Islamists target northern Mozambique 鈥� especially the children
| Chi煤re, Mozambique
Musa was eating dinner with his wife and three children at their farm in northern Mozambique when the rattle of gunfire in the distance suddenly broke the calm.聽
On that February evening, he knew immediately what was happening: His village was under attack by Islamist militants. They would likely kill or enslave anyone they managed to catch, and then burn the homes and farms they left behind.聽
Musa 鈥� who uses that pseudonym for his safety 鈥� did the only thing he could think of. He ran, joining a panicked throng taking cover in a nearby forest.聽
Why We Wrote This
A story focused onSince 2017, children in northern Mozambique have grown up in the shadow of a violent civil war. The experience of one father and son shows how that experience has reshaped childhood for an entire generation.
Only after the chaotic escape did he make a horrifying discovery: His 8-year-old son, Ismael, was not with him.聽
Since 2017, a group of extremist militants pledging allegiance to the Islamic State (ISIS) has waged a fierce terror campaign in Mozambique鈥檚 northernmost province, Cabo Delgado. Around 6,000 people have died in the fighting, and more than a million have been displaced. This year alone, 100,000 people have fled their homes. Some 60,000 of them are children, deepening the trauma of a generation that has grown up in the shadow of a brutal guerilla war that is largely invisible to the outside world.聽
Each of those children has a story. This is the story of Ismael and his father Musa.聽
A desperate search
Ismael 鈥� also using a pseudonym 鈥� was only 1 year old in 2017, when news of a strange new wave of terror attacks began to arrive at his parents鈥� farm in Chi煤re, a farming region in the south of Cabo Delgado. Young men would enter nearby villages at night, spray them with bullets, and take prisoners. They called themselves Al Shabab 鈥� or 鈥渢he youth鈥� in Arabic 鈥� and claimed to be waging a holy war to establish an Islamic government in Cabo Delgado.
The militants 鈥� loosely affiliated with ISIS 鈥� were angry at having watched Mozambique鈥檚 government fail to develop the region for decades, even as privileged locals and foreigners grew rich extracting its rubies, graphite, gold, and timber. Over the next few years, the insurgency spread through the poor and isolated province.
In 2021, the conflict made international headlines when insurgents captured the town of Palma, the site of a $20 billion natural gas project. Foreign troops soon restored the peace, but late last year, Al Shabab began a fresh wave of attacks in sparsely guarded areas in the south of Cabo Delgado.聽
All along, Musa knew that his young son was particularly at risk. Al Shabab specifically targeted schools, and as its support among local people dwindled, the group often to serve as fighters.聽
So when the war arrived at Musa鈥檚 doorstep on that day in February, he feared the worst for Ismael. After the attack, he fled south on foot to Er谩ti, a town in the neighboring province of Nampula. As he traveled, he made panicked calls to friends and neighbors. Over and over he heard the same thing: 鈥淪orry. We ran for our lives, too. We didn鈥檛 see Ismael.鈥�
Musa wasn鈥檛 the only parent frantically searching. UNICEF registered of children separated from their parents in Chi煤re.聽
But he was fortunate. Three days after he arrived in Er谩ti, Musa got word that some neighbors had found Ismael in the frightened crowd fleeing into the forest, and had taken him with them.聽
Recalling the moment he saw Ismael again, Musa says the joy was nearly impossible to describe. 鈥淚 recovered everything,鈥� he says simply.
Stay or go?聽
But displacement took other tolls on his family. Living in a small town overflowing with uprooted people like themselves, they did not have enough to eat, and they couldn鈥檛 work.
With much of the world鈥檚 attention and money focused on crises in places like Gaza and Ukraine, 鈥渢he funding [for displaced people] is not enough, and the presence of [humanitarian] actors is low鈥� in northern Mozambique, says Ulrika Blom, country director for the Norwegian Refugee Council. Aid workers are stretched thin in a remote province roughly the size of Maine with few paved roads, where insurgents still roam freely.聽
That lack of support drives many displaced people back to their villages, even when the threat of violence still looms.鈥淭hey say that they prefer to die at home in the attacks instead of dying in the displacement camps,鈥� says Tom谩s Queface, who heads Cabo Ligado, an organization .
And so, a little more than a week after he fled, Musa and his family made the return journey, heading for the house in Chi煤re he鈥檇 built by hand. 聽
鈥淗ome is home,鈥� he says. 鈥淲henever you need something, you can ask your neighbors and they will help you. Being away from here is like being in a foreign country.鈥�
But he found Chi煤re transformed. His chickens and ducks were gone. The burned-out husk of a truck set aflame by the insurgents sat on the road leading to his farm.聽
Musa also watched how somber and timid Ismael and his friends had become, drained of the innocence they had displayed before the fighting in their village.聽
鈥淭hey don鈥檛 play as they used to, because now they鈥檙e aware that there鈥檚 a war,鈥� he says.
More than 100 schools in Cabo Delgado and neighboring Nampula have shut down because of the conflict, disrupting classes for 50,000 children, according to the latest figures from UNICEF. Ismael is studying, Musa says, but many of his classmates are afraid to go back to school.
This is common in Cabo Delgado, says Lindsay Shearer, a child protection specialist for UNICEF in the province. After seeing schools destroyed, 鈥渋t takes time for [children] to build trust again and feel safe.鈥�
When a Monitor reporter met Musa in March, just a few weeks after the family鈥檚 return home, he and Ismael were taking their new life one day at a time.聽
鈥淓very night when you go to bed, you say thank you to God that you survived the day. They didn鈥檛 find us. They didn鈥檛 come,鈥� he says.聽
Then, in late April, Al Shabab forces attacked Chi煤re once more, burning 50 homes and beheading a man. Musa longs for a normal life. 鈥淲e are crying for an end to the war, crying for an end to the war, so that we can relax,鈥� he says.
Reporting for this story was supported by Oxfam.聽聽
