There were two deadly explosions in Kabul, Afghanistan Earlier Thursday, more than 70 people were killed — including at least 12 members of the US military — and more than 140 people were injured.
US officials accused the Islamic State of Afghanistan, also known as ISIS Khorasan or ISIS-K, for carrying out these attacks. The organization later claimed responsibility for the suicide bombing.
The attack took place outside the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, during a period of turmoil in Afghanistan.
Thousands of refugees and foreign nationals have fled the country in the past few weeks before the U.S. military is about to withdraw at the end of this month and the Taliban suddenly take over.
Kabul bombing: At least 72 people were killed, including U.S. military personnel, officials said
US officials have previously warned that the risk of an ISIS-K attack will increase-a risk that has now become a reality after Thursday’s bombing.
With the organization on the front lines, what exactly is this branch of the Islamic State in Afghanistan, and how dangerous is it?
What is ISIS-K and how was it formed?
Inspired by the extremist views of the Islamic State, the organization was formally established in 2015 after hundreds of Pakistani Taliban militants were pushed across the border of Afghanistan.
In the next few years, as the United States and the Taliban continued their peace talks, the organization began to expand in size. Sympathetic extremists and Afghan Taliban fighters who were dissatisfied with the Taliban’s increasingly gentle tone began to flood the ranks of ISIS-K.
Many of those who joined were dissatisfied that the Taliban were negotiating with the United States rather than opposing them militarily. The Taliban ruthlessly ruled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, and were then expelled by the US military to hunt down al-Qaeda.
Other followers of the organization include fighters from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Iran and the Turkistan Islamic Party in Xinjiang, China.
The official name of the organization-ISIS Khorosan-is taken from the province of Khorosan, which in the Middle Ages covered Afghanistan, Iran, and most of Asia.
Other names for this group include ISK and ISKP. It has been officially recognized by the leadership of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.
How dangerous is ISIS-K?
Although the Taliban limits themselves to Afghanistan, the Islamic State organization in that country has also joined the call for a global jihad against non-Muslims.
In the first few years of its establishment, ISIS-K attacked ethnic minorities, public areas, and government targets in major cities in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Since 2017, the organization has launched dozens of attacks on civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and has clashed hundreds of times with local Afghanistan, Pakistan, and US-led coalition forces.
Two terrorism experts-Amira Jadoon of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and Andrew Mines of George Washington University-told Reuters that by 2018, the organization had been listed as one of the four deadliest terrorist organizations in the world. It also cited the Global Terrorism Index of the Institute of Economic Research and Peace.
They said that although the US government did not launch an attack on US territory, the US government still believes that this is a long-term threat to the interests of the United States and its allies.
However, the organization suffered heavy casualties after years of fighting with U.S.-led troops, aircraft, and drones, and between 2019 and 2020, more than 1,400 fighters surrendered to the Afghan government. The organization was declared defeated by some people.
As for the main branch of the Islamic State, it took five years of continuous fighting between the local and coalition forces to dismantle the caliphate it had established in large areas of Syria and Iraq.
According to Jaden and Mins, the current withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan reduces the ability of the United States to detect and respond to the Islamic State on the ground.
At a briefing on Thursday afternoon, US President Joe Biden promised to hunt down the assailants responsible for the Kabul bombing and said he had asked Pentagon officials to develop a counterattack plan.
What is their relationship with the Taliban now?
Although both the Islamic State Khorasan and the Taliban are widely classified as terrorist organizations, including Canada as terrorist organizations, these organizations are enemies.
Taliban fighters launched a major offensive against the Islamic State organization in Afghanistan, and even some Taliban insurgents joined the Afghan government and coalition forces to eliminate ISIS-K from parts of the northeastern part of the country.
A U.S. Department of Defense official previously told the Associated Press that the Trump administration is seeking to reach a withdrawal agreement with the Taliban, hoping to join forces against the Islamic State group, which it believes is a real threat.
— WThe i-th file from Reuters and Associated Press
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