Al Qaeda militants are moving closer to seizing the capital of the West African nation of Mali, which, should the city fall, would become the first country in the world run by the U.S.-designated terrorist group.
The rapid advance of the jihadists in Africa comes after Islamist groups took power in both Afghanistan and Syria, but, if they take Bamako, it would be the first time militants with direct and current connections to al Qaeda achieve such a feat.
They appear to be getting close, though they will likely wait some time before making any decisive move, security specialists say. Insurgents are blocking food and fuel deliveries to Bamako, the capital city, triggering shortages that are even hindering the army’s ability to respond, according to local and European officials and footage posted by the jihadists.
Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin, which translates as Support Group for Islam and Muslims, is betting on a creeping takeover rather than an all-out assault, European security officials say. “The longer the blockade drags on, the closer Bamako comes to collapse,” said Raphael Parens, a fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, a nonpartisan policy center in Philadelphia.
JNIM was formed in 2017 from the merger of veteran al Qaeda affiliates and immediately pledged allegiance to the group. Its fighters have received assistance in bomb-making and ideological training from the organization’s core leadership in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region, according to Western and African officials.
On Tuesday, dozens of tanker trucks were ambushed as they brought fuel to relieve the Malian capital on a road that normally brings goods. Jihadists in ragged cuffed pants and turbans emerged from the savanna, setting the first vehicle on fire and seizing the rest, according to footage from the insurgents and Western contractors and officials.
A large army contingent in nearby Kati, the ruling junta’s biggest stronghold, was unable to intervene. They had requested fuel for three weeks and never received any, people familiar with the incident said. “It’s a self-perpetuating cycle. To defeat JNIM, the junta needs large-scale ground operations and air support; yet both depend on a steady supply of fuel,” said the FPRI’s Parens.
Access to fuel is becoming the focal point of the conflict. The price of a liter of gasoline in Bamako has almost tripled to 2,000 CFA francs, or roughly $3.55, said local resident Ibrahim Cisse. People often have to wait for days for fuel, he said. “Today, there is nothing at the pump,” Cisse said. The government has responded by suspending schools and university classes for two weeks and shutting down some power stations.
Last week, Malian Prime Minister Abdoulaye Maïga vowed that “even if we have to seek fuel by foot or by spoon, we will look for it.”
Al Qaeda and Islamic State militants are conducting insurgencies across a vast area of West Africa, including Niger, Burkina Faso and Mali in the arid Sahel, and creeping toward the traditionally more prosperous countries—Benin, Ivory Coast, Togo and Ghana—along the Gulf of Guinea coast.
Western officials have grown increasingly worried that al Qaeda, the stronger of the two Islamist groups in West Africa, might actually win control of either Burkina Faso or Mali.
Mali, with a population of 21 million over an area triple the size of California, looks increasingly like it could fall first.
Islamists have proved in Syria and Afghanistan they can win a war of attrition where the existing regime ultimately collapses from within. JNIM has said it wants to emulate the Taliban, who entered Kabul after the military they had been fighting for two decades effectively vacated the capital. The Malian jihadists also see the seizure of Damascus by a former al Qaeda affiliate in December as a “blueprint” for their strategy, a United Nations report said in July.
In Mali, the insurgency started off in 2012 before being taken over by Malian al Qaeda leader Iyad ag Ghali, a former Marlboro-puffing rock’n’roller who became radicalized and banned music from the territories he controls.
Ag Ghali remains elusive despite being wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes and crimes against humanity. His group has gradually expanded its reach from the country’s far north to the doorstep of the capital. None of the foreign forces supplied by the U.S., the European Union or the U.N. have been able to halt their advance.
The Malian military, worried about the growing threat, overthrew the country’s civilian government in 2020, then ousted its own commander in 2021. The coups were followed by similar military putsches in Burkina Faso and Niger.
The current Malian junta expelled a French-led force and hired Russian mercenaries from the Wagner Group, but they, too, failed to quell the violence.
Instead, the Kremlin’s guns-for-hire and their Malian allies embarked on a campaign of widespread reprisals that drove many locals to join al Qaeda or at least seek its protection, say human-rights activists and local community leaders.
Cattle merchant Seydou Bah survived the March 2022 massacre of over 500 locals by Wagner in the central Malian market town of Moura. After the army killed his brother the next year for speaking out, he fled to a village controlled by the jihadists.
There, the new rulers frequently corralled men to the mosque for prayers and imposed tributes paid in cattle and harvests, said Bah, who has since fled the country and scrapes a living working on building sites. “Whether it’s under the army or JNIM, there is no freedom,” Bah said.
Earlier this year, the Russian military sent a new contingent of fighters under its direct control, but they lacked the experience to fight effectively in Mali’s rough terrain. The militants easily ambushed their joint convoys with Malian forces, allowing the insurgents to seize more weapons and lay plans to seize the capital.
The junta has sought further help from Russia. Last week, a visiting Russian delegation promised to ship up to 200,000 tons of oil and food.
The U.S., meanwhile, said it was evacuating some diplomats from its embassy and urged American citizens to leave the country immediately.
In July, Rudolph Atallah, a Trump administration counterterrorism adviser, visited Mali to offer American assistance. He didn’t return a request for comment.
European security and experts say the Malian regime is unlikely to fall in the short term because insurgents will find big cities harder to hold than the countryside. Instead, a future government, particularly if the junta falls, could negotiate with the jihadists, they say. They point out that community leaders have already held talks for local truces with JNIM in the central part of the country.
Meanwhile, the insurgents are building on their tightening grip on the rest of the country and taxing gold and narcotics transiting through Africa from Latin America to Europe.
Malians who have the option are trying to leave. In recent days, some have flown to neighboring countries such as Senegal and Ivory Coast, Malians living abroad say. The Bamako airport remained open as of Thursday.
Al Qaeda blockades prevent others leaving by road from joining the 334,000 Malians who, according to the United Nations, have already sought refuge in neighboring countries.
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Appeared in the October 31, 2025, print edition as ‘Al Qaeda Militants on the Brink of Taking Over Mali’.