Around 30 villagers were kidnapped at gunpoint and forced to dig protective trenches on the Muhajirun's island base, all the while being urged to pray with them and accept their vision of Islam, Gordo and his father said.
On New Year's Eve they scrawled "Taliban" on a captured jeep and set off for Damaturu, 150km away, burning a local government compound and raiding a police station armory en route.
The military response was uncompromising. The Muhajirun were driven back from Damaturu and flushed out of Kanamma. Nine were shot dead and later buried in the village, Gordo said.
At least 47 others have since been arrested, seven of them picked up trying to cross the border into Niger. Villagers in neighboring Borno State shot dead seven fleeing rebels. The uprising has come to an abrupt end.
In Yobe State, officials insist that the fighting should be seen as an isolated incident, but some Muslim leaders warned that the Muhajirun's extreme reaction was a symptom of broader dissatisfaction among Nigerian youth.
Ibrahim Datti Ahmad, the influential head of the Islamist pressure group the Supreme council for Shariah, said that educated but unemployed young Muslim men are boiling with anger over corrupt rule in their country.
"These are very sophisticated youth. They are not just the trash that is in government," he said of the "Taliban" rebels.
"I can understand why they did it. I'm not in a position to say whether I support it or not, but they must have their reasons," he said.
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