and the October 2022 Mogadishu bombings. In addition to being active in Somalia, it is also active in other East African countries, especially in Kenya, and occasionally also in Ethiopia. Attendant to its recent resurgence, it was estimated to have increased its combat strength to between 7,000 and 12,000 fighters in February 2022. Name Al-Shabaab is also known as Ash-Shabaab, Hizb al-Shabaab ("Party of the Youth") and as the Popular Resistance Movement in the Land of the Two Migrations (PRM) (). The term al-Shabaab means "the youth" in Arabic. Organisation and structure Origins Although it is unclear when al-Shabaab was formed, it is understood to have originated as a wing of the Islamic Courts Union, an umbrella group which provided de facto governance in much of Somalia until the country was invaded by Ethiopia in December 2006. In 2007–8, al-Shabaab established itself as an independent actor, gaining prominence as a vehicle of armed resistance to Ethiopian occupation in the War in Somalia. Many of its early leaders and members previously belonged not only to the Islamic Courts Union but also to the older al-Ittihad al-Islamiya, a group founded on the tenets of Salafism and opposition to clannism. Many early al-Shabaab leaders had also been trained as mujahideen in Afghanistan and Syria. Ideology According to the International Crisis Group, Salafism has been the core unifying principle of al-Shabaab, although this principle is not interpreted uniformly by the group's members and leaders. In particular, al-Shabaab officially and generally advocates a form of Salafi jihadism with transnational aims, linking Somali nationalist and local grievances to the plight of Muslims worldwide. Through this lens, incursions into Somalia by Ethiopia – and later by Kenya, the United States, and others – are viewed as continuous with non-Muslim acts of aggression in other Muslim-majority countries. However, this globalist framework is not universal within the group, an ideological fault-line which has sometimes fostered factionalism and internal conflict. Much of al-Shabaab's Somali support base is fiercely nationalist, and sees as its primary goal the establishment of a stable Islamic state inside Somalia, or, more ambitiously, inside so-called Greater Somalia, uniting the ethnic Somali populations of Ethiopia, Kenya, and Djibouti. Other domestic supporters are concerned primarily with clan-related and local objectives, and are therefore prone to infighting and shifting alliances. However, these ideological differences can accommodate broad opposition within the group to common adversaries – notably opposition to external