Ethiopia: Coping with Islamic Well Treated and Permitted to Practice Their Religion As They Wished

AAFFRRIICCAA NNOOTTEESS Number 7 February 2002 Ethiopia: Coping with Islamic well treated and permitted to practice their religion as they wished. Consequently, the Prophet Muhammad concluded Fundamentalism before and after that Ethiopia should not be targeted for jihad. Ethiopia’s September 11 Christian rulers left no doubt, however, that Islam would be subservient to Christianity. Christian-Islamic relations David H. Shinn remained generally cordial until Islamic raids from the Somali port of Zeila plagued the highlands in the late Prime Minister Meles Zenawi commented in the mid-1990s fifteenth century. that the most significant long-term threat to Ethiopia’s security is Islamic fundamentalism. At that time, the The Islamic threat to Ethiopia became more serious in the principal external threats emanated from Somalia and, first half of the sixteenth century when Ahmad ibn Ibrahim especially, Sudan. The concern with Sudan has, at least for al-Ghazi (known as “Gragn the left-handed”) rallied a the time being, dissipated. On the other hand, the events of diverse group of Muslims in a jihad designed to end September 11, 2001, have caused Ethiopia to focus on the Christian power in the highlands. Aided by forces coming situation in Somalia, particularly the threat posed by hostile from the Red Sea coast of present-day Eritrea, Gragn Islamic groups such as Al Itihaad al Islami (Unity of Islam). defeated the Ethiopian emperor and conquered most of the Ethiopia is the linchpin to the Horn of Africa. What Ethiopian highlands. In the process, he destroyed a number happens there impacts the rest of the region. The of Ethiopia’s centers of Christian civilization. It was not importance of Islam in Ethiopia is not well appreciated by until 1543 that Ethiopia raised a large army that defeated the United States, and U.S. officials are well advised to pay the Muslims and killed Gragn. Thousands of Muslims and attention to Ethiopian Islam and the way in which Ethiopia Christians lost their lives in these wars. interacts with its Islamic neighbors. In 1875 the khedive of Egypt organized a force, including This analysis will argue that September 11 has not several officers from both sides of the American Civil War, significantly altered Ethiopia’s security situation vis-à-vis designed to conquer Ethiopia’s Christian kingdom. the threat from Islamic fundamentalism. What has changed Marching into the highlands from the Red Sea coast, the is a new interest by the United States and others in possible Ethiopians defeated them decisively. The last major, Al Qaeda links to the Horn of Africa, particularly Somalia, organized threat from Islam occurred in 1888, when the and the prospect that Ethiopia, among others, can take forces of the mahdi in the Sudan sacked the former capital political advantage of this new situation. But before getting Gondar and burned many of its churches. The following to the end of the story, it is important to look first at year the Ethiopians defeated the mahdist troops at the Ethiopia’s historical interactions with Islam and the status Battle of Metema on the Ethiopian-Sudanese border. of Islam in Ethiopia today. An understanding of Ethiopia’s position also requires a review of the last decade of Islamic This history reflects Christian-Muslim competition for fundamentalist threats to Ethiopia from Sudan and Somalia. control over the Ethiopian highlands rather than an early effort to impose Islamic fundamentalist rule. At the same An Auspicious Beginning Turns Sour time, non-Muslims, particularly those who hold political power, have not forgotten this background as they According to tradition, a group of Arab followers of Islam confront more recent threats from Islamic in danger of persecution by local authorities in Arabia took fundamentalists. refuge early in the seventh century in the Aksumite Kingdom of the Ethiopian Christian highlands. They were Africa Program • Center for Strategic and International Studies 1800 K Street, NW • Washington, DC 20006 • Tel: (202) 775-3135 • Fax: (202) 775-3199 • www.csis.org Page 2 Islam in Ethiopia tends to be decentralized. By and large, the Ethiopian Islamic community is a benign one. Islam expanded gradually in Ethiopia, especially in the lower-lying parts of the country. Most Ethiopian Muslims There remains the important and disputed matter of belong to indigenous ethnic groups; they are not of Arab religious composition of the Ethiopian population. The descent. Always treated as a secondary religion, Islam 1994 census indicates that there are 14.3 million Muslims emerged in the shadow of Christianity, and Muslims in Ethiopia or about 29 percent of the total population. The experienced discrimination. There were, however, only same census places the Ethiopian Orthodox percentage at brief periods when Christian rulers tried to suppress Islam. about 52 percent. Ethiopia’s population has increased There were other occasions, especially the period of rule significantly and is now estimated at about 65 million. Most from Gondar in the seventeenth century, when Muslim outside observers no longer accept the 29 percent Muslim communities had considerable autonomy. and 52 percent Ethiopian Orthodox figures. In a recent survey of Islamic populations around the world, the Three internal developments in the twentieth century International Population Center at San Diego State revived Christian concerns about Islam. Upon the death of University said Ethiopia’s Muslim population is 29 million. Emperor Menelik in 1913, his grandson, Lij Iyasu, The same survey indicates that Ethiopia is tied with inherited the throne. Iyasu was pushed aside after three Morocco for the eleventh-largest Muslim population in the years, having made what the Christian leadership world. If the figures in this survey are accurate, it means considered too many overtures to Muslims, renewing “Christian” Ethiopia has more Muslims than Saudi Arabia, concerns that followers of Islam might try to assume power. Sudan, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Ethiopia’s current population Following its invasion of Ethiopia in 1936, Italy took a is probably about 45 percent Ethiopian Orthodox, between number of measures that favored Muslims at the expense of 40 and 45 percent Sunni Muslim, at least 5 percent Christians, a policy that led to some incidents that Protestant, and most of the remainder animist. Christians did not soon forget. In 1961 the Eritrea Liberation Front (ELF) began an armed struggle to create The Islamic Fundamentalist Threat an independent Eritrean state. A largely Islamic movement, from Sudan the ELF drew its fighters from Muslim nomadic tribes, and its leaders called for a jihad against Christian Ethiopia. Geography inextricably ties Ethiopia to Sudan as the two Leadership of the Eritrean independence movement countries share a 1,000-mile-long border. Future EPRDF subsequently shifted to Christians who continued to hold officials benefited from periodic refuge in Sudan as they the upper hand when Eritrea became independent in 1993. fought the Derg regime and eventually overthrew it in 1991. During those years of refuge, some close, personal With the overthrow of Haile Selassie in 1974, the socialist relationships developed between senior Sudanese officials Derg regime discouraged all religion and managed to and these Ethiopian leaders. After taking power in Addis alienate Christians and Muslims equally. The current Ababa and perhaps in gratitude for Sudanese assistance, the Ethiopian Peoples’ Revolutionary Democratic Front EPRDF reduced Ethiopian support for the Sudan Peoples’ (EPRDF) government came to power in 1991 and has Liberation Army (SPLA). Operating out of Ethiopia, the generally encouraged cordial Christian-Muslim relations. SPLA was trying to overturn the government in Khartoum. Many EPRDF leaders are not known to have strong After the fundamentalist National Islamic Front seized religious beliefs, but they do seem to understand the need to control of the government in Sudan in 1989, however, build a political system based on religious tolerance. concern developed that Sudan would encourage groups opposing the government in Ethiopia. As a result of the way Islam has developed in Ethiopia and due to more recent concerted efforts to avoid religious There has long been a certain tit-for-tat element in the conflict, Ethiopian Muslims are generally not receptive to Ethiopian-Sudanese relationship. Groups opposed to the Islamic fundamentalism. Muslims in Ethiopia tend to government of Sudan, such as the SPLA and the National identify first with their ethnic kin. They are geographically Democratic Alliance (NDA), have received, depending on intermixed throughout the country except for overwhelming the strategic situation in the region, varying degrees of concentrations in Somali- and Afar-inhabited areas. support from the Ethiopian government. For its part, Sudan Although the Supreme Islamic Council is an important has irregularly provided, again depending on regional organization, political power among Ethiopian Muslims strategic concerns, support for groups such as the Oromo Africa Program • Center for Strategic and International Studies 1800 K Street, NW • Washington, DC 20006 • Tel: (202) 775-3135 • Fax: (202) 775-3199 • www.csis.org Page 3 Liberation Front and the Benishangul Liberation Front, in a cross-border attack near Kurmuk. The speaker of which aim to topple the government in Addis Ababa. Sudan’s parliament and National Islamic Front leader, Sudan has also supported Al Itihaad, an Islamic Hassan al-Turabi,

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