saar, dhaanto, and sadaxley). El-Ali town is situated in southern Somalia, 90 km south of Beledweyn city was once governed by the Italian colony as the Italian colony map shows below:
The local indigenous community in El-Ali rely on camels for transportation, milking as well as a source of
animal protein. They also sell their camels to local markets. The El-Ali region is considered to be the most strategic livestock hub in Somalia. The region has been under the full control of Al-Shabaab militias for more than a decade now. Its indigenous people have suffered many human rights violations perpetrated by Al-Shabaab
terrorists. For instance, Al-Shabaab forcibly marry their young girls, forcibly recruit their children as soldiers and take extortion money from the community to generate income for their insurgency.
Furthermore, the El-Ali people live in harsh conditions and frequently suffer from devastating droughts and
famine caused by climate change. The community does not have access to basic medical assistances and
education. It has little access to humanitarian aid since humanitarian agencies neglect this entire region. Therefore, the community may only rely on the remittances sent by its members for its very survival. Community members who live and work outside their region try their best to send food and medicine to their community locked up in the al-Shabab terrorist controlled region of El – Ali.
The El-Ali meteorite and its cultural importance for the El-Ali community
The El-Ali meteorite is centuries old and has been known to the indigenous local community in El-Ali region aka valley of camels in Somalia for generations. It has been preserved by the community for its cultural and spiritual importance. The indigenous community in El-Ali memorized and mentioned it in their poems and honoured it with traditional dances, as they called it the -Night Fall- or “heavenly-descended stone brought by angels”. The community kept it as a sacred stone and used it as well for sharpening knives for their sacrifices.
The oral history of the El-Ali community, as well as its current and previous community leaders, confirm that the long-lasting presence, usage, and importance of the meteorite. For instance, the elders of El-Ali always advise their sons before they pass away to preserve that stone and warned them against the high possibility for its robbery.
Ugaas Hassan Yuusuf Idris – the clan chief – (Ugaas Hassan, 2021) said in an interview with local media outlets in Somalia, that, “El Ali meteorite is a cultural heritage and has spiritual importance for his indigenous community. He added that local herders in El-Ali had known this rock for more than 5 to 7 generations, the whole memorialized through Saar folklore, songs, dances, and poems. We believe that the rock is brought
down from the sky to El-Ali by angels and we use it to sharpen our knives when we prepare meat for
our collective prayers.” – Several reports and other sources confirm and authenticate the cultural, spiritual, and historical significance of the meteorite for the El-Ali community.
The acquisition of the El-Ali Meteorite
In September 2019, Somali government has legalized Kureym Mining and Rocks Company for the sole purpose of removing the meteorite from its legal owners (the El-Ali community) according to Hussein Husni, a regional minister in Hirshabelle state of Somalia, and subsequently artisanal miners working for the Kureym Mining and Rocks Company, commenced hunting for the meteorite in full collaboration with al-Shabab and once they recovered it, they sent a piece of it to Kenya for XRF confirmation. Kureym company is accused of paying unknown amount of money to al-Shabab to take care of the removal of the meteorite from its original location in El Ali as confirmed by Dahir Jeesow, (MP in the \somali Parliament).
In early 2020, al-Shabaab terrorists sent heavily armed militias, trucks, bulldozers and cranes to remove the
meteorite from El-Ali and took it to Buq Aqable town (located in an estimated distance of 90km south of El-
Ali), as transit hub to transport the meteorite to Mogadishu, where it was planned to be sold. El Ali local
community members stoop up immediately to defend their meteorite against al-Shabab robbers, but they were overpowered and overrun by heavily armed al-Shabaab terrorists who killed twenty five locals and injured many others while some other members of the community remained unaccounted for.
Due to the rule of Al-Shabaab terrorists and control over the El-Ali district, getting information out of El-Ali
is almost a ”mission impossible.” For that reason, there are different reports about the number of casualties among the civilians who stood up to defend their cultural heritage. That said, no one disputes that there were causalities. Subsequently, Somalia’s army has allegedly intercepted the meteorite en route to Mogadishu, where it was confiscated and taken into the most notorious secret prison known locally as ”Godka Jilicow”. The news spread all over and become viral.
Different local media outlets and politicians spoke about it and the government released the meteorite to Kureym
Mining & Rock Co. who claimed ownership rights of the meteorite. This was followed by loud silence about
the whereabouts of the meteorite, until recently, when the University of Alberta and other institutions
announced the discovery of three new minerals in fragments of the El-Ali meteorite.
Dahir Amiin Jesow, member of the Parliament of Somalia, stated in a press conference posted on the
Facebook account of a local TV station, “that many people were murdered in Eli-Ali because of trying to
defend their meteorite against Al-Shabaab militias who came to rob it”
According to confirmed reports by multiple sources, many people were killed from the community when stood up to defend the meteorite against al-Shabab terrorists who wanted to remove the meteorite against the of indigenous community.
Alleged businessmen paid 264,000 $ to Al-Shabaab terrorists and that motivated them to kill and rob the meteorite from the community. Kureym mining Company “ was given a licence by the government after they discovered that stone was a meteorite, in order to give legal cover to their operation.” Said Prof. Husein Abiikar of Almaas university in an interview, watch the full interview (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JulJ0tjri98)
On November 30th, 2022, El-Ali indigenous leaders made an urgent international call for Canada, USA and
China to immediately return their meteorite and compensate for the damage and loss of lives caused by the
meteorite robbery by al-Shabab. Yarow Omar Abiikar, the mayor of El-Ali district, said in an interview with kulmiye Radio: “There were other attempts to rob the meteorite in the past by foreign and state actors, but they were rebelled by our community.
Al-Shabaab has also attempted many times to rob our meteorite but this time they used
excessive military power and killed many members of the community and was able to remove the meteorite and
sell it to alleged businessmen from Banadir region, we don’t understand why businessmen would have to
involve in such a deal of buying robbed meteorite by Al-Shabab’’.
Chairman of the regional parliament of Hirshablle, Somalia, Osman said in an interview with BBC Somali Service
“Al-Shabab comprises of local and foreign fighters, the foreign fighters were able to identify the El-Ali
nightfall stone as meteorite, and then asked local businessmen to pretend that the meteorite belongs to them
and claim the ownership right to sell it out. I can’t believe that al-Shabab would sell such a precious stone
for 260,000 $ and the truth is that the alleged businessmen were selling the meteorite on behalf of Al-
Shabaab terrorists in order to fund their terror campaign in Somalia.”
In addition to that, MP Dahir Amin Jesow said: “It is totally wrong to buy the meteorite from Al-Shabab
terrorists as if they were the legitimate owners of the meteorite.”
AAD Research Team
Read the following reports reference
El Ali Status Information (duke.edu)
