Nigeria It is the last of the countries in which The United States has decided to intervene forcefully. The president Donald Trump defended the attacks launched on Christmas Day as a necessary response to an alleged “massacre of Christians”of which there is no evidence, perpetrated by jihadist groups that attack the entire population indiscriminately.
Contravening his own principle of ‘America first‘with this movement of violent interventionism Abroad, the American president has awakened ghosts of the past despite his new argument that applies to all of Africa: alleges persecution of the Christian minority to justify armed intervention.
However, the internal conflicts in Nigeria respond to a much more complex set of factors, which, although they include an Islamist insurgency, also territorial disputes and ethnic tensions as colonialist heritage that left a fragmented continentwhere the tribes were divided between multiple countries, and countries that crowded together disparate communities within artificial borders drawn in Western offices.
Below are the keys to understanding what is behind the conflict and why the US has decided to intervene now:
The attacks occurred in northwest of Nigeriain a border area with Niger where he operates Islamic State of the Sahela subsidiary of the jihadist group that has intensified its actions against government and civilian forces. It is a territory with little state presence, something through which jihadism spreads. Trump presented the offensive as a blow to Islamist militants whom he accuses of murdering Christians, although without specifying specific attacks.
No. US reports indicate that extremist violence affects both Christians and Muslims. A 2024 study of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom points out that the attacks have a transversal and not exclusive impact. Many analysts emphasize that reducing the conflict to religious persecution simplifies a reality marked by the collapse of security, rural poverty and the weakness of the State.
The US argument replicates that deployed in South Africa, where Trump falsely alleges genocide and apartheid of the white minority, despite the fact that they, who represent 15% of the population, bring together the lands and wealth of the country.
The Nigerian Government has denied that there is systematic persecution of Christians, and that it cannot be described as genocidepointing out that the network of violent armed groups kill Muslims and Christians indiscriminately. In addition, he has defended that the country is religiously diverse and that the State combats violence “against all communities.”
Even so, the Nigerian government has confirmed that the US attacks were carried out in coordination with the Nigerian authoritieswithin a framework of security cooperation that includes intelligence exchange and strategic support.
The operation culminates a verbal escalation that began in early November, when Trump stated that if the Nigerian government continued “allowing the murder of Christiansthe US would immediately suspend all aid and assistance to Nigeria, and would enter the country disgraced ‘with weapons at the ready‘” The president did not cite specific attacks or present evidence, but he had public support from allies such as Senator Ted Cruzwhich accused the Nigerian government of condoning religiously motivated mass killings.
In parallel, the White House once again designated Nigeria as “country of special concern” on religious freedom, a label already used at the end of Trump’s first term and later withdrawn by the Biden Administration.
The President of Nigeria, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, on November 28, 2024 during a state visit to Paris / SARAH MEYSSONNIER/ EFE
Nigeria’s cautious response reflects a key contradiction: it denies Christian genocide but accepts US support for counterterrorism attacks it cannot confront alone.
Trump’s strategy in Africa involves reduce multilateral cooperation and push the countries of the continent to renegotiate bilateral agreements on more favorable terms for the US. Offer less direct help and more demands in return, whether access to natural resourceseconomic concessions or US military presence. Nigeria, despite being a heavyweight in the African economy, is not immune to that pressure. Trump knows this, and takes advantage.
For Trump, Nigeria serves to stage his speech tough hand against terrorism and present himself as a defender of the persecuted christiansa story with strong roots among the ultra-conservative American electorate.
Paradoxically, while defending this attack on social media, Trump congratulated Christmas in an atypically religious tone for a US president. With openly confessional language, praising Christ, salvation and eternal life, the message has awakened critical voices that demand maintaining the separation between Church and State. Nigeria, in this context, functions as an external extension of a domestic cultural battle, anti-‘woke’ and supposed return to traditional values.
Nigeria, with some 220 million inhabitantshas been trapped in overlapping conflicts for years. In the northeast it operates Boko Haram and its split, the Islamic State in West Africa (ISWA)responsible for indiscriminate attacks against Christians and Muslims. More than 12,000 people have died this year in Nigeria due to the action of violent groups, according to ACLED data, a figure that illustrates the magnitude of the problem beyond any confessional reading.
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