A few key paragraphs to give a sense of the essay. Go to the link to read the whole thing.
[MiddleEastEye] Ever since signing a peace deal with the US in Qatar
...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates. Home of nutbag holy manYusuf al-Qaradawi...in 2020, the Taliban
...Arabic for
students...
hoped for formal recognition. But not a single country has recognised them. In July last year, this mistrust reached new heights. The Taliban received their first major blow when al-Qaeda’s top leader, Egyptian Ayman al-Zawahiri
...Formerly second in command of al-Qaeda, now the head cheese, occasionally described as
the real brains of the outfit.Formerly the Mister Big of Egyptian Islamic Jihad. Bumped off Abdullah Azzam with a car boom in the course of one of their little disputes. Is thought to have composed bin Laden's fatwa entitled World Islamic Front Against Jews and Crusaders. Currently residing in the North Wazoo area assuming he's not dead like Mullah Omar. He lost major face when he ordered the nascent Islamic State to cease and desist and merge with the orthodox al-Qaeda spring, al-Nusra...
, a criminal mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, was killed in a US dronezap in Kabul’s high-security zone. He lived with top Taliban leaders as a "state guest"
[love toy?]
in a "safe house".
Zawahiri’s death raised many questions. Who gave on-the-ground intelligence for the US attack? Is Kabul safe anymore? Reportedly, even top Taliban leaders left the capital city for fear of more attacks.
Another side of the Taliban’s challenge is existential. Zawahiri’s death has confirmed the rumours that there are widening gaps in its ranks.
From the start, the militia was divided into two main groups: one led by its deputy prime minister, Abdul Ghani Baradar, called the Kandahari group, which is entrenched in Kandahar, Afghanistan’s second city, near Pakistain’s southern border; the other led by its hardline interior minister, Sirajuddin Haqqani
...son of Pashtun warlord Jalaluddin Haqqani, still titular head of the Haqqani Network...., with links to the Pakistain military.
The Haqqani group controls Kabul and the provinces leading to Pakistain’s northwestern border and beyond, a strategic advantage it availed during fighting against the US-led NATO
...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A cautionary tale of cost-benefit analysis....
forces.
This division seems dormant, but the mutual tensions from time to time weaken the Taliban's grip over the country. The barometer of this division is their rival krazed killer group, the Islamic State
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling
Allaharound with every other sentence, but to hear western pols talk they're not
reallyMoslems....
Khorasan (IS-K). The IS-K’s numbers doubled in 2022, spreading its operations to all of the country’s 34 provinces, targeting with precision the Taliban's interests, including attacks on Chinese, Russian and Pak missions in Kabul.
Without admitting the presence of the IS-K, the Taliban, however, understands that this challenge could not arise without defections in its own ranks. This rising threat can make the IS-K a site of convergence for anti-Taliban groups, including resistance in the country’s northern parts, and especially the Panjshir Valley.
Unleashing the current oppression against women, therefore, also reveals the Taliban leaders’ efforts to make their foot soldiers realise that their ideology of implementing their own