Observers say the Taliban’s intensifying rivalry with IS-K has signaled the beginning of another phase of war in Afghanistan. “IS-K will be looking to convince these communities that they cannot trust the Taliban and that joining IS-K is their only option.” “This is a historically marginalized population under the Taliban,” he adds. “IS-K has launched dozens of attacks, and subsequent Taliban reprisals have targeted local Salafist communities,” says Andrew Mines, a research fellow at George Washington University in Washington. It was the deadliest attack since the international troop withdrawal on August 31.Įxperts say IS-K is trying to recruit new fighters and undermine the Taliban’s hold on power. counterterrorism presence in Afghanistan and the Taliban's inadvertent release of hundreds of IS-K inmates from prisons during its sweep of the country.Īn IS-K suicide bomber blew himself up inside a Shi’ite mosque in the northern province of Kunduz on October 8, killing more than 70 people and injuring over 140. ![]() IS-K considers Shi’a Muslims as apostates who should be killed.Įxperts say the extremist group has been bolstered by the diminished U.S. Since the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, there has been surge in IS-K attacks against the Taliban and Afghan civilians, especially the Shi’ite minority. drone strikes and Afghan special forces also targeted IS-K strongholds in eastern Afghanistan. Since it first emerged in neighboring Pakistan in the early 1990s, the Taliban has allied itself with Al-Qaeda, a Salafist network, and absorbed smaller Salafist groups.īut the Taliban has opposed IS-K since its emergence in 2015, when turf wars erupted between the two movements. Many Taliban leaders are followers of the 19th-century Deobandi Movement of British Colonial India, a hard-line strain of Hanafi Islam. It is followed by about one-third of the world’s Muslims, making it the school with the most adherents. The Hanafi school of Sunni Islam dominates Afghanistan and the wider South Asia and Central Asia region. Since then, Salafist schools and mosques have been built with funds from rich Arab states. Salafism emerged in Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, when Arab Salafists arrived to fight alongside the mujahedin, the Islamist factions fighting against Soviet forces. It has been linked to IS-K, its rival Al-Qaeda, and other transnational militant groups. It first emerged in the 18th century on the Arabian Peninsula. ![]() The Salafist sect is a strict orthodox Islamic revivalist movement. “The message calls on all those who have been involved in destructive activities against the Islamic Emirate in the past or present to return to their homes and areas and apologize,” it read. The tweet cited a recent message attributed to Taliban chief Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada. “Members of the former army, police, intelligence and the Kharijites have once again been assured of the general amnesty,” the Taliban media center in Nangarhar tweeted on October 20. Taliban officials have referred to Salafists as Kharijites, members of an early radical Islamic sect that are widely considered renegades. But its rhetoric against Salafists has hardened in recent months. The Taliban denies targeting the Salafist community. But human rights group accuse the Taliban of executing, torturing, and detaining its rivals, including members of Afghanistan’s former armed forces.Īfghan Hazaras Fear The Worst After Forced Taliban Evictions The Taliban declared a general amnesty when it seized control of the capital, Kabul, on August 15. “All this will eventually benefit Daesh because it will attract more recruits to its cause and will win broader support ,” says Abdul Sayed, a Sweden-based researcher who tracks militant groups in the region. Observers say the Taliban’s deadly crackdown on Salafists could backfire and be used by IS-K as a recruiting tool. The Taliban, which many Salafists blamed for the killing, denied it was responsible. In September, a senior Salafist cleric in Afghanistan, Sheikh Abu Obaidullah Mutawakil, was abducted and then found dead days later. “The Taliban view every Salafist as a member of Daesh, which is unfair because not everyone who follows the Hanafi faith is a Taliban member,” Hakimullah says. Hakimullah says that many of his friends who are Salafists have been detained or killed by the Taliban in Nangarhar, the epicenter of clashes between the Taliban and IS-K militants. ![]() A Taliban soldier stands guard in front of a house neighboring a IS-K hideout raided by Taliban forces in northern Kabul in early October.
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