There has been a sharp rise in the number of US drone strikes in Yemen and Somalia since US President Donald Trump took office, says a report.

In March, Trump gave the US military authority to carry out airstrikes without notifying the government in regions designated as areas with "active hostilities."

South Africa says it will downgrade its diplomatic status in Israel in response to the United States’ decision to recognize Jerusalem al-Quds as the Israeli regime’s “capital.”

The ruling African National Congress (ANC) Party announced the decision at a conference in Johannesburg late on Wednesday.

“The ANC’s National Conference, the highest decision making body of our organization, has unanimously resolved to immediately and unconditionally downgrade the South African Embassy in Israel to a liaison office,” the ruling party said in a statement.

The ANC said the resolution aimed to “give practical expression to the oppressed people of Palestine,” and “will send a clear message to Israel that there is a price to pay for its human rights abuses and violations of international law.”

Senior Human Rights Expert at the African Union’s Department of Political Affairs, Salah Hammad, said yesterday that Jerusalem is the capital of Palestine and the United States cannot give it to Israel or any other party.

“The African Union’s position on the US decision is clear,” Hammad said in remarks to the Anadolu Agency on the sidelines of a solidarity campaign organised with the Palestinian cause in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

He pointed out that the US decision does not serve the Palestinian cause and does not lead to peace on the ground and stressed that the African Union’s position of solidarity with the Palestinian people is “clear and strong, and stems from the common African values ??that prevent a state from dominating another”.

A Tunisian labor union on Sunday evening announced its decision to boycott U.S. ships docking at a seaport in the country’s southern region of Sfax following Trump’s recognition, on Wednesday, of Occupied Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

Spokesman of the Popular Conference for the Palestinians Abroad, Ziad al-Aloul, said on Facebook that the regional executive office of Tunisia’s Trade Unions decided to boycott all American ships docking at Sfax commercial harbor.

As part of the boycott move, workers at the seaport will not empty the shipments onboard boats tied up at Sfax seaport after they had set sail from the U.S.

BuzzFeed News reported Friday, citing sources, that the deaths of eight soldiers, including four US servicemen, could have been avoided if the US military mission in October at the village of Tongo Tongo near the Malian border had been better planned.

BuzzFeed News described this deadly incident as the "the worst military fiasco under the Trump administration — in which four US soldiers were killed alongside four Nigerians by Islamist militants — was the result of reckless behavior by US Special Forces."

Senior US officials privy to the matter told the US media outlet that the "fiasco" came after US soldiers with alleged inadequate reconnaissance support and a lack of ammunition rushed into a tightly-secured hotbed of high-ranking Daesh militants. Buzzfeed News additionally revealed that a number of further "negligent" actions during the mission provided Daesh gunmen with a deadly dominance in accidental combat.

Sudanese parliament has called on the Arab and Islamic countries to recognise the State of Palestine with Jerusalem as its capital amid calls by some lawmaker to expel the U.S. chargé d’affaires.

The Chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, notes with deep concern the decision of the United States Government, announced today, to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of the State of Israel. He regrets this decision, which will only increase tensions in the region and beyond and further complicate the search for a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Chief Mandla Mandela of Mvezo has lambasted United States President Donald Trump’s decision to declare Jerusalem the capital of Israel.

In a statement opposing the controversial move, the Chief called the decision “an act of perverse incitement.”

“Jerusalem will always remain the capital of Palestine,” reads the statement.

“Trump's illegal act of declaring Jerusalem the capital of Israel is an act of aggression against the Palestinians and all freedom loving people in the world.”

Eight countries have since called for an urgent meeting of the UN Security Council to discuss the matter. Bolivia, Egypt, France, Italy, Senegal, Sweden, the United Kingdom and Uruguay want a meeting by the end of the week.

Cairo recently reiterated its longstanding position that it’s against Addis Ababa’s construction of this megaproject on the Blue Nile river through which it receives most of its water, believing that the dam would allow Ethiopia to control downstream Egypt’s access to this resource and thus place it in a strategically vulnerable position. The Horn of African state hit back at the latest criticism by stating that it won’t be thwarted in carrying out this nationally important development project, and it also refuted the rumors which claimed that Qatar was partially funding the dam. Egypt’s latest infowar campaign against Ethiopia’s initiative is thought to be fueled in part by Sudan’s strategic realignment towards Addis Ababa in this dispute and more broadly in a larger Silk Road context, which has totally changed the dynamics and correspondingly placed Cairo on the defensive.

The government of Niger has given the Defense Department permission to fly armed drones out of the Nigerien capital, Niamey, Pentagon officials said Thursday, in a major expansion of the American military’s footprint in Africa.

Pentagon officials want to start the flights within days.

A review of thousands of internal company documents and witness statements published on Tuesday points to the Anglo-Dutch organisation’s alleged involvement in the brutal campaign to silence protesters in the oil-producing Ogoniland region in the 1990s.

Amnesty is urging the UK, Nigeria and the Netherlands to consider a criminal case against Shell in light of evidence it claims amounts to “complicity in murder, rape and torture” – allegations Shell strongly denies.

Shell stopped operations in Ogoniland in early 1993 citing security concerns but “subsequently sought ways to re-enter the region and end the protests by the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People, Mosop”, claims Amnesty.

On 30 April the same year troops guarding Shell’s contractors opened fire on protesters injuring 11 people, and a man was fatally shot at Nonwa village in a separate incident several days later.

US Africa Command (AFRICOM) will be adding armed drones to their Nigerien arsenals to bolster their combat capabilities after the October ambush that left four US soldiers and five Nigerien soldiers dead.
Niger had already given the US permission to fly surveillance drone missions out of bases in their country, but now Niamey and the Pentagon have come to an agreement to allow AFRICOM to add MQ-9 Reaper drones equipped with a suite of missiles on bombs to their assets.

Saudi authorities have arrested Mohammed Hussein Al-Amoudi a duel national with Saudi and Ethiopian citizen and is reportedly the second richest Saudi, after Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal.

While bin Talal’s arrest has gained most media attention. Al-Amoudi’s arrest is especially important because it could potentially destabilize the economy of an entire country, according to Middle East Eye.

Al-Amoudi, who is also known as “the Sheikh”, has invested in almost every sector of Ethiopia’s economy, including hotels, agriculture and astrology.

According to a leaked diplomatic cable from 2008 “the Sheikh’s influence on the Ethiopian economy cannot be underestimated.”

BORIS Johnson has said the nation stands “ready to assist” Zimbabwe to stabilise the country following the resignation of “despot” Robert Mugabe.

More than 100 al-Shabaab militants were killed Tuesday in the latest US airstrike in Somalia the Pentagon announced, the latest in a series of strikes against the al Qaeda affiliated group and ISIS fighters in the war-torn country meant to support the local government. The strike occurred 125 miles northwest of the capital of Mogadishu, and was the 29th such strike since the start of 2017, and 7th since November 9.

The Pentagon released the following statement commemorating the latest airstrike:

U.S. Conducts Airstrike in Support of the Federal Government of Somalia

In coordination with the Federal Government of Somalia, U.S. forces conducted an airstrike in Somalia against an al-Shabaab camp on Tuesday, Nov. 21 at approximately 10:30 a.m. local Somalia time, killing more than 100 militants. The operation occurred 125 miles northwest of the capital, Mogadishu.

Days before the military coup d’état in Zimbabwe, one of Mugabe’s sons uploaded a snapchat displaying his £45,000 diamond watch with £200 champagne, according to Daily Mail. The story went viral fueling anger of Zimbabweans as the country suffers from an economic collapse with a 95% unemployment rate.

Lane runs the Bhejane Trust, a charity dedicated to preserving the black rhino in parks including Hwange. “I’m a great fan of Prince William, but he’s got it completely wrong on trophy hunting,” he tells me. “Not only does it provide a large chunk of our national park budget, but it gives local people a vested interest in preserving wildlife.”

Take elephants — one of the big five species most favoured by trophy hunters (the others being lion, leopard, Cape buffalo, and rhino). To a squeamish urban Westerner, it might seem a monumental tragedy when — as happened in Zimbabwe in October — a massive bull elephant gets shot by some fat German trophy hunter. To a starving African villager, though, it’s a lifeline.

From becoming one of the major points in Africa from which migrants can attempt to cross over into Europe, Libya is now turning into a slave trade city thanks to the heavy flow of desperate people from other parts of the continent. A new investigation has revealed people are being sold as modern-day slaves for as little as £300 ($400).
According to CNN which exposed the racket, slave sales are conducted on the outskirts of the nation’s capital, Tripoli, where auctions take place for various types of manual labourers. In one case, a video was made available, which shows the sale of “big strong boys for farm work”.
An undercover operation revealed similar auctions where around a dozen people were sold in a matter of five to six minutes. “Does anybody need a digger? This is a digger, a big, strong man, he’ll dig,” an auctioneer calls out in one clip. “What am I bid, what am I bid?”

One of the many quiet escalations in countries where US military operations on the ground hadn’t really been well publicized in the first place, officials say that the US has more than doubled the number of ground troops in Somalia this year, and now have over 500 troops there.

This is the most troops the US have had in the country since 1993, when the Black Hawk Down incident killed 18 US soldiers and led to a quick withdrawal from the nation. This year was also the first year since 1993 that any US troops died in Somalia.

This escalation has involved a soaring number of US airstrikes in Somalia, not to mention a number of joint ground operations with Somali forces, mostly against al-Shabaab fighters, but many of them with very unclear goals.

Tens of thousands of jubilant Zimbabweans joined rallies on Saturday to celebrate the imminent departure of President Robert Mugabe, the only leader they’ve known since independence in 1980.

The US Fish and Wildlife Service under US President Donald Trump has decided to allow the remains of elephants hunted for sport in Zimbabwe to be imported into the United States, reversing a ban on such imports introduced in 2014.

Zimbabwe's elephants are listed as "threatened" under the US Endangered Species Act (ESA).

The service justified the change by saying the ban, imposed under former president Barack Obama, was based on limited information available at the time.

The key architect of the soft coup in Zimbabwe this week traveled to China and met with top military officials just days before the confusing and still-unfolding government shakeup, sparking speculation that Beijing may have played a role in the coup that has seen Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe placed under house arrest.

US Senator Jim Inhofe said on Wednesday he was encouraged by the reports of a "peaceful action by the Zimbabwean military to reject the brutal and restrictive dictatorship of President Mugabe".

"I am cautiously optimistic that the military’s apparent efforts to restore differing viewpoints to the government will be an important step in that journey," Inhofe said.

U.S. Senator Jim Inhofe is hopeful the military takeover of Zimbabwe from President Robert Mugabe leads to a true democratic state for the beleaguered African country. Mugabe has been president since 1987. He is now under house arrest by the military, which is claiming its takeover of the government is not a coup. The move is likely to be challenged by the Southern Africa Development Community.

Zimbabwe’s military says it has deposed President Robert Mugabe and first lady Grace Mugabe and has appointed recently ousted Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa as interim president. This comes just one week after President Mugabe ousted the vice president—who’s a close ally of Zimbabwe’s army chief. Witnesses reported seeing armored personnel carriers in the streets, with heavy gun and artillery fire in parts of the capital Harare. Zimbabwe’s military denied it had carried out a coup.

An armored convoy of Zimbabwean tanks were seen rolling towards the capital city of Harare on Tuesday. The mysterious military actions come just one day after the nation’s military leader said he was prepared to “step in” against the purge of supporters of ousted Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa.

Zimbabwe’s army has announced in a statement that no military takeover is taking place in the country and that President Robert Mugabe and his family are safe and sound.

Zimbabwe's military has read out a statement on the country's state-run media, ZBC, saying it has taken action to target criminals "committing crimes that are causing social and economic suffering in the country", claiming that there is no "military takeover of government" and that President Robert Mugabe is safe.

First lady Grace Mugabe reportedly out of country as military says in statement that it is ‘targeting criminals’ around 93-year-old president

The natural resources of Zimbabwe are coal, chromium ore, asbestos, gold, nickel, copper, iron ore, vanadium, lithium, tin and the platinum group metals. The main products that Zimbabwe exports includes precious stones, precious metals, tobacco and ores

Zimbabwe is on edge amid speculation that a military coup is in progress, with army tanks seen outside the capital a day after the army commander threatened to "step in" to calm political tensions over the president's firing of his vice president. The Associated Press said it saw three tanks with several soldiers in a convoy on a road heading toward an army barracks just outside the capital, Harare, while Reuters reported that four tanks were seen heading toward the capital.

Hundreds of Ethiopian soldiers have been spotted crossing the border town of Dolow into Somalia carrying heavy artillery.

As you read today’s piece by historian and TomDispatch regular Alfred McCoy, author most recently of In the Shadows of the American Century: The Rise and Decline of U.S. Global Power, think of Afghanistan as the gateway drug for three Washington administrations.

Meanwhile, the whole question of opium eradication has, according to Mashal, gotten surprisingly "little attention in the Trump administration’s new strategy for the Afghan war." It seems that U.S. counter-narcotics officials have come to accept a new reality "with a sense of helplessness" – that the country now supplies 85% of the world’s heroin and there’s no end to this in sight.

Thousands of people have been infected and over 143 are now reported dead from the plague outbreak that’s now threatening Africa, reports the UK Daily Mail. “Health officials are unsure how this year’s outbreak began,” reports the paper. “Experts warn the disease spreads quicker in heavily populated areas.”

Isn’t it interesting that just as Prince William is calling for “urgent depopulation efforts” in Africa, we suddenly have the rapid spread of the plague from unknown origins? As Natural News previously reported, Prince William appears to be pushing for depopulation efforts across Africa in the name of environmentalism:

“Africa’s rapidly growing human population is predicted to more than double by 2050 – a staggering increase of three and a half million people per month,” Prince William explained during a recent event hosted by the Tusk Trust, a charity that is committed to protecting African wildlife.

Malawi is bracing itself for an outbreak of the plague after the deadly disease continues to spread across the island nation of Madagascar.
At least 143 people have died and more than 2,000 others have been infected in Madagascar since an outbreak in early August this year.

Yet Malawi's health secretary confirmed the country is ready for any reported cases of the disease amid mounting concerns of Africa's 'porous borders'.
Dr Dan Namarika, principal secretary in the ministry of health, said the country were working in conjunction with Mozambique to help best prepare for a possible outbreak.

Just days after the release of a jaw-dropping video lecture called the Science Agenda to Exterminate Blacks, a bombshell science paper has emerged that confirms the use of covert sterilization chemicals in World Health Organization vaccines deployed in Africa. Entitled, “HCG Found in WHO Tetanus Vaccine in Kenya Raises Concern in the Developing World,” the paper documents the covert deployment of an infertility chemical in vaccines that are administered to young black women in Kenya:

Oller, J.W., Shaw, C.A., Tomljenovic, L., Karanja, S.K., Ngare, W., Clement, F.M. and Pillette, J.R. (2017), HCG Found in WHO Tetanus Vaccine in Kenya Raises Concern in the Developing World. Open Access Library Journal, 4: e3937.
https://doi.org/10.4236/oalib.1103937

What is it going to take for the international media to catch on to this most insidious of crimes, for the world had the food to prevent all these deaths, something the UN is supposed to be on top of.

But then one of the top dogs at the UN is the Executive Director of UNICEF, supposedly the number one (N)o (G)ood (O)utfit with the responsibility to prevent this crime, headed by former National Security Advisor to Pres. Clinton and later failed nominee to head the CIA , Anthony Lake, whose appointment was a favor returned by Pres. Obama. Loyalty to empire can have its rewards in the form of being overlord of a multi billion dollar a year aid empire internationally, UNICEF, and the ability to carry out “long term solutions” as in genocide by starvation of the Somali people.

The piece includes dazzling tales of de Merode evading machine gun fire while flying his Cessna jet over territories held by militiamen, his battle to defeat poachers targeting endangered animals and his “visionary” bid to remake the region.

But given the brutal history of the Belgian monarchy in the Congo, and the historic transfer of wealth out of the country to its rulers in Europe, some readers quickly declared the piece not only tone deaf, but also a stunning display of ignorance.

A Nigerien soldier who survived the Daesh ambush that claimed eight lives in early October has told the Washington Post that the US special forces were assisting Niamey in a search and destroy operation - which runs counter to the Pentagon’s claim that the troops were on a simple and low-risk reconnaissance mission when they were killed.

The disease, known as Marburg virus disease (MVD), is similar to Ebola and can be lethal in up to 90 per cent of cases.

Emergency screening has begun at the Kenya-Uganda border in Turkana after three members of the same family died of the disease in Uganda.

Health workers have been asked to work with communities to stop the deadly Marburg outbreak from devastating communities in the rural region.

Dr Zabulon Yoti, Technical Coordinator for Emergencies at the World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Office for Africa, said: “Community engagement is the cornerstone of emergency response.”

He urged health officials to “work with the communities to build their capacity for success and sustainability” and develop a better understanding of the local customs and traditions.

A former lawmaker filed a petition at Kenya’s Supreme Court on Monday challenging the results of last month’s presidential election, a Reuters witness said, opening the door to potential legal challenges to President Uhuru Kenyatta’s re-election.

The Pentagon’s gradually escalating combat mission in Somalia reached another important milestone Friday - one of many that have occurred since the inauguration of President Donald Trump - when the military revealed that it had carried out the first airstrikes against Islamic State-linked fighters in Somalia.

The news comes as ISIS forces in Syria were driven out of their last remaining patch of territory as Syrian Army forces retook the eastern city of Deir Ezzor, inspiring even anti-Assad pundits to marvel at the Army’s advance against seemingly insurmountable odds.

A US official told the Associated Press the strikes were carried out in northeastern Somalia, with the first around midnight local time and the second later in the morning. The official was not authorized to discuss the mission publicly so spoke on condition of anonymity.

Some 1,300 cases of the pneumonic plague, which is transmitted by air, have now been confirmed.

An estimated 50 million lives were lost as a result of the Black Death epidemic of the 1300s.

And now the deadly disease has spread into more African countries after taking root in Madagascar.

Countries affected include South Africa, Mozambique, Tanzania, Kenya, Ethiopia, Comoros, the Seychelles, Mauritius and Reunion.

Officially, the US military never leaves troops behind. Secretary of State James Mattis even said literally this last week, in denying that a soldier might’ve been left behind in the October 4 Niger ambush, in which four US special forces were killed.

As details continue to emerge on the incident, however, it appears increasingly certain that Mattis hadn’t told the truth, with officials now saying that when French helicopters evacuated the US forces, they had lost contact with four US troops, and only evacuated seven out of 11 in the unit.

Hours later, they managed to return to recover the bodies of the three soldiers initially reported killed. The fourth soldier wasn’t found for another two days. That the troops left without contact with the four makes it uncertain if some might’ve been alive at the time, and died abandoned on the field.

In comments Wednesday regarding the recent revealed US military operation inside Niger, President Trump confirmed that he never personally authorized any of the mission, but rather that “my generals and my military” did that all on their own.

Trump insisted his generals “are great generals” and “I gave them authority to do what’s right” and he is confident that eventually “we’re going to win.” Trump added that he’s been finding out about the mission just like everyone else has.

Which seems like a huge problem, despite no one treating it like one. President Trump was apparently “informed” of Niger after the October 4 ambush when they realized one of the soldiers was missing, and Senate Armed Services

100s of 1000s of Africans are being held in what are essentially slave camps under brutal conditions, awaiting shipment to Europe via a network of pro-immigration NGOs and human traffickers. It is an eye-opener.

The EU only has itself to blame for this next tsunami of refugees about to storm their shores. The refugees are merely riding the blood red tidal wave NATO-backed wars.

US officials describing the military operation in Niger, which only became public knowledge earlier this month after four US special forces were killed in an ambush, have not only revealed that nearly 1,000 US troops are on the ground in Niger, a massive force for the tiny country, but that this is the “hub” for US military operations in Western Africa.

Details on what exactly that means are scant, since the Niger military operation was basically a secret, and by extension so are all the other regional operations that we’re not being told about. Officials did assure reporters Niger has the most troops in the region.

Niger has hosted a US drone base for years, and about 100 troops were reported deployed in 2012. Somewhere between then and now, this increased ten-fold, and those troops started engaging in patrols. African Command says there are no armed US warplanes in West Africa at present, but that they rely on French warplanes.

Few Americans know anything about the country. They’re minimally knowledgeable geographically about nations only when Washington goes to war – testimony to public ignorance, a national disgrace in a nation where it’s simple to stay informed by following reliable independent online sources.

Niger is landlocked in central northwest Africa, nearly twice the size of France territorially. It’s the world’s fifth largest source of uranium, its fourth largest producer, reason enough for America’s presence.

Its other valued resources include coal, iron ore, tin, phosphates, gold, molybdenum, gypsum, salt and oil – with at least 40 billion barrels of proved reserves, perhaps multiples this amount, it’s believed, along with plentiful natural gas.

Niger became newsworthy with reports of militants killing four US special forces, the Pentagon saying little about what happened.

With Pentagon officials offering the first details on the Niger ambush incident, they also revealed details about the ongoing US war in Niger, including the revelation that there is an ongoing US war in Niger. Nobody seems to have known about it.

Especially not those whose job it is to know. Senate Armed Services Committee members confirmed they were “stunned” by the revelation, and had no idea that the US had upwards of 1,000 ground troops operating inside Niger.

Gen. Joe Dunford presented this military operation as being targeted at an ISIS affiliate inside Niger, and the suggestion is that the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) in Afghanistan is serving as the legal justification.

The October 4 ambush in Niger that killed four US Special Forces members forced the Pentagon to admit that they had been routinely carrying out ground patrols inside Niger, but African command (AFRICOM) may be cashing in on the incident.

With the revelation that there are US military operations ongoing in Niger and countless other countries, AFRICOM is noting that they’d requested a lot more military equipment than they got, and some of that might conceivably have come in handy during the ambush.

The US special forces were, after all, sent out in unarmored vehicles, with no air surveillance, and no way of evacuating if a problem happened. Instead of questioning why they sent troops into such dangerous circumstances in the first place, officials just say it proves they should’ve been given way more equipment.

France will do everything to protect its interests in Niger after an attack on a uranium plant run by nuclear reactor maker Areva near the northern town of Arlit earlier on Thursday, French President Francois Hollande said.

“We will have the same will to co-operate (with Niger) to fight against terrorism and will also protect our interests,” he told reporters.

The US must step up support for French troops fighting Islamic State in West Africa, the French defense minister said during a visit to Washington, even as US officials sparred over the ambush in Niger that left four US service members dead.

“Much more needs to be done,” Defense Minister Florence Parly said after a meeting Friday with her US counterpart James Mattis and National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster, according to Reuters. “We can’t be and don’t want to be, the praetorian (guards) of sovereign African countries. They must be made able to defeat terror on their own.”

Without US support, Parly said, the mission is likely to fail.

US Defence Secretary Jim Mattis thanked French Defence Minister Florence Parly for France's help after four US soldiers were killed in an ambush in Niger, sparking controversy over American operations in the west African country. The Iran nuclear deal and Chad, which is affected by President Donald Trump's travel ban, were among other questions raised by Parly during her visit.

"Thank you for your support and for your letter of condolences for our fallen following this attack," Mattis told Parly when they met on Friday.

French helicopters, backed up by warplanes, arrived to evacuate the US victims within 30 minutes of the ambush by about 50 attackers, thought to be jihadists, near the Mali border.

Another deadline has passed without agreement in Niger in the government's ongoing negotiations with the French nuclear company Areva on the renewal of the company's license to operate in the country.

After months of discussions, the mining minister, Omar Tchiana, said last week that Friday would be the final deadline for the two sides to strike a deal. Now it has been agreed that talks will continue without a fixed deadline.

The negotiations are deadlocked on the issue of the royalties Areva pays Niger for the rights to two large uranium mines, Somair and Cominak in the arid north of the country. The terms of the original deal struck in the early 1970s have never been made public, but government sources say the company pays about 5.5% of its revenues in royalties. Niger wants the terms of a new mining code passed in 2006 to be implemented, which would force Areva to pay between 12% and 15% in royalties, and end a number of tax breaks on materials and equipment.

Secretary of Defense James Mattis provided a Capitol Hill briefing about the deadly ambush in Niger that took the lives of four U.S. troops – and the emerging details describe a chaotic encounter with inadequate support.

Mattis briefed Armed Services Chairman Sen. John McCain, who was so upset by the lack of information that he threatened to issue a subpoena.

A congressional source briefed on the mission called it a 'massive intelligence failure,' NBC reported.

The ugly row over whether President Trump disrespected the young widow of a fallen American soldier has overshadowed a bigger issue. That is, the increasing number of US military operations across the African continent.