Are Somali-Canadians joining the Jihad???

We already know some Somalis from Minnesota have gone over to fight...

Counterterrorism officials are investigating a group of youths who allegedly left Canada for East Africa two weeks ago, amid concerns they may have gone to join the Somali militant group Al-Shabab.

Two sources familiar with the case said investigators had been canvassing Toronto's large Somali-Canadian community for information about as many as five men who departed Canada together in early November.

They are believed to have flown to Kenya, the sources said. Kenya borders the region of southern Somalia controlled by Al-Shabab, an Islamist militia aligned with al-Qaeda and sometimes likened to the Taliban.

The investigation comes as the Somali conflict has become a key focus of North American counterterrorism officials. Several Somali-American youths have left the Midwestern United States to join the Shabab, and the commissioner of the RCMP said in a speech last month he is concerned about a similar trend in Canada.

"Radicalization within the U.S. Somali community may be an indicator of similar processes at work in Canada," Commissioner William Elliott said in his Oct. 30 address to the Canadian Association of Security and Intelligence Studies in Ottawa.

"As you know, we have one of the largest Somali diaspora communities in the Western world. The potential follow-on threat, from a Canadian and RCMP perspective, is Somali-Canadians who travel to Somalia to fight and then return, imbued with both extremist ideology and the skills necessary to translate it into direct action."

Al-Shabab, which means "youth," is an armed extremist group that has emerged from the lawlessness and chaos of Somalia and aims to establish an Islamic state.

It has been battling pro-government forces and African Union peacekeepers, and now holds the country's south and most of the capital of Mogadishu, where it has imposed harsh laws and carried out beheadings and stonings.

A handful of Canadians have fought with armed Somali groups in recent years, including Abdullah Ali Afrah, a former Toronto businessman who was killed last year while leading an ambush against Ethiopian troops.