because there was no government in most of somalia (except where one had been built from scratch, like puntland and somaliland) somalia's only legal system, beyond the law of the gun, was traditional custom and islamic sharia law. because of this, sharia legal scholars in the lawless south of somalia gained quite a bit of influence. around the same time, the people fighting for somali lands in ethiopia to be part of somalia turned to the example of the afgani mujahideen, and created their own group called al-ittihad al-islamiyya or the islamic union. during the 1990s ethiopia invaded somalia several times to attack the islamic union, who were helping somali rebels in ethiopia.