and allied forces and innocent civilians,” Mr. “Every day we’re on the ground is another day we know that ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both U.S. 31, probably influenced President Biden’s decision on Tuesday to stick to that deadline. These threats, coupled with new demands by the Taliban for the United States to leave by Aug. American military and intelligence analysts say threats from the group include a bomb-laden truck, suicide bombers infiltrating the crowd outside Hamid Karzai International Airport and mortar strikes against the airfield.
31 withdrawal deadline is a common rival that is lesser known: Islamic State Khorasan, or ISIS-K, the terrorist group’s affiliate in Afghanistan.Ĭreated six years ago by disaffected Pakistani Taliban, ISIS-K has carried out dozens of attacks in Afghanistan this year. As the Islamic State lost territory, it "increasingly turned to Afghanistan as a base for its global caliphate," CSIS said.WASHINGTON - The United States has been battling the Taliban and their militant partners in Afghanistan, Al Qaeda and the Haqqani network, for 20 years.īut the biggest immediate threat to both the Americans and the Taliban as the United States escalates its evacuation at the Kabul airport before an Aug. " has received support from the Islamic State's core leadership in Iraq and Syria since its founding in 2015," per a 2018 report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). This was less than a year after ISIS took over a large swath of territory in Iraq and Syria, declaring a caliphate (which has since collapsed). ISIS-K first emerged in 2015, and staged attacks as early as April of that year. Volatility in Afghanistan to launch attacks to increase their own political relevance and sow discord." ISIS-K 'remains a potent threat' "ISIS will attempt to erode the Taliban's governance and attack the Taliban's religious legitimacy on the ground."Īmira Jadoon, an assistant professor at the US Military Academy at West Point, agreed, telling Insider that ISIS-K "will seek to exploit the current "Spectacular attacks in Afghanistan and attempts to conduct such attacks in the West are highly likely in coming weeks and months," Cafarella added. The Taliban's victory "puts significant pressure on ISIS to demonstrate its continued relevance to global jihad, which will make ISIS more dangerous as it attempts to prove the organization's capability and relevance," Jennifer Cafarella, a national security fellow at the Institute for the Study of War, told Insider. Along these lines, ISIS-K has an interest in conducting attacks that would induce chaos, embarrass the Taliban, and make it harder for the militant group to tighten its grip over Afghanistan. The group's leaders denounced the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan, The New York Times reported. ISIS-K views the Taliban as apostates, and not devout enough in terms of its approach to Islam. The Taliban and ISIS-K are sworn enemies and have been fighting for years. Khorasan is the historic name for the region in Central Asia that includes parts of Afghanistan. ISIS-K - the Islamic State in Khorasan Province or ISIS-Khorasan - is the Islamic State's affiliate in Afghanistan. Earlier in the week, Biden said, "Every day we're on the ground is another day we know that ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both US and allied forces and innocent civilians." ISIS-K is the Taliban's sworn enemy