Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
Hello, dear listeners, or should I say dear subscribers? Thomas Small here for another episode for our conflicted community. Eamon, you're here with me too. Eamon, spring has sprung and the conflicted community is now live on Discord. How are you feeling about it? Oh, amazing. It is so good to interact with such serious
listeners, that they are willing to part away with some of their hard-earned cash, just like I mean to listen to both of us, you know, ranting and rambling and arguing like married couple. Not just dear listeners, dearest listeners. Indeed. I think. Okay.
We're back with our second episode for our conflicted community. This is the final episode going out on our normal conflicted feed. So for anyone not already signed up, you can find out exactly how to do it on the link in our show notes. That will give you access to our conflicted community on Discord and the new podcast feed.
Now, today, Conflicted is returning to our bread and butter, away from the war in Israel and Gaza, and to a place we've visited plenty of times before: Afghanistan.
Because in the wake of the horrific terrorist attacks in Moscow on the 22nd of March, we wanted to discuss how Afghanistan under Taliban rule has once again become the world's main hotbed for jihadist terrorism. Let's jump right in. Eamon, in the first episode of the last season of Conflicted, I asked you a question, quite a big question actually.
Where have all the terrorists gone? When we recorded that episode last June 2023, the Muslim world looked a very different place, didn't it, before the outbreak of war in Gaza. How do you see the state of play in Islamist or jihadist terrorism today in 2024, let's say regionally, geopolitically?
outside of just the prism of Hamas and Gaza. - If you remember, Thomas, in that episode, I talked about my lecture for the European Union end of 2022, where I talked about terrorism as cyclical. - When you were addressing the notorious Finnish diplomat. - A Finnish minister, actually. And I think he's finished anyway.
Oh man, first dad joke of the Discord community. So what happened is because of the cyclical nature of terrorism that they need a gravitational pull of a full moon. And at that time there was no full moon. That's it. I mean, it's gone. The full moon was Syria and it's gone.
But of course, I said the problem with conflicts in the Middle East is that they keep happening in different spaces and different places all the time. And therefore, the next moon is going to happen. And then we started having the next moon, which is for now, I know we don't want to talk about it too much, but for now it's Gaza, which is
galvanizing a lot of the feelings of anti-Western, anti-Russian, anti-establishment governments in the Middle East, anti-everything, because there are so many different schools of thought when it comes to what to do about Gaza. Now, the problem here is that because people are deceived by the cycles, they think that it's gone, therefore it's no longer there.
Do you remember what I said in that episode in answer to your question, Thomas, when you asked, where did they go? And I said, they are hibernating. Yeah, they're hibernating. Well, they're not hibernating anymore, are they? Yeah, they are waking up from their hibernation. And what is the better place to wake up from hibernation than the land of the bears?
Russia. Yeah, it's true. One thing from that episode is amazing. We did talk about how there was a growing anti-Russian dimension to the renewed jihadism coming from Central Asia and Afghanistan, especially ISIS Khorasan. And we're going to talk about that in a second because of those terrible attacks that happened last month in Moscow.
But going back to that episode, we didn't talk about Afghanistan very much in that episode as a particular hotspot. You emphasized Pakistan a lot. You said that's really going to be a big incubator of terror. And obviously, wherever Afghanistan goes, Pakistan is either following or leading. So it's not like you can disconnect the two. But we didn't focus that much on the Taliban and the problem of terrorism within Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. Why was that?
I think because it was taken for granted that Afghanistan is a hotbed of terrorism regardless, because the Taliban, you know, harbored for many years prior to 9-11, many groups such as Al-Qaeda, the GSBC, the Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, you know, the Islamic movement of Uzbekistan, you know, the Islamic movement of Tajikistan. They were harboring so many of these different groups, including the Uyghurs of China.
of course, after 9/11, they continued to harbor them. And now that they have won the war with the help of all of these jihadists, they are harboring them too. And this is, I think, where the Taliban
are now having a problem. Two problems. One, they are having problems with their own enemies domestically, and they are having a problem with their own friends domestically. Well, let's just put a pin in that. We're going to come back to talk about the Taliban in the second half. We're going to analyze what life is like now in Afghanistan under Taliban rule and how the Taliban are or are not living up to their side of the Doha Accords.
Before we go there, we want to talk about what happened in Moscow. So on the 22nd of March, at least 144 people were killed. That's a lot of people for a terrorist attack.
and over 500 wounded when gunmen stormed the Crocus City Hall, where a concert was going on in the outskirts of Moscow. They opened fire randomly to the civilians present, then set the venue on actual fire in Russia's worst terrorist attack in years.
They were wearing combat fatigues, so it was clearly a militarized, or at least it was taking advantage of a kind of militarized style of attack. And they detonated explosives across the venue. A tremendous attack.
I mean, a real sign of a resurgence in jihadism, Ayman. Is this a good barometer, do you think, of things to come? What I worried about, Thomas, is the fact that I don't believe that this is just only a resurgence of terrorism, but what I fear also is a manipulation of terrorism.
What do I mean by that is the fact that why Russia? And why now? And what was the immediate provocation that led the Islamic State or ISIS? Because I have no doubt that it was an ISIS cell, an ISIS cell that was based out of Turkey. Ah, based out of Turkey. That's interesting. A month prior, I was reading a report within the intelligence community that, you know, I shared with some of my colleagues that
We read a report that says that some of ISIS cells there in Turkey are actually offering their services to whoever pays. In other words, we started to have mercenary terrorism. It's so easy that any group of Ukrainian businessmen
Any group of, let's say, anti-Russian business people or organization would come and just buy the loyalty of this group, say, okay, this is a million dollars, give me something amazing in the heart of Moscow.
And they will say, you got it. Amen. Let me just stop you right there then, because are you saying that there might be some credibility to what Vladimir Putin has been saying following these attacks, that they were carried out in cahoots with the Ukrainians? I assumed that that was just classic Putin-ish bullshit. Are you saying there might be some truth to those claims? Yes.
Some, some truth, but not entirely. Why? Because it could be, you know, and this is what I believe is the case, it could be a rogue element from within the Ukrainian society or even non-Ukrainian third actors, whether state or non-state actors, who really want to see Russia punished completely.
for whatever happening in order to ignite the war further or for whatever reason. I mean, they really wanted something out of this. The problem is in recent months, I started to see within the intelligence community and the information that I've been seeking and looking into and investigations that I've been conducting,
that not only there are sales that are offering their services because they are staffed for cash and they want the cash, they're offering the services whoever pays, as long as the target is palatable as far as they are concerned. What worries me is the fact that there are
You know, buyers of these services who would use such actions in order to profit from either short positions on the stock market or in order to bet on commodity prices. There are plenty of really bad actors out there.
trying to profit from this. Oh, my God. And this is what I always feared that terrorism would end up. You start noble, you start on the path of good intentions. But as always, with people like ISIS, you will end up with mercenaries for hire. So now terrorists for hire is what we have right now. And the fact of the matter is that I read this a month before the attack.
- Mercenary terrorism, my God. - Yeah, so when the attack happened and they said we were promised half a million rubles for each one of us, I was thinking, okay, because there was something missing from that attack. The motive of part of them wasn't there. - Hmm.
Mercenary terrorism. What a new specter haunting the world. It sounds like something like so many things, actually. Something out of sort of Star Wars, like these havens of scum and villainy and weird cahoots with corrupt financiers in the imperial center dealing with corrupt governments that are not playing along with the central power.
We're really entering into a very new post-unipolar world that's emerging. It's not exactly stable and secure and just, is it? Exactly. And this is why I keep saying to many people like that, we are entering into a phase where
of murky behind-the-scenes scheming and planning that is done even by rogue third-party actors who could be a group of business people, who could be a group of people who would profit from any particular instability. It could be a third-party state who just want to profit from a greater amount of
problem between Russia and Ukraine. It could be, I'm just giving you a very far-fetched scenario, it could be Kim Jong-un, our favorite teddy bear, you know, who just wanted to... Sow some chaos. Yeah, who wanted the war to continue going because who is buying his munitions? Who is buying his weapons? Putin. And so it is the best time of North Korea's existence right now. Oh my God. Let's do some history now.
So this terrorist attack in Moscow was carried out by gunmen affiliated with ISIS Khorasan or ISIS-K or ISK, we're going to call it, ISK.
which began operations in Afghanistan and Pakistan in 2015. So, you know, this is back when America was certainly still there in Afghanistan in a big way. The Taliban had been resurgent to some extent fighting the Americans, but some jihadist groups or jihadist sympathizers felt that the Taliban were not hardline enough.
And so ISIS-Khorasan, ISK, arose. Now this group, surprise, surprise, wants to create a caliphate, specifically in Khorasan, which is the Persian word for quite an old sort of even pre-medieval zone of the Persian world extending across parts even of the Indian subcontinent, far up into Central Asia.
Eamon, what is the resonance of the place named Khorasan in the imaginations of Muslims? It's extremely resonant. It's linked to the apocalyptic hadith of the black banners. Khorasan is where salvation, militant salvation, often comes from or originates in the fantasies of Islamists, isn't it?
Yeah, unfortunately, alas, in the failed book I wrote in 2009 until 2013, which was called Al-Qaeda and the Power of Prophecy, I talk about Khorasan a lot. And all the hadith texts that are referring to Khorasan as the land from which the salvation of the Muslim nation will come from, of course, bin Laden relied on it, the Taliban relied on it, and now ISIS is relying on it.
It is the prophecies of the black banners, armies hosting the black banners of Khorasan, rooting injustice, establishing justice, and
and expelling all the foreign evil from the Middle East and beyond. So that is the prophecy. It's such a shame because, as you know, Ayman, these prophecies or so-called prophecies of the black banners from Khorasan are nothing else but propaganda from the Abbasid revolution of the 8th century and early 9th centuries. Total fabrication. So they were fabricated.
by the Abbasid dynasty, which came from, to some extent, Khorasan, surprise, surprise. And in order to justify their overthrowing of the Umayyad Caliphate, they cooked up these prophecies saying that Muhammad himself had foreseen that from Khorasan, men with black banners would take over the world. How incredibly convenient if you're an Abbasid prince. Exactly. I mean, at the end of
the day, this is where a lot of the fabrications of Islamic mythology originated from. The Abbasid revolution, the black flags, the victorious vanguard, the Mahdi, even the Mahdi idea was fabricated during that time and seeped into the imagination of both Shia and Sunnis.
So dearest listeners can go back to last season and to our episode on Ahmed ibn Hanbal if you want more context for the Abbasid revolution and the shadow it cast across Islamic history, really, beginning right at the start of the revolution. It caused tensions.
And really was a seminal moment in the formation of, let's call it classical or orthodox Islam, which to this day resonates in groups like ISIS, Khorasan. Ironically, the attackers, almost all of them came from the former Soviet Union Republic of Tajikistan.
And Tajikistan, which borders Afghanistan, is considered to be part of Khorasan as far as Al-Qaeda, ISIS, Taliban, and all of these groups were concerned.
And there is a long history of jihadism and jihadist tradition in Tajikistan. In fact, if you look at where ISIS in Afghanistan, which is ISKP, which is ISIS Khorasan province, where they are based, they are based in the Kunar province and Nuristan province. Now, north of these two provinces is Badakhshan.
which is connected to Tajikistan. It's basically on the border with Tajikistan. And this is where the ease through which Tajik fighters can cross the border between Tajikistan and Afghanistan, which is a very rapid river, by the way. And they go for training. Most of this training is happening not far away from Badakhshan's capital, which is Fayzabad.
And then they go back to Tajikistan. And from there, they seep into Russia, pretending to be economic migrants from the former Soviet republics. And that's how the infiltration of Russian society was easy and inevitable. Fascinating. Well, ISKP has been responsible for dozens of attacks.
since the fall of Kabul to the Taliban at the beginning of the Biden administration. We did a whole episode on the fall of Kabul on your analysis, Eamon, of the Biden administration's big mistakes in the way in which American forces were taken out of Afghanistan. Go back and listen to it, dearest listener, if you need a refresher.
So some of these attacks carried out by ISKP since the fall of Kabul include a suicide bombing at the city's airport very early on during that same withdrawal period, killed at least 175 people, including 13 U.S. troops, a fact which was kept from us at the time. The Biden administration did not want people to know that as many as 13 U.S. troops were killed.
It has also gone on to target Afghanistan's Shia minority. The classic Sunni-Shia rivalry is playing itself out there in Afghanistan. They've attacked Taliban officials because ISKP are against the Taliban still. And in 2022, they attacked the Russian embassy in Kabul. So the Moscow attacks was just the latest in an increasing salvo against
Russian positions, interestingly. Now, Eamon, a year ago,
In June, the UN released a report saying that ISK had between 4,000 and 6,000 fighters in Afghanistan. They said that there were camps for ISKP in at least 13 Afghan provinces, that there were sleeper cells across the country, including, of course, in Kabul, the capital. Now, at the time, US intelligence criticized the UN report, saying that the UN had vastly overestimated the size of ISKP. What
What do you think, Ayman? Should the world have listened to the UN? Was the UN right about the threat? Look, I read that report and, you know, when I saw the US criticizing the report for saying it's vastly overstating the numbers, I knew that there is something right about that report.
And for a good reason, because... Wow. Yeah, and for a good reason. So your trust levels in the U.S. intelligence community is very high, I see. No, no, no. It's not about the... The U.S. intelligence know the truth. It's the problem is the fact that
The Biden administration is just so sensitive when it comes to Afghanistan. They don't want anyone to label Afghanistan a strategy as a mistake, as the exit, the exit like in the US executed at the time as a strategic mistake. So if you say that ISIS in Afghanistan, the ISKP,
has expanded so much that they become now a new terror threat. It's like, oh, here we go again. Please, UN, just shut up. We don't want to listen or hear about anything. This is exactly what I experienced myself in 2010 when I was warning people
that ISIS, or ISI at that time, the Islamic State of Iraq, was hibernating and they are preparing for a big comeback. Well, two and a half years later, they came back with a big bang. And that time they said, oh, if only we could have foreseen. Of course, the criticism from the U.S. administration to this particular report from the U.N.,
And especially it's the UN Taliban and terrorism monitor, which is a very professional one. And I know some of the people working in that committee, they are really good intelligence operatives. They produced a good report. And guess what? It was rubbished immediately by the Biden administration because why? It doesn't align with the policy. No, no, no, no, no. We left Afghanistan in good hands to some extent. We left it intact. Thank you so much. Yeah.
technocratic and political ostriches with their heads in the sand. So often it happens that way. But eventually, even the ostriches have to look up once in a while. ISIS in Afghanistan, ISKP has spread out beyond Afghanistan. Earlier this year, in Iran, there was that really terrible bombing
that killed almost 100 people on the 3rd of January at a ceremony celebrating the four-year anniversary, commemorating, I should say, the four-year anniversary of the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, about whom we did a whole episode once. Two bombs went off, 94 people died, 284 injured, a huge terrorist attack, the second largest in Iranian history, if I'm not mistaken. Indeed. And then later that month, on the 28th of January, there was an attack on
on a church in Turkey, Catholic church during Sunday mass. Two masked men stormed into the church. One person was killed. So ISKP are on the move because now Moscow. Four suspects have appeared in court in Moscow already charged with carrying out the attack. As you said, Eamon, they're all citizens of Tajikistan.
It was kind of bracing to see images of the suspects because clearly they had been roughed up by the Russian security forces. There was no attempt whatsoever to hide that fact. It's sort of funny given all of the slack that America receives from the way it handles terrorist suspects, certainly back in the glory days of the counterterrorism campaigns after 9-11. Indeed. To see Putin's regime just openly parade the fact that they torment, beat up, torture. They don't even care.
It does show you that there is an essential difference between Western norms and non-Western norms, isn't it? Well, I mean, at the end of the day, the emotions were just so raw because, again, we come back to the optics. Because if that terror attack was done without any optics, the impact on the people would have been less. But because of the optics...
as we talked about it in the last episode regarding Gaza and the 7th of October, the optics really shook the Russian people to the core, seeing their compatriots being hunted down. I want to ask you about that because, you know, ISKP released footage of the attack. And I wonder, do you think that they did that, inspired by Hamas releasing its footage on the 7th of October? Is this
a new turning point in jihadist terrorism where we're always going to see extremely explicit videos of terrorist attacks as they're carried out? Yes, because how do you, in a really crude, macabre way, you know, and really, really crude way,
how do you excite your base? How do you tell your base? Yes, it was me and I did it. This is the proof. This is the proof, not the proof of life, but the proof of death that it's me who carried out this attack. And this is why the attack had a massive impact on the collective Russian psyche. That's why when they were apprehended, oh my God, like, you know, I mean, you know, the,
Russian security forces spared them no punches and even like someone was, you know, had his ear cut off and was forced to eat it. My Lord. Amen. Yes. What a world. What a world you inhabit, honestly. Russians, man. So all I can tell you is the fact that they delivered, you know, a swift justice before the justice that they will administer on these people. Most likely these people will face a shooting squad. But
I would say that when I saw that they were all Tajiks, I more or less opted for the analysis at the time by Aaron Zillin, who's one of the most brilliant, I would say, analysts when it comes to ISIS, since he collected hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of ISIS attacks, analyzing them and understanding them. So I definitely recommend following his Twitter feeds. He's really excellent when it comes to understanding ISIS phenomenon. So he
He immediately pivoted towards the fact that it was genuinely ISIS because of the fact that they already declared their responsibility and they actually received video clips filmed by the attackers themselves, you know, and sending in real time to their cell leader. Now, since it was run out of Turkey, and this is when a month ago I saw that report which says that they are offering their services to whoever willing to pay, they will say, look, guys, you know, we have a list of enemies here.
If this list of enemies align with your own list, for example, if you hate the Americans, tell us, finance our operation, we will do it. If you hate the Russians, do it. If you hate the Iranians, do it. So they were offering their services. And this is how we see here the motive of martyrdom have disappeared a little bit and that these people were running away, ironically, in the direction of Ukraine, in
in order to receive their payment. Not because they were in cahoots with the Ukrainian authorities, but because whoever promised them payment was somehow within Ukrainian territory. Well, from martyrs to mercenaries, it's the new phase of Islamist terror. Now, Eamon, I want to talk about the leader of ISKP,
In that episode last season, Where Have All the Terrorists Gone?, you talked about ISIS's caliph of the week because there were so many. And at that time, you said the current caliph, the present caliph at that time, was Abul Hussein al-Hassani al-Qureshi, whom no one knew much about, although you thought he was probably from Tajikistan.
Is this the leader that has been reported in the press widely now, Sanaullah Ghaffari? Is he that Abul Hussein al-Hassani al-Qurayshi you were talking about? Because if so, maybe the caliph of the week phenomenon is over because he survived at least 15 months. Oh,
So, yeah, so far he survived 15 months and most likely he is the one because why? There is a belief among some analysts that this young guy, this 29 year old only. Yeah, 29 years old. And you see, you see his his photograph. I mean, he he's not a good looking guy. I mean, he must see looks really dumb. It's so you see these these jihadists that they just look like.
submental brutes, really? How do they achieve so much? I don't understand. Exactly. So this guy who happened to be like an Amin Tajik himself, I think...
This guy just happened to be conveniently claiming descent from the Prophet Muhammad and that he is a Hashemite. So there is a possibility that he is the caliph. And the other minor possibility is because every time they appointed the caliph somewhere in Iraq or Syria, they get killed quite swiftly because of the fact that Iraq and Syria now is
really, you know, an open book to the anti-Daesh coalition. While in Afghanistan, there is a high level degree of protection. It's a double layer protection. The first protection is the fact that it is a huge country with the absence of any coalition forces. And the second that the Taliban, generally speaking, don't allow any foreign operatives from outside to operate. That will make it difficult for the Americans to hunt him down.
And his name is Istana'ullah Ghaffari, which means God's praise. And I'm thinking, oh my God, what's so praising about this dumb idiot? Well, he was reported to have been killed last year in June. So he's been on people's radar for a while, but clearly he was not killed. He managed to escape.
probably into Pakistan, into that frontier AfPak world where a lot of jihadists have always been able to be undercover. And now they think that he's living in Balochistan, Balochistan, which is one zone of the Middle East, Eamon, or the subcontinent at least, that you did point out in that episode last season as a possible incubator for terrorism.
So Afghanistan, Pakistan, Balochistan area is back on everyone's radar. We'll take a break here. And when we come back, we'll talk about the role that Afghanistan has been playing in fostering ISIS KP and these Tajik terrorists and in general, the renewal of Islamist terrorism and the threat that it holds to the world. We'll be back.
Welcome back, dear listeners, to this, our second episode for our conflicted community. For those not signed up, do so now through the link in our show notes to keep listening to these episodes coming out every two weeks. Eamon, let's talk about Afghanistan over the past two years.
We last spoke about Afghanistan at the start of season three of Conflicted in January 2022. You said then, Eamon, the future of Afghanistan rests on a game of political poker and the Taliban is the dealer.
How have the Taliban played their cards over the last two years? Well, they've been playing them quite well, but not as well as one might expect, because I think they are playing with so many players and they are trying to police a casino with so many customers. I think it's just the popularity of Afghanistan as a casino has become too much for them to handle. You see, dear listener will know that I do have a day job.
I mean, actually, you know, I always joke with my wife, like, you know, it's a day and night and weekend and, you know, dawn and midnight job. Oh, oh, Amen. Terrorism never sleeps, buddy. Terrorism never sleeps. And so neither does Amen Dean. Indeed. The problem is my day job doesn't only include terrorism, but also include terrorism finance, include also, unfortunately, narcotics and human trafficking and trafficking in
And so this is why, you know, I have... Oh, my God. I have to do a lot of projects that are related to Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, Syria, Iraq, Somalia, Somaliland, Senegal, Mali, the Wagner Group in Sudan, you know, Burkina Faso, you name it. So what happened is...
One of the things that I've been observing a lot from Afghanistan over the past, I would say, 18 months is how quickly the number of safe houses for multiple number of terrorist organizations and other unsavory organizations are actually popping up.
all over the place. So, for example, you start to see the IMU, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, having several farms just southwest of Kandahar, you know, where identified as a place for them. And then you start to see
certain money laundering operations taking place in Jalalabad and Nangarhar in Kabul, and the money exchange operations between Afghanistan, Turkey, between Afghanistan, Pakistan, between Afghanistan, Tajikistan, between Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, and even Kazakh and Russians are using Kabul as a money laundering place, with tentacles extending all the way to places which is really exotic, like
Vietnam and Cambodia. And with it comes narcotics, with it comes a lot of the human trafficking, human trafficking from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, even human trafficking, you know, young Ukrainian people and young Russian people and young Kazakh people and young Chinese people. It's like when you look at all of this,
You see that Afghanistan is back to being the black hole of the world economy again. I was going to say, it really gives one a sense of deja vu. I mean, we're both in our mid-40s now, Eamon. Actually, no, Thomas, it's not deja vu. It is deja poo because we have seen this shit before. Oh, no. The second dad joke of the episode.
But yeah, I mean, we're in our mid-40s, Eamon. So like seeing these reports now about Afghanistan, I think, what is this, 1997 again? I mean, are we just back exactly where we were 30 years ago? Except in a way, though, it's not. It's even worse. Back then, when the Taliban were first on the scene ruling Afghanistan, they actually governed the country more or less differently.
I mean, there was less narcotics. There was less of this sort of human trafficking. But now they're actually weaker than they were before. And the whole country seems to be like one big, you know, forgive another Star Wars reference, one big Mos Eisley, one big Tatooine. Yes. Yes.
You know, the video calls I have with my sources there on the ground, and one of them work in the money exchange in a world there, you know, he would show me, you know, stacks upon stacks of dollars, euros, pounds, Japanese yen, Swiss francs, Canadian dollars, as well as, you know, Pakistani rupees, Iranian currency, Turkish lira, you know, all over the place. And he says that,
You know, Eamon, you know, you're missing on so much. You should come here. You will be millionaire within two months. Oh, I definitely, Eamon, I'm fully expecting, just so you know, for your life story to take yet another unexpected turn and you just become like the head, the head of the global mafia terrorist network. And maybe for all I know, you already are, buddy. I don't know. Don't give the game away, Thomas.
Or I will not give you your cut. I'm still waiting for my Bentley, you know. But, you know, the weird thing, though, Eamon, about Afghanistan is, so, you know, this is all true. It's the armpit of the world once again. And yet, at the same time, like our producer, Harry, who's, you know, of course, listening to this. Hi, Harry. He knows someone who's planning to go on vacation to Afghanistan soon as a tourist.
So it's like, what the hell is going on? You do see reports on the news and even that notorious report from a Tory MP who said that life's never been better in Afghanistan than it is now. The Taliban are doing a great job. Now, the MP was forced...
to step down from his chairmanship of a committee in the parliament for saying such an idiotic thing. And yet clearly Afghanistan is a place that people can like visit, which was not the case so much in the late 90s. What the hell is going on? There is so much money. It's just, you know, what my sources are telling me
So much money. You have no idea the amount of nice, beautiful Toyota cars and Lexus and Nissan Petrols and Infinities and Mercedes. And people have building like in a big mansions. You know, you can find all the brands, you know, available there. iPhones, you know, Samsung phones. Huawei is actually making a killing there.
in Afghanistan, not literally, of course. And so all I'm saying is that there is a tremendous amount of money because it is now a black economy. It is the capital of the money industry.
laundering in a nexus in Asia. You want gold? Go there. You want dollars? You go there. You want weapons? You go there. You want narcotics? You go there. I'm glad you mentioned gold. I want to ask you a question about that in a second. But first, you know,
The Taliban, they're running the country, for goodness sake. Have they fundamentally changed? Are they, let us say, more easy with sin than they were back in the 90s? Are they okay with this kind of consumerism, rampant open consumerism, rich people flaunting their wares on the streets of Kabul than they were then? Have they fundamentally changed?
They don't mind wealth, they just mind flesh. In other words, basically, as long as the girls are covered, that's it. You know, they have now established Sharia on earth. And just now, just now, the Taliban leader, Haybatullah Khunzada, he issued the proclamation that the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan is going to reinstitute the stoning of women.
Because it is in compliance with Sharia, you know, which I know, and you know, my opinion, Thomas, on this very much, basically, that I am completely and utterly opposed to stoning because it is not and never was mentioned in the Quran as a punishment. In fact, it's contravened the Quran. So it sounds maybe then that the Taliban haven't changed at all.
Now, when they came back to power, they did so on the back of the Doha Accords, an agreement negotiated in Qatar between the Taliban and the United States overseeing how the transition back to Taliban rule was going to be carried out. Now, those accords, the Doha Accords, imposed strict counterterrorism commitments on the Taliban.
It seems like they are not living up to those commitments. Well, in the words of Captain Barbossa from, you know, the Pirates of the Caribbean films, these are not exactly strict rules. These are just guidelines. Guidelines, yeah. Exactly.
Well, there are certainly claims, not claims, we know it. The Taliban are openly working now with a number of terrorist groups in Afghanistan, specifically, Eamon, your old comrades, Al-Qaeda.
A report has been circulating, I read, among diplomats alleging that Al-Qaeda operatives are now deeply embedded within the Taliban's security apparatus, which is not exactly news. When Ayman al-Zawahiri, the former head of Al-Qaeda, was assassinated in 2022, he was staying at the villa of the Taliban interior minister.
So, Ayman, what's going on? The Taliban and Al-Qaeda are back in bed with each other. This is exactly what the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 was supposed to prevent. Exactly. And I think the day that Dr. Ayman Zawahiri became Dr. Kabab Zawahiri, you know, by this ninja, you know,
Oh man, third dad joke. We need to have a little sound effect for ding, ding, ding. Maybe from some old game show from the 80s, like the gong show. Every time there's a dad joke. So I think they learned the lesson not to be too visible, but the reality is that how do we detect their presence?
How do we detect Al-Qaeda's presence there in Afghanistan and detect their numbers? Someone asked me the question, how do you do that? I said, simple, really, follow the money. Because, you know, this is what I do, terrorism finance. And so the question is, the Hawala system, which is what makes Afghanistan so rich right now with cash,
The Hawala system indicates how much money is moving, let's say, from the Middle East to Afghanistan, from Europe and North America to Afghanistan. And there is that place in the center called Turkey. And Turkey, you know, which has now changed its name into Turkiye. Okay, so Turkiye is now acting as the clearinghouse
for the Taliban. In fact, the Taliban don't have even an ambassador in Turkey. They have a way over that. They have a Taliban minister who is the supreme envoy to the Turkish Republic. Oh, my Lord. Yes. I mean, a supreme envoy. He is basically responsible for, you know, this economic money laundering ties between Turkey and Afghanistan. And all of it go through, of course, from Tabriz, which is across the Turkish border in Iran.
all the way to Zahedan and to Mashhad across the Iranian borders with Afghanistan and Pakistan. It's just a lifeline as far as the Taliban is concerned. And this is basically how we can detect there is so much payments from non-Afghans in the Middle East, in North America and Europe, going to non-Afghan surnames in Afghanistan. Ah.
And the numbers are in their hundreds. And when we look at the hundreds, we're talking about the high hundreds, like seven, eight hundreds. You mean the amounts of money? No, not the amounts of money, the number of recipients. Oh, I see. Because we are following the surnames.
Let's say, like, I mean, if, like, let's say someone, his name is Khalil Gulzada, you know, from Manchester is sending money in Kabul to another guy and his name is Ahmed Zay. We say, okay, an Afghan to Afghan. No problem. The problem is when we
have a name called Kamal Bennawi, you know, from, let's say, like, you know, Michigan, is sending money to someone basically whose name is Abdulaziz Dussouki, you know, aha. So an Arab name to an Arab name from America to Afghanistan, this is suspicious. I bet it is. Yes, and at the moment, basically, almost between 700 to 800 of that kind of transactions and surnames. It means that there are about 800 households
because they will always nominate someone to receive on behalf of two, three, four, five, six. So the numbers could be anywhere between four to five to 6,000, you know, Arabs or non-Afghan Taliban. So that could be al-Qaeda. Now I've read, Eamon, that al-Qaeda also has a controlling stake in the Afghan gold mining industry. Yes. Apparently almost $200 million dollars
of revenues from gold mining activities have flowed into al-Qaeda's coffers. I mean, when did al-Qaeda get its hands on Afghanistan's gold? Because there are certain provinces where gold has been discovered. You see, like, you know, I mean, when you are hiding in networks of caves, what you're going to discover in these caves? You know, several commodities. And one of them is gold, silver, zinc, copper, but also one also other commodity, which is lithium.
Lithium rocks are being sold in Quetta, as far down as Gwadar. So lithium rocks, gold ore, as well as many other minerals and gemstones. So we're talking about emeralds and rubies are being discovered in Afghanistan and are being sold in the black market. And they are generating, you know, tens of millions of dollars for Al-Qaeda and Taliban. I'm loving this adventure story more and more as it develops, Ayman. Now we're talking about emeralds and rubies and caves in the mountains.
When is Indiana Jones going to show up? I swear, I love it. Or it's like it's like it's Alan Quartermain. Forget Indiana Jones. This is Operation Alibaba. Amazing. We should open a production company and start making movies. Exactly. The Taliban are in cahoots with Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda are in bed with the Taliban. Fine. But as we said, the Taliban are no friends of ISIS.
And there is Taliban counterinsurgency activity going on against ISIS in Afghanistan and on the border with Pakistan. Just briefly, Ayman, remind us what the ideological or political split is between the Taliban and ISIS. Well, of course, Taliban are a typical Diobandi Muslims. We talked about them before. Yeah, absolutely. And ISIS? They are Hanafis. Yeah.
And ISIS are Salafists who became Takfiri and Kharijites, similar to ISIS in Iraq and Syria and Yemen. So they became Takfiris, they became Kharij, and they believe that anyone who is, any Diobandi is a Kafir, basically.
From their opinion, the Taliban are tyrants and apostates as far as they are concerned. I must say, it's just an idiotic position because obviously the ISIS people would be greatly strengthened if they could just set aside this theological problem and join up with other jihadists. It's so stupid. No, but that's their ideology. Thank God for it because it divides them. Exactly. But imagine if the Taliban are combating ISKP
Should the West, let's say the United States especially, should they normalize relations even more with the Taliban and maybe participate in the Taliban's counterinsurgency? Or if the West were to get in bed with the Taliban, do you think that would be an effective way of combating ISIS at least? If I was formulating policy, I would say that we should take it step by step. We should start engaging with the Taliban because they are ruling Afghanistan.
And we start step by step to help you against ISIS. Please, can you compromise on this particular issue and this issue and this issue? And then we move on. And then you start step by step with them until finally you have some understanding of where your relationship with them is going, is heading to. Because the world will lose significantly in terms of security if Afghanistan is permitted to return back
Well, essentially, it's only returned back. It actually became Afghanistan 2-0 of the 1990s, of a place of instability rather than stability. So we have to talk to the Taliban, since they are the only force since the 1970s to be controlling the entire Afghan territory. But this control is weak because they don't have the mechanisms for counterinsurgency such as the U.S. and the Europeans do, which is drones and
and the ability to have effective reconnaissance against an intelligence gathering against ISIS. But all of this depends on also the goodwill from the Taliban themselves. Are they open for such a help?
Are they willing to do so? And what do you think? Are Taliban 2.0 more open to alliances with Western nations than they were in the 90s? Yes and no. Yes, because there are factions within Taliban who see that this is the way forward. And there are other factions who, no, no, no, don't see this. So, for example, the Rabbani,
In a faction, basically, they believe that, yes, there should be cooperation between the West and the Taliban. How ironic, because it was in the villa of a Rambani member that Ibn Azawahiri was living when he was killed. So you never can be sure which Islamist is the realist and which is the idealist. Very.
They always play good cop, bad cop. Like, you never know, like, you know, basically who you're talking to. But nonetheless, at some point, better the devil you know. You have to deal with them, you know, sensibly in order to defeat a greater threat. They are unpalatable for many people. I know that. I understand that. I'm not saying, hey, open embassies and let's have, you know, a jolly good party together. No, I'm just saying that
I think they should at least open their airspace for counterinsurgency that would allow Western nations and even regional nations such as Pakistan, India, Russia, to neutralize threats against them originating from that territory. I'm glad you mentioned Pakistan. I want to ask you, and maybe you can keep this brief, but just what is the Pakistan dimension at the moment in the Afghanistan scene? Pakistan always exerts
power in Afghanistan. There's still the tensions in the AfPak border always, you know, the central government is fighting forces there. What's the Pakistan angle in the current situation of Taliban-run Afghanistan? The problem between the two sides is eternal. It's a question of Pashtunistan. It's a question of the fact that
The Pashtuns of Afghanistan always cry over the Pashtun lands that Britain carved out of Afghanistan in order to incorporate into the British Raj, which then was inherited by an independent Pakistan.
There are 15 million Pashtuns living in Pakistan, greater than the number of Pashtuns actually living in Afghanistan possibly. And that's one thing. So the second thing also is the fact that there are many Pakistani Taliban who are different from the Afghan Taliban.
But they keep attacking the army in Waziristan and Suwat Valley and Sarhad and Chitral. And they keep running back across the border into their brethrens in Afghanistan. And when the Pakistani army come and try to pursue them there, they are obstructed and also fired at by Taliban forces, which lead to continuous skirmishes between the two sides. So when the Pakistani army bomb
and the Air Force in particular, when they bomb sites for Taliban of Pakistan inside Afghanistan, this is when the two sides start to retaliate against each other. Unfortunately, until the Taliban of Pakistan can find a solution for this problem, it will always persist. My God, what a nightmare. Let's shift our focus, Ayman, to the West and the possible threat of renewed jihadism from Afghanistan in the West.
I'm obviously talking about ISKP, but maybe Islamist terrorism more generally. Apparently in March, there was a foiled terrorist plot to attack Sweden's parliament. Germany is sounding the alarm saying that they feel that there's the biggest threat from Islamist terrorism in its history at the moment. The president of France, Emmanuel Macron, has said that the French security services have stopped numerous threats.
Things are a bit quiet in the U.S. and the U.K. We don't hear much from the Anglophone world. But obviously, the Olympics are coming up in Paris in the summer. All the reports are saying, my God, that is a natural target for any sort of terrorist group. What is your analysis of the threat against Western countries now in this resurgence of
of terrorism and obviously Russia in this analysis is not Western, I suppose, 'cause they have suffered directly. - Yes, exactly. I mean, I would say that in my opinion, we will see a resurgence of terrorism in 2024, 2025. There is no question about it.
cities that are mostly vulnerable will be Paris, especially during the Olympics, London during the summer, and most likely capitals like Brussels, Rome, Berlin, and also other cities in Germany. The reason for this is because, of course, like I mean, the tensions are high. And as the war between the Israelis and Hamas and Gaza drags on, it is a recruitment. ISIS has now resumed recruitment online.
I think the past three months must have been a Christmas, you know, coming both late and early at the same time, because it provided them with so many young, disaffected, angry people, you know, over what's happening in Gaza, even though, like, you know, my opinion about this.
There is so much misinformation, propaganda, misguidance. And of course, I mean, this is the swamp of disinformation in which the mosquitoes of ISIS will go and try to infect people with their malaria-like ideological nonsense. And exactly like, you know, this is where we are heading. It's just the number of recruits online is rising.
That's worrying me. And the possibility of lone wolves attacks are also on the rise using cars, vans, knives, acid, you know, corrosive chemicals, whatever they have in their disposal. And in France, with access to firearms, the Olympics is going to be a nightmare.
You know, take it from me. Well, you know, I said at the beginning of this episode that I wanted to stay away from Israel and Gaza, but there's no getting away from it. As you said, Eamon, Gaza now and Israel's campaign against Hamas is the new full moon that the hibernating Islamists, jihadists were waiting to proclaim.
to bring them out of their caves and back into the open. They're coming to get us again. Indeed. Oh, my Lord. Thanks so much to our conflicted community listeners. We really appreciate your support as it allows us to keep on making shows like this one. We'll see you soon.
Conflicted is a Message Heard production. This episode was produced and edited by Harry Stott. Sandra Ferrari is our executive producer. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley and Tom Biddle.