Somalia Extremism. Politics and Religion. Due to its strategic location in one of the world's main maritime arteries and trade routes, connecting the Middle East and Europe with the Far East, and its location on the shores of the Gulf of 'Aden and the Indian Ocean, just across the Gulf of 'Aden from the Arabian Peninsula, Ethiopia and the Arab world struggled over expanding their influence zones over Somalia. For Ethiopia, which has always striven for an outlet to the sea and to world commerce, spreading its control and influence into Somalia has been vital, while the for the Arabs from the Arabian Peninsula and Egypt, Somalia served as the gate for the proliferation of Islam and Arab influence into the rest of Africa, especially East Africa. Thus, there is no wonder that Somalia has developed from the Middle Ages onwards into a battlefield between the Arab world and Ethiopia as well as between Christianity and Islam and, nowadays, due to the same strategic considerations, Somalia has developed into a battlefield between the US and al-Qa'ida