The US has launched “highly effective and lethal” strikes in opposition to teams it claims are affiliated with ISIL (ISIS) in Nigeria, President Donald Trump mentioned on Thursday.
The unprecedented Christmas Day strikes got here after weeks of accusations from Trump and prime Republicans about an alleged “Christian genocide” they are saying has been enabled by the Nigerian authorities. They symbolize the primary recognized direct US army intervention within the troubled, conflict-racked nation.
Advisable Tales
checklist of 4 gadgetsfinish of checklist
Neither facet has shared exact details about the id of the targets struck and the outcomes of the strikes. Safety analyst Kabir Adamu from Beacon Safety and Intelligence in Abuja instructed Al Jazeera the seemingly targets are members of “Lakurawa”, an armed group linked to an offshoot of ISIL, and which has solely lately develop into recognized. Its profile continues to be being studied by researchers.
One city which appeared to have been hit was Jabo within the northwestern Sokoto State, however no ISIL-linked cells are recognized to function there. Moreover, when Trump and different US proper wingers have referred to a “Christian genocide” In Nigeria, they’ve normally talked about a wholly totally different space in central Nigeria.
Launching the strikes on Christmas Day and on areas in northwest Nigeria, the place the Sokoto Caliphate, chargeable for the unfold of Islam into Nigeria and revered by Nigerian muslims, is very symbolic, analyst Femi Owolade of the UK’s Sheffield Hallam College instructed Al Jazeera, and performs into the Trump administration’s narrative of “saving” Nigerian Christians.
“Hanging on Christmas Day reinforces perceptions of a religiously motivated confrontation or a renewed spiritual ‘campaign’,” he mentioned.
Right here’s what we all know in regards to the strikes:
What occurred?
US President Donald Trump revealed in a put up on his Reality Social platform on Thursday that the US had launched “quite a few good” strikes on “ISIS positions” in northwest Nigeria.
“Tonight, at my path as Commander in Chief, the US launched a strong and lethal strike in opposition to ISIS Terrorist Scum in Northwest Nigeria, who’ve been focusing on and viciously killing, primarily, harmless Christians, at ranges not seen for a few years, and even Centuries!…”
Trump didn’t disclose particulars about which or what number of targets have been hit, however he added that they might proceed if the alleged slaughter of Christians didn’t cease.
The US Africa Command mentioned in a press release that an preliminary evaluation of the strikes had revealed “a number of ISIS terrorists have been killed within the ISIS camps”.
US Secretary of Protection Pete Hegseth thanked Nigeria for cooperating with the strikes. The (US) “is at all times prepared, so ISIS discovered tonight – on Christmas. Extra to come back…,” he posted on social media platform X.
In one other put up on X, the US Protection Division shared a video displaying what gave the impression to be the second a bomb was fired from a US warship in an unmarked location. Battle analyst Murtala Abdullahi from Nigeria’s Workplace for Strategic Preparedness and Resilience in Abuja, who tracks aerial exercise in Nigeria, mentioned it was seemingly that the US had launched missiles from a place within the Gulf of Guinea.
In a press release on Friday morning, Nigeria’s Overseas Affairs Ministry confirmed the assaults and mentioned they focused parts based mostly within the northwest of the nation.
Nigerian authorities have vehemently denied allegations of a “Christian genocide”, and mentioned the strikes had been carried out inside a world cooperation framework that enables the sharing of intelligence and strategic coordination with the US and others, “in step with worldwide legislation, mutual respect for sovereignty and shared commitments to regional and international safety”.
Talking to Al Jazeera, Minister of Overseas Affairs Yusuf Tuggar mentioned each events carefully cooperated on the assault and that the US Secretary of State had known as him earlier than the strikes have been launched. Tuggar, nevertheless, added that Nigeria faces a fancy safety problem that can also be affecting different international locations within the area, and that the strikes weren’t religion-based.
“It’s a regional battle, it isn’t a Nigeria Christian-Muslim battle,” he mentioned.
What do we all know in regards to the targets?
A minimum of one city – Jabo in Nigeria’s northwestern Sokoto State – was confirmed to have been hit, analyst Adamu mentioned. Images shared on social media by residents there seem to verify the situation, with some posting what look like fragments of a bomb and others posting movies of a giant fireplace on a farm. The knowledge couldn’t be independently verified by Al Jazeera.
“There have been no casualties as of this morning,” Adamu mentioned, including that it’s unclear why Jabo was chosen, as there aren’t any recognized ISIL-linked terror cells there.
Locals on social media additionally questioned why their city had been focused.
A spokesperson for the Nigerian Overseas Ministry instructed Al Jazeera that the strikes had been carried out based mostly on intelligence supplied by Nigeria.
“The air strikes lined a exact space, and what persons are seeing are fragments that fell in Jabo,” he mentioned.
Is ISIL working in Nigeria?
Sure, about six ideological armed teams exist in Nigeria, all of them linked to both ISIL (ISIS) or al-Qaeda.
They’ve focused each Christian and Muslim communities of their areas of operation within the nation’s predominantly Muslim northeast and northwest areas.
The strikes on Thursday seemingly focused a faction known as Lakurawa, which has lately emerged, and whose profile continues to be not totally recognized.
Listed here are a number of the factions defined:
Boko Haram: Essentially the most recognised armed group is Boko Haram, which is predicated in Borno State, northeast Nigeria.
The group gained worldwide notoriety for kidnapping 300 faculty ladies from their dormitory in Chibok, Borno State, below the management of Ibrahim Shekau in 2014.
It was most lively between 2012 and 2015. On the top of its actions, the group focused army installations and civilians round Borno and the neighbouring Yobe and Adamawa states. It additionally unfold throughout porous borders into Cameroon, Niger and Chad.
Boko Haram used suicide bombing and mass kidnapping techniques in opposition to each Christian and Muslim communities, attacking church buildings and mosques alike. Its essential hideout was the Sambisa Forest in Borno, but it surely additionally managed giant swaths of rural territory the place it taxed locals and operated as a authorities.
A minimum of 30,000 folks died, and tens of millions have been displaced on the top of Boko Haram’s operations. The group has been largely deflated by infighting and stress from the Nigerian army. Since 2015, it has misplaced a lot of the territory it managed.
ISWAP: The ISIL-affiliate in West Africa Province (ISWAP) broke away from Boko Haram in 2016 following disagreements between prime army leaders. The 2 teams have maintained a violent rivalry.
ISWAP is believed to have between 8,000 and 12,000 fighters, in response to the United Nations. It’s at the moment lively across the Lake Chad basin space in northeast Nigeria, and has lively cells within the northwest of the nation.
It controls native communities, the place it makes an attempt to win assist by offering fundamental facilities whereas taxing native farmers and fishermen.
Lakurawa: A newly emerged faction, the group operates in distant components of the nation’s northwest Sokoto State, together with within the Tangaza, Gudu, Illela, Binji and Silame native governments. It is usually current in northwest Zamfara and Kebbi states.
Jabo, which is situated in Sokoto and was struck on Thursday, is understood for harbouring bandits, however analysts say there’s no sturdy presence of Lakurawa or different ISIL cells within the city.
Nigerian officers confirmed the group’s existence in November 2024 and designated it a terror group in January.
Earlier than its emergence, ragtag bandit teams had been focusing on distant communities in Sokoto and neighbouring Zamfara. In 2017, native leaders invited armed fighters from Mali and Niger, largely from the Fulani pastoral ethnic group, to combat the bandits, as authorities presence was failing to discourage them, in response to researchers James Barnett and Vincent Foucher. Nevertheless, a number of the arriving fighters have been affiliated with armed teams working in Niger and Mali, together with the ISIL in Sahel Province (ISSP), also called Islamic State Better Sahara (ISGS).
By 2018, the fighters had moved on from rescuing victims from bandits to implementing Islamic legislation on villages.
Lakurawa parts have since grown bolder and extra deadly in recent times, focusing on safety outposts.
Researchers don’t consider there’s a single, homogenous Lakurawa group, however counsel that many factions are being clumped collectively by the federal government, probably hampering an efficient response. Some additionally say the group’s alllegiance may very well be to al-Qaeda, fairly than ISIL.
In 2024, a United Nations Safety Council report confirmed the presence of ISGS associates in northwest Nigeria’s Sokoto State. It’s unclear to what extent ISWAP and Lakurawa coordinate.
Why is the Trump administration focusing on Nigeria now?
President Trump maintains that the US strikes have been carried out to guard Christian communities in Nigeria.
United States Senator Ted Cruz first accused Nigeria’s authorities of enabling a “bloodbath” in opposition to Christians in October 2025, citing a rising variety of attacks in opposition to the group within the nation’s central Center Belt area, which is separate from the violence within the north. He claimed, with out proof, that fifty,000 Christians had been killed since 2009. In September, he launched the Nigeria Non secular Freedom Accountability Act which, if it passes Congress, would sanction Nigerian officers seen as complicit within the killings of Christians.
Cruz was echoing claims from inside the Christian political proper within the US of a Christian genocide in Nigeria for the previous few years.
Then, in November, Trump additionally accused Nigeria of a Christian genocide, referring to ISIL, and showing to hyperlink the 2 separate points. He additionally referred to Nigeria as a “Nation of Nationwide Concern”.
However whereas Cruz and different far-right US voices recognized the Center Belt area of Nigeria as the location of the alleged “Christian genocide”, the US strikes on Thursday focused a city in Nigeria’s predominantly Muslim north. Jabo is a largely Muslim city, and Muslim communities there have been the targets of bandits who kidnap them for ransom.
What is de facto taking place in Nigeria?
The scenario in Nigeria is much extra complicated than has been introduced by the Trump administration, which seems to conflate two separate points.
Nigeria is an unlimited nation of 200 million folks from greater than 250 ethnic teams. It suffers not simply by the hands of the ideological armed teams but additionally on account of ethnoreligious violence.
The fertile Center Belt area of the nation, which Cruz referred to, has lengthy been a hotbed of violence between predominantly Muslim herders from the bulk Fulani ethnic group and Christian farming communities from totally different minority ethnic teams who’ve repeatedly clashed over land and water sources.
The violence has grown in scale and weaponry over the previous few years, and has largely focused Christian farming communities.
The farmers say herder teams assault their communities in deadly raids utilizing subtle weapons, burn complete villages to the bottom and bloodbath civilians. Additionally they goal infrastructure like faculties, clinics, grain reserves, church buildings and boreholes.
In Might, Amnesty Worldwide reported that near 10,000 folks had been killed since 2023, together with youngsters, within the worst-affected states of Benue and Plateau, and that greater than 500,000 folks have been displaced.
Nigeria’s authorities has lengthy termed this a “native farmer-herdman disaster”, however the affected communities reject this classification, saying it oversimplifies the issue and means an insufficient response. One group chief in Benue known as latest killings a “full-scale genocidal invasion and land-grabbing marketing campaign by herder terrorists and bandits”.
How a lot of a say did Nigeria have within the US strikes?
The Nigerian Overseas Ministry mentioned the strikes had been carried out with the consent of Nigeria. Regionally, nevertheless, Nigeria’s President Bola Tinubu has come below fireplace from opposition politicians who say the US strikes symbolize a violation of the nation’s sovereignty.
“Judging by the character of the confirmed strike on a village in Sokoto, it’s clear that the US President below whose authority this operation occurred neither understands nor genuinely cares about Nigeria or Nigerians,” Omoyele Sowore, a former presidential candidate and chief of the African Motion Congress, mentioned in a press release on X.
“It’s deeply troubling that Nigeria [Africa’s most populous nation] lacks the succesful and sovereign management required to guard its folks and its territory.”
Analyst Owolade instructed Al Jazeera it’s unlikely that the US would launch strikes with out Nigeria’s inexperienced mild, however identified that the best way the US has referred to the cooperation is kind of totally different from how Nigeria is wording it.
“This means a cooperative however unequal partnership, formed by Nigeria’s dependence on exterior intelligence and army capability, and the US’s need to border the stress in Nigeria as genocide in opposition to Christians and venture counter-ISIS resolve in West Africa,” he mentioned.
What’s the historical past of US-Nigeria safety collaboration?
The US has cooperated with Nigeria and different West African international locations to fight the regional risk of armed teams, primarily by coaching and weapons gross sales. That is the primary time the US has instantly carried out air strikes in Nigeria, nevertheless.
In the course of the peak of the Boko Haram disaster, the US intensified coaching cooperation and supported Nigeria with intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, particularly below the joint Multinational Joint Process Drive (MNJTF). The group consists of Nigeria, Niger, Chad, Cameroon and Benin, that are all related by Lake Chad, and that are all experiencing armed incursions.
Nevertheless, the joint job drive has begun to interrupt down. Niger’s army authorities has been at odds with Nigeria since June 2023, when the army there seized energy. Niger can also be at odds with the US and different Western companions like France. In August 2024, the US army started withdrawing from its vital bases within the nation, from the place it monitored armed teams within the Sahel.
Niger pulled out of the MNJTF in April, and Chad is threatening to withdraw. Analysts from the Institute for Safety Research hyperlink the coalition’s breakdown to elevated armed group exercise throughout the area.
