The Pakistani Taliban’s official propaganda wing, Umar Media, has released a statement rejecting the Islamic State’s “self-professed caliphate” in Iraq and Syria. The publication, written by a jihadist known as Abu Usman Salarzai, is nearly 60 pages long and purports to expose the errors in Abu Bakr al Baghdadi’s claim to be the new caliph.
Salarzai praises Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Omar, as well as Osama bin Laden and his successor as the head of al Qaeda, Ayman al Zawahiri.
The Pakistani Taliban’s statement is the latest twist in the competition between the Islamic State and al Qaeda in South Asia. While the Islamic State has made inroads, primarily by poaching disaffected Afghan and Pakistani Taliban commanders, al Qaeda has deep and longstanding relationships with jihadists throughout the region.
Still, the Islamic State has attempted to cut into the support enjoyed by the Taliban and al Qaeda. In January, a group of mid-level Pakistani Taliban commanders pledged their loyalty to Baghdadi. In February, the group’s emir for the tribal agency of Bajaur also defected to Baghdadi’s cause. The defections came after internal discord and disputes dissolved the original Pakistani Taliban coalition last year.
In March, however, a major faction calling itself the Pakistani Taliban Jamaat ul Ahrar decided to rejoin the original umbrella organization. In addition, another jihadist group named Lashkar-i-Islam also decided to join the Pakistani Taliban. [See LWJ report, Pakistani jihadist groups, Lashkar-i-Islam merge into the Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan.]
There have been indications in recent weeks that al Qaeda has been leading the effort to reunite jihadists.
Earlier this month, Matiur Rehman, a veteran al Qaeda leader, united three jihadist groups under his command and then folded them into the Pakistani Taliban coalition. The US Treasury Department has described Rehman as “a planning director for al Qaeda.” Rehman has been connected to multiple planned attacks against the West, including al Qaeda’s 2006 London airliner plot and a thwarted attempt to bomb trains in the New York City area in 2009. [See LWJ report, 3 jihadist groups merge with Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan.]
Umar Media has recently made the Pakistani Taliban’s close relationship with al Qaeda known in other ways as well.
In April, Pakistani Taliban spokesman Muhammad Khorasani released a eulogy for Ustad Ahmad Farooq and Qari Imran, two al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) leaders who were killed in separate US drone strikes in January. [See LWJ report, Pakistani Taliban praises slain al Qaeda leaders.]
Khorasani said that Farooq oversaw Umar Media’s propaganda. “We would frequently meet for the purpose of media related tasks,” Khorasani explained. “During our meetings, if he [Farooq] would see any mistakes in any of our Umar Media productions or in any of my statements that I would release as the spokesman, he would point them out in a very kind and loving way, allowing me to benefit from his valuable suggestions.”
Khorasani said Imran was “among the greatest militant teachers,” and noted that he and “thousands” of other jihadists trained under him.
“Thousands of young men received militant training from him [Imran] before going and dealing heavy strikes against the centers of the infidels,” Khorasani said. “I also gained my militant training from him.”
Abu Usman Salarzai’s rejection of the Islamic State’s “caliphate” contains a critique of the operations authorized by Baghdadi. Namely, Salarzai criticizes the Islamic State’s targeting of Shiite holy sites and civilians, saying such attacks are “unwise” as they alienate the population. His critique is somewhat ironic, given that the Pakistani Taliban has repeatedly carried out unpopular attacks, including a massacre at a military high school last year.
Documents recovered in Osama bin Laden’s compound show that al Qaeda has long maintained close ties to the Pakistani Taliban, but has also tried to rein in its violence.
8 Comments
IS takes Damascus, you can bet they’ll be singing a different tune. Be funny if it weren’t so serious. Interesting times we live in. Putin and China are sitting back and laughing as they get away with murder.
How about this. We fear IS when they teach their trucks how to swim. Till then we focus on Putin and China which are real threats. Let IS and the Shia kill each other. Cheaper that way.
The Pakistani Taliban under Baitullah Meshud and later Haikmullah Meshud chose to wreak havoc on FATA and Khyber Patoonakha from the beginning of the kaloosha operation till the army took back Bajur and partially Miranshah. During this havoc many shia shrines gatherings and practices were desecrated with suicide bombers and total suppression of the populace. Thareek e taliban Pakistan extorted payment from shia communities and created an overall atmosphere of paranoia between the shia and their sunni counterparts. The Afghan Taliban just last month damned the attack on the Peshawar school and claimed the exact thing saying TTP was isolating the public.. What it comes down to is jealousy. Neither TTP or aqis has ever held territory like the islamic state nor have they ever had the recognition. Up until recently the tribals were the mainstay for foreign jihadis from all over north Africa and even iraq and Syria. Now that IS has managed to do in two years what the Pakistani Taliban has tried to do for ten why wouldn’t they criticize their much larger and more organized rival. As al Qaeda fades into the distance where will their fighters come from because always remeber, Pakistani s are not Arab and nor do they speak arabic so the same old chains of language and culture hold them back once more..
A house divided… and within the house so many vie for ???….just a gut feeling.
Mullah Omar is on death’s door if he is not gone already.
Is there a queue for succession? Is this scramble for consolidation a message?
Why detail the Baghdadi problem this way now?
What about all those guys who jumped ship in the first quarter of this year declaring loyalty to ISIS?
Hmmmm…
This step of Pakistani Taliban gives a valuable indication into understanding the structure of Islamic insurgency. The western people make a mistake in understanding the dilemma by putting all sects and ideologies existing in Islam into one bracket. Things are utterly different from what they speculate.
The Islam is a collection of ideologies ,with many rivals to each other. Even the standards of Khilafate vary from sect to sect. The Pakistani Taliban and ISIS follow to different schools of thought with latter very orthodox and stiff. ISIS understandingly purports to lay down the Islamic society of very initial days i-e of Prophets time while the Taliban are relatively more innovative.
No stream of religious ideology can bind them together. It would be tactic or temporary if they unite against a common enemy somewhere.
Omar has been dead for years.
@ Zakkie
“The western people make a mistake in understanding the dilemma…,” this is very true. What’s taking place in Pakistan is as much a secessionist movement, if not more so, as it is a Religious/Ideological ‘motivator.’
I think it is an unstated strategy.
Any evidence for that claim?