Dozens killed in Mogadishu truck bombing


At least 30 people were killed and dozens more wounded by an explosion in Mogadishu, Somalia, on Saturday when a truck bomb exploded near the entrance of a hotel.
While no terrorist group has claimed responsibility so far, Mogadishu civilians are a regular target of al Shabaab, an al Qaeda-linked extremist group that seeks to overthrow the Somali government. Police were trailing the truck before it exploded and are continuing rescue and investigation efforts Saturday afternoon.
Eyewitnesses said the attack, which comes two days after the head of U.S. Africa Command visited the Somali president in Mogadishu, was the worst they'd seen in years. It was "the biggest blast I have ever witnessed; it destroyed the whole area," said Mogadishu resident Muhidin Ali.
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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.
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