to kill these defectors. Mumin's small group proceeded to form Abnaa ul-Calipha, better known as Islamic State in Somalia, and to evade their erstwhile comrades, while recruiting new members for their cause. Al-Baghdadi and the IS leadership did not acknowledge Mumin's bay'ah, instead choosing to wait and see how the Islamic State in Somalia fared. While Mumin's group in the north thus managed to survive, the situation of pro-IS forces in southern Somalia consequently became even more precarious. In two notable incidents in November and December 2015, al-Shabaab attacked and destroyed two of the most important southern IS cells, namely the ones of Bashir Abu Numan and Mohammad Makkawi Ibrahim. Pro-government forces such as the Somali Armed Forces and Ahlu Sunna Waljama'a also claimed to have targeted southern IS groups. As result, IS forces in southern Somalia remained very weak, and those that survived appear to have accepted Mumin's authority over time, formally becoming part of ISS. As result, the "disparate clump of pro-Islamic State cells" in Somalia transformed into an "organized group". Rise in power and Qandala campaign In March 2016, an ISS cell in southern Puntland was pursued by al-Shabaab fighters into Mudug; the pursuers were however attacked and completely defeated by the Puntland Dervish Force and Galmudug soldiers, thus unintentionally allowing the Islamic State militants to escape into safety. From this point onwards, ISS and al-Shabaab temporarily ceased fighting each other with the exception of some isolated incidents. Over the following months Mumin's followers built up their strength, and by April 2016 they had set up a temporary training camp named after Bashir Abu Numan, the IS follower mentioned above who had been killed by al-Shabaab in November 2015. In one of the group's propaganda videos, Mumin blessed the makeshift base as the "first camp of the Caliphate in Somalia". On 25 April, ISS also carried out its first attack on government forces, when one of its fighters detonated an IED against an AMISOM vehicle in Mogadishu. By August 2016, Mumin's cell still remained very small, probably under 100 militants, and was not yet very active. According to the United States Department of State, however, ISS began to expand in size by abducting and indoctrinating boys between 10 and 15 and employing them as child soldiers. By October 2016, ISS had claimed less than one dozen attacks overall since its foundation, showing that the group was still