Alert for the infiltration of ISIS-K and Al-Qaeda suicide bombers among Afghan refugees

Chicago (special for Infobae) – It was an attack long announced. As soon as the overwhelming Taliban advance on Kabul took place and the evacuation of foreigners and refugees began at the airport in that city, US intelligence officials warned against possible suicide attacks. The head of the CIA himself, William Burns, had asked the Taliban to stop the most extreme forces that could attack. The Afghans in the black turban told him there was nothing they could do. In reality, suspects are also your enemies.

In Afghanistan, as the pro-Western government collapsed and US troops – along with others in NATO – withdrew, militias affiliated with ISIS, ISIS and the Al-Qaeda terrorist network reaffirmed on the ground. The Taliban’s triumph gave them the last push they needed. They were ready to attack troops and Afghans who wanted to get to Kabul airport. Their aim was to present themselves as the “real fighters” who had “expelled the wicked from Muslim land”. And they did it very easily: two suicide bombers, two explosions in the crowd trying to escape the regime and the marines guarding the place. Death and destruction. Terror. Mission accomplished.

At the Pentagon in Washington, there were already great concerns about possible ISIS and Al Qaeda operatives who they were trying to infiltrate the refugees leave Afghanistan. At Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, which is the first stop for most evacuation planes, they have already detected several suspects. According to the specialist site Defense One, the automated biometric identification system found that Almost 100 of 7,000 Afghans evacuated fit counterterrorism watchlists intelligence agencies. This set off all alarms in the West. The attacks confirmed that the threat was extremely real.

All this made the security measures for the reception of refugees extreme. Will have an even more in-depth second check potential beneficiaries of special immigration visas when they arrive and remain confined for several days at the military bases of Fort Bliss in Texas, Fort McCoy in Wisconsin and Fort Lee in Virginia. “This process includes biometric and biographical security checks carried out by our intelligence, law enforcement and counterterrorism professionals, who literally work around the clock to track down all these Afghans before they are allowed to enter the United States, ”explained a head of migrations at the ABC channel.

Since the attacks of September 11, 20 years ago, the intelligence services they were stained with doubts for not having detected the 19 suicide bombers who embarked the planes in the Twin Towers or the hijacking of the planes. They were also not accurate in describing the relentless advance of ISIS forces and the creation of the emirate between Syria and Iraq. The latest failure came from not determining how quickly the Taliban would take power in Afghanistan. From now on, all the conditions are met to face a new hard blow with the entry on the American territory of dozens of potential terrorists mixed among legitimate refugees.

The greatest danger lies in what is called the Islamic State Khorasan or ISIS-K. It is the branch of Daesh (the nomenclature in Arabic) in what was historically called Khorasan (pronounced “Khorasan”) and which occupies parts of what are today the territories of Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran and areas of other neighboring Central Asian republics. In 2014, its leaders they swore allegiance to the then head of ISIS, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. There were only a few dozen militants who had previously fought alongside the Taliban, but who they were abandoned as “lukewarm”. With the fall of the caliphate, three years later, fighters fleeing Syria were added. Were those they brought greater rigor in the interpretation of “sharia”, the Koranic law.

In a report released last week by the Pentagon Inspector General, it is noted that ISIS-K took advantage of the weakness of the Afghan government and the distraction of the Taliban, engaged in the offensive, to expand its territory and reach Kabul. . “In this way, they have achieved an advance from the Afghan provinces of Kunar, Nangarhar and Nuristan towards the centers of power in the Afghan capital. They have exploited political instability and increased violence over the past three months and especially after the (American) forces evacuated the base of Bagram (the most strategic) by attacking minority sectarian targets and infrastructures to sow fear and denounce the inability of the Afghan government to provide adequate securityThe report says.

ISIS-K led six major attacks in Kabul in 2016, 18 attacks in 2017 and 24 in 2018, according to an “article” from the CSIS study center. “They have been a persistent problem because, despite all the pressure that we and then the Taliban put on them, successfully maintain highly efficient functioning cells. Most of the most ruthless attacks, such as those on hospitals and a maternity hospital, have all been perpetrated by ISIS-K, ”he told the newspaper. United States today former CIA counterterrorism chief Douglas London. According to the spy, this group represents enormous competition for the Taliban, which makes them “deadly enemies”. “They compete for resources, materials and power, even if they are relatively small”, noted.

May 8, ISIS-K attacked a girls’ school in Kabul and killed at least 68 people and injured more than 165, mostly students, according to a Defense Intelligence Agency assessment cited by the Inspector General. A suicide bomber slammed an explosive-laden car into the school gate and as the children fled other bombs exploded. The school was attended by Hazara girls, a Shiite Muslim ethnic minority, a target of ISIS-K which is Sunni, the other major branch of Islam. In May 2020, terrorists attacked a Hazara maternity hospital, killing 24 mothers and newborns.

Before the withdrawal of American troops, negotiated by former President Donald Trump, US military commanders attempted to wipe out ISIS-K. The Army General Joseph Votel, former head of the Central Command of the United States, had designated these terrorists as “an enemy to be defeated”. In 2017, the air force dropped the largest conventional bomb in the American arsenal, the Massive Ordnance Air Blast, also known as the “The mother of all bombs”, on an ISIS-K stronghold. The explosion killed 96 fighters.

In addition to their characteristic brutality, these militants distinguish themselves from the Taliban and the Al-Qaeda network by not to get involved in or profit from lucrative opium smuggling. Afghanistan is the world’s largest producer of opium and heroin, and its trade finances the activities of terrorists of all stripes. But the “IKs” were able to survive in the mountains with very little food until the end of winter came down to feed. They say that they are trained to live for weeks on just pine nuts and water. They are very familiar with the terrain around the Hindu Kush mountain range between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Most of its members come from the local tribes of Mehsudis, Waziris and Pashtuns in the cross-border area. “It is there, in these mountains, that the hearts of these people are found. She does not consider herself Afghan, nor Pakistani, ”said Agent London. Many of these militiamen have already passed through the ranks of Pakistani extremist groups such as Tehrik-E Taliban (TTP) and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LJ), who was involved in the kidnapping and murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in 2002.

The Al-Qaeda affair is more classic, or at least has a well-known existence of 25 years since, under Osama bin Laden, they carried out the attacks of September 11. Comes from “The list” drawn up by the Saudi engineer who died in 2011 Islamist militants from all over the world who joined the war against the Soviet Red Army which invaded Afghanistan in the 1980s. It and many other groups of mujahedin (Islamic militiamen, pronounced “mujahedin”) received at that time CIA armament and funding. They succeeded in defeating the Soviets who had to withdraw in 1989. This sparked a civil war between the different factions that had constituted the Afghan insurgency forces and which ended seven years later when one of these groups , the Taliban, who had organized themselves in the madrassas, the Koranic schools on the Pakistani border, took power for five years in Kabul. It was when Bin Laden and his men received refuge and support from the Taliban to organize several sophisticated military training centers for militiamen who came from all over the planet. Hence the order of the attacks of September 11, 2001 and started the war on terror.

During all these years, historical elements of Al Qaeda have occupied positions in certain desert areas and in the mountains of the north of the country. The new management distanced himself from the Taliban and engaged them in bloody combat. They are also opposed to ISIS-K, but have a common goal of attacking the United States. Yesterday’s attacks in Kabul are part of this strategy and they are seeking by all means keep attacking the heart of the “empire” with suicide bombers who are now trying to hide among the more than 100,000 Afghan refugees fleeing the Taliban and seeking refuge in the United States.

KEEP READING: