THIS is apropos the news report, ‘IS or Taliban? Either way fear stalks war-weary Afghans. Behind this the most lethal bombing in the eastern city of Jalalabad, which killed at least 34 people and wounded more than 100, there is a tragic saga of colossal blunders on the part of not only Nato but also all those states which had had Afghanistan as a broad expanse to launch proxies against each other.

The gigantic bloopers of the Bush administration in assaulting both Afghanistan and Iraq, whether on the pretext of ‘war on terror’ or on the grounds of Saddam’s WMD humbug, are solely responsible for begetting this ‘child of war’ in the shape of IS, as aptly described by Patrick Cockburn in his latest account: The rise of IS and the new Sunni revolution. Cockburn’s insight unveils the loopholes of the Western and Arab failure in reining in Sunni extremist militias, especially in the Syrian context of Assad’s regime.

Being the vanguard victims of terrorism, it seems clear that both Afghanistan and Pakistan have learnt the lessons by their past mistakes. Gen. Raheel was right when he pre-empted the IS danger by clearly raising his concerns in the US that Pakistan would never let the IS to cast its shady shadow upon Afghanistan.

It is also pertinent to mention that the Taliban denied their involvement in the recent Jalalabad carnage, along with President Ghani’s swift acknowledgement that the Taliban are not involved in this tragic bombing.

Another positive development in Pak-Afghan relations is the latest visit of Afghan army chief in which he unequivocally declared non-state actors as a common enemy of both countries.

By successful offensive Zarb-i-Azb, Gen. Raheel has negated the traditional ‘good-and-bad-Taliban’ premise for restoring state writ in North Waziristan. Now the real tangle of Afghanistan is yet to be disentangled which is only possible by power-sharing with the Taliban. It should be conspicuous that, like Hizbullah, Taliban has the capability to neutralize the IS threat.

President Ghani’s friendly gesture toward the Taliban should be appreciated and world powers, like China, should goad this Taliban-friendly arrangement as, indeed, to purge Afghanistan of the IS menace is the need of the hour.

Ali Abbas

Chakwal

Published in Dawn, April 22nd, 2015

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