The Levant Files

  An unprecedented battlefield partnership between a separatist movement and an al-Qaeda affiliate has transformed the conflict in northern Mali, shifting the military balance and deepening divisions over how, if at all, the war can end. When the Azawad Liberation Front (FLA) and Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) launched a joint offensive on April 25, 2026, the conflict entered a phase unlike any before. A war that had long pitted the Malian state against multiple armed groups gave way to a coordinated campaign stretching from Kidal and Anefis to Tilemsi, Gao and Sevare, posing the most serious challenge to the Malian army in years and to Russia’s Africa Corps, the Kremlin-backed force that replaced the Wagner Group in Mali. Since then, the fighting has been marked by simultaneous assaults, ambushes, drone strikes and attacks on military convoys, with all sides claiming significant battlefield gains. Bamako says it is working to restore state authority and dismantle what...

  Jihadist Offensives, Ebola Emergency, and Endless War Converge in Catastrophic Multi-Front Collapse The African continent is experiencing one of the most severe convergences of simultaneous crises in its modern history. Over the past three weeks, a devastating jihadist offensive has effectively besieged Mali's capital, a rare and poorly understood strain of Ebola has jumped borders and been declared a global health emergency, and Sudan's civil war has entered a terrifying new chapter defined by mass civilian slaughter from drone strikes. Taken together, these crises are reshaping the security, humanitarian, and geopolitical architecture of an entire hemisphere — and doing so largely beyond the gaze of an international community consumed by other flashpoints.   🇲🇱 MALI: The Siege of Bamako and the Collapse of the Russian Gamble What began on April 25 as a coordinated series of attacks has since evolved into the most dangerous crisis Mali has faced since the 2012...

In a detailed profile published on May 11, journalist Benjamin Roger of Le Monde traces the extraordinary arc of the 72-year-old Tuareg commander who has become the most dangerous man in the Sahel. Iyad Ag Ghali, leader of Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM), the Sahel branch of al-Qaida, is widely considered the architect of the sweeping jihadist offensive that has brought Mali's military junta to the brink of collapse. The offensive, launched on April 25, 2026, sent shockwaves across Mali. JNIM fighters mounted coordinated strikes on Kidal, Gao, Mopti, and the capital Bamako itself, also storming the garrison town of Kati — a junta stronghold just 20 kilometres from the capital — killing the defence minister and the regime's second-in-command, General Sadio Camara. By April 28, jihadist forces had retaken Kidal in alliance with the Azawad Liberation Front (ALF), humiliating Russia's Africa Corps by escorting their fighters out of the city without a shot fired....

Mali is facing its most severe security escalation in years following a devastating wave of coordinated attacks by al-Qaeda-linked militants and Tuareg separatists that struck the capital, Bamako, and multiple regional cities on April 25, killing senior officials and exposing the military junta’s frail control across broad swathes of the country. The offensive, led by the Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) and the Azawad Liberation Front (FLA), targeted Bamako, Kati, Gao, Sevaré, Mopti, and the strategic northern city of Kidal. In a dramatic blow to the military leadership, Defence Minister Sadio Camara was killed in a suicide bombing during the assaults. JNIM and allied fighters subsequently claimed to have seized Kidal after Malian forces and their Russian-backed Africa Corps allies withdrew from several northern positions. The scale of the offensive revealed an unprecedented degree of coordination between jihadist and separatist factions that had previously operated in ...

How the worst jihadist offensive in Mali since 2012 is reshaping regional security dynamics — from Bamako to Beirut In the early hours of April 25, 2026, the sounds of war came to Bamako. Twin explosions shook the garrison town of Kati, 15 kilometres from Mali's capital, as suicide car bombs and assault teams struck simultaneously across six cities. By dawn, the country's Defence Minister, General Sadio Camara — the man who had built Mali's military partnership with Russia — was dead, killed in his own home by a car bomb. Mali's chief of military intelligence lay wounded. And junta leader Colonel Assimi Goïta, reportedly evacuated to a secure base, fell silent for days. What unfolded over the next 72 hours was the most consequential security crisis in the Sahel since at least 2012 — and its tremors are already being felt far beyond the region. The assault was claimed by two armed coalitions acting in concert: Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM), al-Qaeda...

In what analysts are calling a watershed moment for Russian influence in the Sahel, Mali's military junta suffered a devastating blow over the weekend of April 25–27, 2026, as coordinated attacks by Tuareg separatists and Al-Qaeda-linked jihadists overran key towns and forced Russia's Africa Corps paramilitaries into a humiliating retreat from Kidal, the symbolic northern stronghold they had seized just two and a half years ago. According to the Le Monde, the assault, launched on April 25 by the Azawad Liberation Front (ALF) and the jihadist group Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM), struck simultaneously across multiple locations — including Bamako's military district of Kati, the airport at Sévaré, and Gao — marking the largest rebel offensive in Mali since 2012. By Sunday, the pro-independence flag flew over Kidal's fort, the same spot where Wagner mercenaries had triumphantly raised their skull-and-crossbones banner in November 2023. Moscow's local p...

Mali's military rulers were plunged into their gravest security crisis in years on Sunday after a weekend of coordinated nationwide attacks by jihadist fighters and Tuareg separatists killed the country's defence minister and reportedly handed a strategic northern city to rebels. Defence Minister Sadio Camara, a senior member of the ruling junta and seen by many as a potential future leader, was killed Saturday by a car bomb planted outside his home in Kati, a military stronghold roughly 15 kilometres north of the capital Bamako. His second wife and two of his grandchildren also died in the blast, according to relatives. The attack is believed to have been carried out by the al-Qaeda-linked Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM). The offensive, which began at dawn Saturday, was synchronised between JNIM and the Tuareg-dominated Azawad Liberation Front (FLA). Targets included the Kati base, Bamako's international airport, and towns across central and northern Mali...

Mali is taking stock after one of the boldest insurgent operations against the country in more than a decade, with al-Qaeda–linked jihadists and Tuareg separatists claiming joint responsibility for coordinated dawn attacks that struck Bamako and at least four other cities on Saturday. The army said overnight it had repelled the assault and killed "several hundred" attackers, with sweep operations under way in Bamako, Kati and elsewhere. The whereabouts of junta leader Gen. Assimi Goïta remained unknown into Sunday, and his government had yet to appear publicly in any sustained way. The strikes began shortly before 6 a.m. Saturday with explosions and sustained gunfire near the main military base at Kati, where Goïta lives. Witnesses said a vehicle bomb destroyed most of the home of Defence Minister Gen. Sadio Camara; his entourage said he was unhurt. Gunfire also erupted around Bamako's Modibo Keïta International Airport, forcing flight cancellations and the closure of Air...

A wave of coordinated attacks struck Mali on Saturday in what analysts are calling the most serious militant offensive in West Africa since 2012 — a development that reverberates far beyond the Sahel and underscores the deepening operational link between jihadist networks active across Africa and the broader Levant. Al-Qaeda's regional affiliate Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM), working in apparent coordination with the Tuareg-led Azawad Liberation Front (FLA), launched simultaneous strikes on the capital Bamako and on the cities of Kati, Sevare, Gao and Kidal, exposing the fragility of a security order that stretches from the Atlantic coast of Africa to the eastern Mediterranean. Heavy gunfire and explosions began at dawn near the Kati military base outside Bamako — home to junta leader General Assimi Goita — and spread to the international airport and the residence of Defence Minister General Sadio Camara, which witnesses said was largely destroyed by a blast. Heli...

The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, often referred to as the Levant and its surrounding areas, is facing a deepening crisis of instability along its southern and western flanks. A series of escalating conflicts, from the Sahel to the Horn of Africa, are creating a vast arc of volatility that threatens regional security and humanitarian stability. Recent developments in Ethiopia, Mali, and Sudan paint a grim picture of renewed fighting, the rise of militant groups, and a catastrophic displacement crisis. Ethiopia: The Pretoria Peace Accord Under Threat In the Horn of Africa, the fragile peace brokered in November 2022 between the Ethiopian federal government and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) is showing dangerous signs of collapse. Authorities in Ethiopia’s Afar region have accused TPLF fighters of crossing into their territory, seizing several villages, and launching mortar attacks on civilians. This aggressive move is being condemned by Afar officials as an ...