It Begins - The Taliban Wage Jihad While Biden Pretends It Isn't Happening
Last Friday a suicide bomber attack on a Shiite mosque in northwest Pakistan killed at least 62 people. The death toll may go higher. Both the Taliban and its partners in the Biden administration want you to believe that this attack was carried out by a group called ISIS-K. Both of them – for their own reasons – are almost certainly lying.
The suicide bomber who carried out the attack wore traditional clothes over a suicide vest packed with explosives and ball bearings. He detonated his device just as prayers were about to begin. The mosque was jammed with worshippers.
The mosque where the attack took place is in Peshawar. That’s less than fifty kilometers from the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Afghanistan is now under the control of the Taliban.
The bombing followed a string of similar attacks inside Afghanistan where several mosques were targeted after the Taliban took control of the country last August. According to Pakistani security sources, the Islamic State-Khorasan Province (ISIS-K) formally claimed the attack. That’s convenient. It allows the Taliban in Afghanistan to claim they were not involved. It also lets the Biden administration continue to peddle the fiction that the Taliban has changed. They are no longer the bad guys who provided shelter to Al-Qaeda and supported the attacks on 9/11. They are some new kinder, gentler Taliban 2.0.
If only that were true.
At the heart of the Taliban regime in Kabul is the Haqqani network. The Haqqanis are murderous, drug-dealing terrorists. The Haqqani network is officially designated as an international terrorist organization by the United States. Its leaders have multi-million-dollar bounties on their heads.
For years the Haqqanis have claimed that they have no connections to ISIS-K. In fact, at present, they represent that they are actively opposing ISIS-K and disapprove of their actions. When 13 U.S. servicemen were killed in Kabul during Biden’s disastrous flight from Afghanistan, the Haqqanis represented that they had nothing to do with the attack. It was those bad people in ISIS-K. If only they could stop them.
The reality is that the Haqqanis cooperate with ISIS-K and have for many years. One of Afghanistan’s former Vice Presidents, Amrullah Saleh said last year in the wake of the attack on the Kabul airport, “Every evidence we have in hand shows that [ISIS-K terrorist] cells have their roots in Talibs [Taliban] & Haqqani network particularly the ones operating in Kabul.”
Saleh also said specifically that there was intelligence in advance of the attack on the Kabul Airport that the Taliban was going to carry out the attack. “We knew from two or three days ago that the Taliban wanted to end the airport disaster with a series of bombings…They spread the word that ISIL wanted to carry out bombings. The Taliban is behind today’s bombing.”
Saleh’s comments were perhaps unusually direct. They were not in contradiction of the available evidence. In fact, it has been known for some time that the Haqqani network and ISIS-K work together.
In February 2021 Haris Jebran, a spokesman for the Afghan National Directorate of Security (NDS), laid out very clearly how the Haqqani network worked in tandem with ISIS-K. As for the partnership's method of operation, he said, "the Haqqani Network takes care of planning and providing resources, while ISIS launches the attacks and takes responsibility." This partnership is intended as a smokescreen, with which the Taliban and Haqqani Network seek to shield themselves from "national and international accusations", Jebran said. The Taliban and Haqqani Network carry out terror acts while ISIS takes responsibility thereby allowing the Haqqanis to claim they were not involved.
Arif Kayani a political and military affairs analyst in Kabul was, if possible, even blunter. “The group that operates under the name of ISIS is part of the Haqqani Network,” he said.
The United Nations analysis of the relationship between ISIS-K (also known as ISIL-K) and the Haqqanis is identical. A report published in 2020 lays out the situation quite clearly.
“While operations in Nangarhar and Kunar have weakened the ability of ISIL-K to conduct high-profile attacks, debate continues as to how many operations were genuinely carried out by ISIL-K during the reporting period. Member States have commented that most attacks claimed by ISIL-K demonstrated some degree of “involvement, facilitation, or the provision of technical assistance” by the Haqqani Network. Furthermore, they have stated that ISIL-K “lacked the capability to launch complex attacks in Kabul on its own” while taking responsibility for operations that had, in all likelihood, been carried out by the Haqqani Network. Notably, the tactical autonomy of the Haqqani Network in pursuing Taliban goals enables them to support operations, which undermined the control and credibility of the Government of Afghanistan. Likewise, operations resulting in civilian casualties allow Taliban deniability whereas ISIL-K is willing to claim responsibility to demonstrate capability and relevance.”
All of this is, of course, known to U.S. intelligence as well. The United States Government fully understands that the Haqqanis are actively staging attacks outside of Afghanistan and hiding behind the ISIS-K fiction. To admit that, however, would be to highlight the impact of Biden’s disastrous Afghan retreat. It would require admitting that Afghanistan has become a terrorist superstate and that attacks are already being launched into neighboring nations from this platform.
It would also, of course, lead immediately to the critical question from an American perspective. How long until the guys blowing up mosques in Peshawar are attacking U.S. targets around the world and even here in the homeland?
Biden is already hanging on by his fingertips in the polls. Americans are already turning against him in droves. This regime cannot possibly survive if the people of the United States understand the full impact of Biden’s flight from Kabul.
Reality is unimportant. No lie is too big. Unfortunately for us, the lies peddled by this White House do not actually alter the facts on the ground. We have wondered since the fall of Kabul how long it would be before the Taliban and their allies began to wage jihad outside Afghanistan’s borders.
We have our answer. It has already begun.