A day after warning of a regional war if Ethiopia does not withdraw from
Somali territory, the Islamists escalated their rhetoric, vowing to repel
Ethiopian soldiers in a tacit warning to the transitional government.
"From today, I am declaring jihad against Ethiopia, which has invaded our country and taken parts of our homeland," said Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, chair of the executive committee of the Supreme Islamic Council of Somalia (SICS).
"The jihad is on from now (and) application of that will be directed by the supreme council," he said in Mogadishu, which the Islamists seized in June and have used as a base to expand through most of south and central Somalia.
Dressed in military fatigues and brandishing an AK-47 assault rifle, Ahmed, who is considered a moderate in a movement accused by the United States and others of ties to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network, said war was inevitable.
"We will not allow the enemy to come and go," he told reporters at a news conference, hinting the Islamists are ready to attack the government at its seat in Baidoa, about 250 kilometres northwest of Mogadishu.
"It is a religious responsibility to go the main headquarters of where the invasion originated," Ahmed said. "It is the responsibility of each and everyone to defend his country from the naked aggression of Ethiopia."
His comments came after officials and witnesses said Somali government soldiers backed by Ethiopian troops had briefly occupied the Islamist-held town of Burahakaba, about 60 kms southeast of Baidoa.
The move was the first offensive operation by the government, which has been wracked by infighting since it was formed in Kenya in 2004, the latest in more than a dozen attempts to restore stability in the anarchic nation.
"The satans were compelled to withdraw," said Sheikh Mohamed Ibrahim Bilal, an Islamist commander in Burahakaba, from where his forces fled earlier in the day as the Somali and Ethiopian troops advanced. "We are now in full control."
Witnesses told news agency AFP that uniformed Ethiopian soldiers had left Baidoa to accompany government forces into the town.
But government commander Said Mohamed Hirsi adamantly denied that any
Ethiopian soldiers were involved in the move on the town and said his forces had merely accompanied an official delegation there on a planned visit.
"This was a normal tour with no other intentions," he told AFP on his return to Baidoa. "I categorically deny there were some Ethiopian troops in that mission. The Islamic courts are full of allegations that are not true."
The Ethiopian government in Addis Ababa quickly denied it had anything to do with the Burahakaba operation.
"There are no Ethiopian troops that crossed the border," said Ethiopian foreign ministry spokesman Solomon Abebe. "This is repeated false rhetoric and propaganda against Ethiopia.
"They want to use Ethiopia as a pretext to fulfil their motives, because they know Ethiopia is not going to accept terrorism and what the extremists are doing," he told AFP in Addis Ababa.
Ethiopia, which is mainly Christian, is wary of the rise of the Islamists and has vowed to defend the Somali government and its calls for the deployment of a regional peacekeeping force.
Over the weekend, the Islamists accused Ethiopian troops of invading, shelling and mining areas around the border near the town of Beledweyne in
Somalia's central Hiran region and ordered the frontier closed there.