Today, Thursday, August 26, 2021, at least 13 people were killed and dozens of others were injured, in two explosions that rocked Kabul International Airport in Afghanistan, one of which targeted a camp for British forces at the airport, and media outlets confirmed that among the injured were American soldiers.

The bombing came a few hours after serious and reliable warnings reported by American media about officials, during which they confirmed the intention of the "Islamic State of Khorasan Province" to target the gates of Kabul Airport.

When did ISIS reach Afghanistan?

How are its cells formed?

What are his thoughts and beliefs?

What about his relationship with the Taliban?


“ISIS Khorasan Province” .. Origin

The Islamic State appeared for the first time in the Pakistani Waziristan region, following splits in the Taliban movement, after the killing of Hakimullah Mehsud, the emir of the Pakistani Taliban movement, in an attack by a US drone in November 2013.

At the time of Mehsud's succession, 3 strong names emerged, they are Mawlawi Fadlullah, the current leader of the Pakistani Taliban movement, Sayed Khan Jajna, and Hafez Saeed Khan Orakzai.

Hafiz Saeed Khan defected from the movement, and began to lead his armed group in the "Orakzai" area away from the general body of the Pakistani Taliban movement, along with some other groups that split from the Taliban, or did not find a place for themselves within the movement.

Mid-January 2015: The emirs of several armed groups from Pakistani tribal areas and from inside Afghanistan gathered in an area in Pakistan on the border strip between the two countries, and they pledged allegiance to Hafez Saeed Khan Orakzai as their emir.

ISIS controls parts of Tora Bora in Afghanistan (Al-Jazeera)

Emir of the organization.. Hafez Saeed Khan Orakzai

Prince Hafez Saeed Khan Orakzai offered the pledge of allegiance to "Ibrahim Awwad Ibrahim Ali Al-Badri Al-Samarrai" and his fame was "Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi", the former leader of the Islamic State in the Levant and Iraq, then the princes collectively pledged allegiance to Al-Baghdadi and published the facts of this pledge.

Shortly after, ISIS announced the establishment of the Khorasan Province, and its incorporation into its state in a video in which the organization’s spokesman, Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, spoke, saying, “The mujahideen were given good news of the extension of the Islamic State to Khorasan. So they announced their pledge of allegiance to the Commander of the Faithful, may God protect him, Caliph Ibrahim (Al-Baghdadi), and he accepted it.

The areas that ISIS calls “Khorasan Province” include Afghanistan and part of Pakistan, as well as Iran, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan.

The Islamic State appointed Hafez Saeed Khan as the governor of the province of Khorasan, and appointed "Abu Talha Abdul Raouf Khadem" as its deputy.

Saeed Khan justified his split from the Taliban and his pledge of allegiance to ISIS in an audio message to him by saying, “It is permissible for these organizations to work in the absence of the caliphate entity with the aim of creating it, but with the establishment of the caliphate, everyone must pledge allegiance to al-Baghdadi, the caliph of the Muslims, and whoever dies without an allegiance dies a death of ignorance, and it is not permissible yet Today, these jihadist organizations continue to exist in the region, and they must pay allegiance to the Khurasan Province.”

July 2015: Saeed Khan was bombed by a drone and the news of his death was published, but he survived that attempt.

Groups of militants in Afghanistan joined the "Khorasan Province", to achieve the presence of ISIS in the region.

"Mother of All Bombs" kills 36 ISIS militants in Afghanistan (Al-Jazeera)

"Salafi jihadism"...and "the rumor of monotheism"

- The Islamic State in Afghanistan and Pakistan did not include new members in its ranks, but most of those who joined it are followers of the Afghan Taliban and Pakistani Taliban movements, especially followers of the "Salafist Jihadism" school and the "Propagation of Unity" group, which is still active in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in Pakistan.

- The announcement of the departure of Mullah Omar on July 29, 2015, represented a great opportunity for the Islamic State to attract more Taliban elements. Those who had a pledge of allegiance to Mullah Omar on his neck ceased to exist after his death, which allowed those who wished from the Taliban to pledge allegiance to the organization and join the state of Khorasan .

Among the most prominent names that announced their joining the Islamic State in Afghanistan and Pakistan are Sheikh Aminullah Al Peshawari and Sheikh Abdul Rahim Muslim Dost - one of the famous Salafi sheikhs in Nangarhar Province - who was one of the first to pledge allegiance to the caliph of ISIS, and the general Salafis were among the most welcoming of the people in eastern Afghanistan Especially in Nangarhar Province.

- It seems that the adherence of followers of these two schools to the Islamic State is due to their tendency to be radical in many issues. They share the Salafist approach with ISIS, and although they were members of the Taliban movement in Afghanistan and Pakistan, they felt that they were not welcome within the Taliban who It bears a special character within the Hanafi school of thought, and its members belong to a special school of thought known as Deobandi.

It also seems that the policy of the State Organization to destroy many ancient domes, shrines and mosques in Iraq and the Levant in the name of fighting heresies and polytheism has attracted followers of these two schools and brought them closer to it.

Abdul Rahim Muslim Dost, the organization’s mufti, says that he was striving for “global infidelity” alongside the Taliban movement, and he did not have any official position in it.

Deputy Emir.. Mullah Abdul Raouf Khadim

One of the organization’s leaders is Mullah Abdul Raouf Khadim Abu Talha. His hometown is the village of “Azan” in the “Kajki” district of Helmand province, and he belongs to the Pashtun Alizai tribe.

Khadem participated in the "jihad" in the eighties of the last century, and joined the Taliban movement after its emergence in the early nineties.

He was leading the "Herat" Corps with the Taliban, and was considered one of the close associates of the movement's leader, Mullah Muhammad Omar, and had good relations with the Arab fighters who were in Herat, including Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

The Americans arrested him in 2001 after the fall of the Taliban Emirate, and he spent 6 years in Bagram prison and Guantanamo Bay. When he was released in 2007, he joined the Taliban again and took important and leadership positions there, until a dispute arose between him and the movement’s leadership “for marginalizing him.” .

According to Afghan intelligence, Khadim was able in late 2014 to travel to Iraq, where he was appointed by ISIS as deputy governor of Khorasan, and when he returned to Afghanistan, to Helmand, he tried to gather around him the Salafis in the “Bakwa” district of Farah province, along with Taliban field commanders In Helmand and its neighboring states, however, he was attacked by a drone and was killed on February 11, 2015.

The most prominent leaders of the organization

Abu Omar Sheikh Maqbool, known as “Shahid Allah Shahid”: One of the most important figures in the Pakistani Taliban movement from the Orakzai tribal region of the Mamun Zai tribe, he was appointed as the official spokesman for the Taliban movement in 2013 for his mastery of different languages, including Arabic, he was a Salafi and one of the first to resign from The Taliban movement pledged allegiance to ISIS in Pakistan in November 2014, but he was killed on July 9, 2015 in a drone attack in Nangarhar Province.

Sheikh Abd al-Rahim Muslim Dost: He is Abd al-Rahim ibn Abd al-Mannan, whose birthplace is the Kot district of Nangarhar province, Afghanistan. He is one of the well-known Salafi writers since the eighties of the last century. He studied in religious schools in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and traveled to Saudi Arabia, where he met the Juhayman group. And the Saudi authorities arrested him because of this, but he managed to escape from the "Turabat Al-Baqoom" prison, according to his account.

- In 2001, Dost was arrested by the Pakistani intelligence and handed over to the Americans. He was imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay with his brother "Badr al-Zaman" for a while, and after his release he was arrested again by the Pakistani intelligence, and he remained in detention for 3 years until he was released in a prisoner exchange between the Taliban movement And the Pakistani government, and from that day on, while he was traveling in the Pakistani tribal areas and the Afghan border areas, and he was considered one of the ideologists of Al-Qaeda in the region before he pledged allegiance to ISIS.

There are other personalities who are not very famous, and only their names or the groups they lead are known, but they formed the first nucleus of the Islamic State in the region, such as Sheikh Jal Zaman Al-Fateh, the emir of his group in the Khyber region of Pakistan (killed), and Sheikh Omar Mansour, the emir of the Red Mosque group (Lal). Mosque) in Islamabad, Saad Al Emirati, Emir of the Saad bin Abi Waqqas Group in Logar Province, Afghanistan, and Obaidullah Al Peshawari, Emir of the Tawhid and Jihad Group in Peshawar, Pakistan.

Among them are also Sheikh Abdul Qaher Al-Khorasani, the Emir of the Heroes of Islam group, Sheikh Mohsen, the Emir of a group in Kunar Province in Afghanistan, Talha, the Emir of a group in the “Marut” region near the Waziristan region in Pakistan, and Hafez Dawlat, the Emir of an armed group in the “Karam” tribal region in Pakistan , Khalid Mansoor Amir of an armed group in the "Henko" region in Pakistan, and Sheikh Mufti Hassan Amir of an armed group in Peshawar, Pakistan.

"The scandal of the Levant and breaking the idols" .. the thought of the organization

The Islamic State considers the existing governments in the region to be “apostate governments and agents of the Crusaders,” according to what was declared by the “Wali of Khorasan” Hafez Saeed Khan. - Those who commit “major polytheism,” especially that their organizations “refer to the Taghut instead of referring to God.”

The theorists of the Islamic State spoke about what they called "the delusions of the Taliban" in detail in a lengthy article written under the name "Abu Maysara al-Shami" and under the title "The scandal of the Levant and breaking the idols."

The article stated: “And most of their princes have relations with the apostate spy sects in Pakistan (“ISI”), and many of their soldiers are on a major shirk that takes them out of the religion by praying for the dead, seeking intercession for them, vowing to them, slaughtering for them and prostrating to their graves, and many of their sects are now governed by customs. Tribalism without legal rulings in areas where they claim empowerment, then their religion is the “mullah” of every mullah (i.e. not Mullah Omar in particular).

He mentioned that the dispute between them and the Taliban is in the origins, and at the end of the article he threatened the Taliban movement to fight, and that there is no conflict between fighting the Crusaders and fighting the Taliban, and that ISIS will fight the two groups as it fought them in Iraq and the Levant.

Severe clashes erupted between ISIS and the Taliban in several districts of Nangarhar province, such as Mamand, Achin, Spin Ghar, Kot, Petti Kot, Rodat, Haska Minh and Khokyani. And "Shirzad", "Chaparhar", "Pechiru Agam" and others, which led to the death of many parties.

In the areas they control, ISIS members focus on several matters, including:

Fighting the Taliban, whom they accuse of working for the Pakistani intelligence, and apostasy, as stated by Hafiz Saeed Khan.

Demolition of domes and shrines under the pretext of fighting polytheism and heresy, which is what they used to do in the areas they controlled.

Slaughtering and killing people on charges of espionage, apostasy, loyalty to the infidels and others, and they published many pictures of slaughtering people under the pretext that they are spies. Sheikh Abdul Rahim Muslim Dost defended the slaughter and beheading, saying, "The aerial bombardment is more brutal than beheading, and they do not cut off the heads of non-criminals."

On the other hand, the Taliban movement accuses ISIS of working for the Jews, and requested in a lengthy letter signed by Mullah Akhtar Muhammad Mansour from Al-Baghdadi, that his group leave the arena and not cause sedition by establishing a branch for them in the region, otherwise the Taliban will be forced to stand in his way, to ward off sedition and to scatter and divide the ranks and in defense on its gains over the past years.

Life returns to Kunar state in Afghanistan after the expulsion of ISIS militants (Al-Jazeera)

spheres of influence

- ISIS tried to find a foothold in the south and southwest of Afghanistan - such as the Wilayat of Helmand and the Wilayat of Farah - and sent one of its most important leaders, Mullah Abdul Raouf Khadim, but he was killed two weeks after entering Afghanistan, and the organization was unable to establish its feet in that area despite It has several groups.

Some of his armed groups - accompanied by fighters who joined him from Central Asian countries - have also arrived in northern Afghanistan, but they do not control these areas tightly, which could pose a threat to the Taliban movement.

As for the areas that are considered among his areas of influence and in which he controls large areas, they are the Pakistani tribal areas, Nangarhar Province, and some areas of Kunar Province. The areas most exposed to the spread of ISIS ideology.