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Featured Indians and Central Asians Are the New Face of the Islamic State - Foreign Policy

The Muslims of India, instead of othering themselves away, should support the new Muslim progressives like Shehla Rashid and Umar Khalid, and the new non-Muslim progressives like Kanhaiya Kumar and Prakash Raj.

Thank you for your reply, I just wanted to explore your thoughts.

Regarding the othering, I think othering is always a majority led process, the minority cannot act inclusively whilst the majority is bent on exclusion.
I do feel you guys, the Muslims, place far too much burden on yourself regarding inclusion.

Myself, here in the UK, othering and inclusion should be an issue, and it is to a certain degree, but it is not something we feel. We are in reality the "other" because we are immigrants, but you can see the effort to not make us feel alienated, that is a majority led process, minority can only play a part once inclusiveness starts, not otherwise.

In India, the Muslims of India are ethnic owners of their land, the act, thought or process of othering should not exist at all, because they are not the "other". If it exists, the fault purely lays on the footsteps of the majority, the Hindu.

Already Muslims have given up Urdu, and so many other examples, it is time to stop sacrificing and demand respect and equality, nothing else. For the first time I can see a sign of that, although its not vibrant as yet. That can only be good for India, I think.
 
Myself, here in the UK, othering and inclusion should be an issue, and it is to a certain degree, but it is not something we feel. We are in reality the "other" because we are immigrants, but you can see the effort to not make us feel alienated, that is a majority led process, minority can only play a part once inclusiveness starts, not otherwise.

The underlined - Is it because of the stiff upper lip British politeness ?

In India, the Muslims of India are ethnic owners of their land, the act, thought or process of othering should not exist at all, because they are not the "other". If it exists, the fault purely lays on the footsteps of the majority, the Hindu.

Most of that's a wonderful point. :tup:

Except that it is not Hindu but Hindutvadis ( BJP, RSS, Bajrang Dal, Sri Ram Sena etc ).
 
The underlined - Is it because of the stiff upper lip British politeness ?



Most of that's a wonderful point. :tup:

Except that it is not Hindu but Hindutvadis ( BJP, RSS, Bajrang Dal, Sri Ram Sena etc ).

The stiff upper lip is only in the movies, it sounds good as a one liner, but in reality its a lot of bull-crap. I have friends and family in Europe as well, and they don't feel so included.
I am not 100% sure why it is different here, because we still have problems, that's life, but the inclusive aspect is different, it is something about the collective thinking, I have thought why? but sorry to say I have not found a definitive answer.
Perhaps it has been recognised that inclusion is a process, when you think ok we have good laws and society is working, is when things start to turn sour, because you become complacent. But if you recognise that problems will arise and you need to act to adjust when they do, it makes a difference.


Yes, I do recognise it is the Hindu extremist element or the Hindutvadis, but I think there is a point at which the blame has to be shared across the board among the majority grouping, India crossed that point when the butcher of Gujarat was elected to the highest office. If the other half remains silent or does not speak up loud enough, they have to share the burden of responsibility, whether they elected him or not.
 



As usual, not enough. Chal...

Oh I don't expect BJP to support the Syrian government. I was talking about the Indian military unilaterally going to Syria.

But this won't happen because sadly the Indian military doesn't seem to have leftist elements.
Oh, I was wondering how insane your idea is. Didn't see that coming. lol

Has any leftist elements in the world even try to help Syria btw?

I will give an example about the Libya war of 2011. The Indian Air Force was looking to buy some foreign fighter jets. Western. The NATO invasion of Libya was full on. The European makers of the Eurofighter Typhoon jet held a presentation at IAF HQ where they played gun cam vids of the Typhoon jet bombarding Gaddafi's Bab al Azizia compound. The IAF didn't exactly protest this. Or even question this.
hmmm so Eurofighter showcased its capability in a demo video, why should IAF protest that? We are not buying jets to showcase we have a Jet, but to use and kill the enemies.
No, like I said before, there is a simple reason why the Hindutva elements adore Israel. They do it because they see Israel as a bulwark against Muslim-majority West Asian countries. Israel is the Hindutvadis proxy against Muslims.
That's quite possible, I don't know many Hindutva types who fancy Israel in any way, I thought they're the Nazi types. hmmm.

Well, I have no fanatic hatred for Israel and wish to see Israel and the Palestinians join together into a single, democratic country.
I didn't say you do, but I don't get few arguments like so, Hindutva follows Nazi ideology, and loves hitler, they also love Israel and that's because they hate Muslims, but then the most people who are cheering on the internet over the Arab Israel deal are the Hindutva types. What am I missing here?

India's official stand is there should be a two-state solution. The probable one IMO and Israelis are not going to do anything that will erode their power. I don't think there will be a one-state solution.
 


As usual, not enough. Chal..
Lolx so you are saying if I am a thief he is too 🤣
 
India is mother of terrorism in South Asia.



World is slowly recognising that, we need to highlight this in every corner of the world.

India is the only country in the world that promotes Islamophobia at the state level.
 
Indians and Central Asians Are the New Face of the Islamic State
Terrorists from India, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan were never at the forefront of global jihad before—now they are.
BY RAFFAELLO PANTUCCI | OCTOBER 8, 2020, 6:32 AM
Members of the Islamic State stand alongside their weapons, following their surrender to Afghanistan's government in Jalalabad on Nov. 17, 2019.

Members of the Islamic State stand alongside their weapons, following their surrender to Afghanistan's government in Jalalabad on Nov. 17, 2019. NOORULLAH SHIRZADA/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES
As white nationalists across the world have gained prominence through racist, Islamophobic and anti-Semitic acts, the world’s focus on terrorism seems to have shifted. Many experts on extremism now focus heavily on the far-right in its many incarnations as an important driver of terrorist threat. But this myopic approach ignores the dynamism that the Islamic State injected into the international jihadist movement, and the long-term repercussions of the networks it built. In particular, the Indian and Central Asian linkages that the group fostered are already having repercussions beyond the region.
This threat emerged most recently with the attack by the Islamic State in Khorasan Province (ISKP) on Jalalabad prison in early August. The attack showed a level of ambition that distinguished the group from many of the Islamic State’s other regional affiliates. Part of a bigger global push to do something about colleagues rotting in prisons, it was also a way of signaling how the group’s approach to freeing its prisoners differed from the Taliban’s. In ISKP’s eyes, the Taliban are in essence surrendering in their peace negotiations with the U.S. government. But the most interesting aspect of the attack was the roster of fighters involved—a multinational group that included Afghans, Indians, Tajiks, and Pakistanis.
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While at first glance this seems unsurprising, the presence of Central Asians and Indians in transnational attacks is a relatively new phenomenon that reflects a shifting pattern in jihadism linked to the Islamic State. Some of the group’s most dramatic attacks—like the Easter 2019 Sri Lanka bombings, the attack on a Turkish nightclub on New Year’s Eve 2017, or the 2017 truck attacks in New York City and Stockholm—revealed jihadism’s persistent appeal to a global audience. Indeed, the rise of Central and South Asian cohorts to the front rank of attack planning is a development with potentially worrying consequences.
Jihadist ideas are not new to Central Asia or India. The civil war in 1990s Tajikistan that broke out in the wake of the country’s emancipation from the Soviet Union was an early post-Cold War battlefield which included jihadist elements. Fighters used northern Afghanistan as a base from which to fight in Tajikistan.
While most of the support for the fighting in Tajikistan emerged from communities in northern Afghanistan who went on to fight against al Qaeda and the Taliban, some disillusioned fighters in the conflict ended up fighting alongside al Qaeda. And for a while, assessments of where al Qaeda would go after its ejection from Afghanistan post-9/11 focused on the Fergana Valley, a region spanning Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan that is home to conservative communities who have clashed with their respective capitals. Groups like the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Jund al Khilafah, the Islamic Jihad Union or various Tajikistani groups provided networks that helped Central Asians get involved in fighting in Afghanistan and Pakistan. But these networks were relatively limited in their impact.
India was the birthplace of the Deobandi movement, a sect that was a source of ideas for the Taliban, and the conflict in Kashmir has for years been a rallying cry for extremist groups
India’s history of jihadism goes back even further. The country was the birthplace of the Deobandi movement, a sect that was a source of ideas for the Taliban among others. And the conflict in Kashmir has long been held up by extremist groups as one of the world’s most long-standing unresolved jihadi conflicts. While most Kashmiris are nationalists furious at New Delhi, their conflict is one that is regularly adopted as a rallying cry by extremists who point to it as one of the many places where Muslims are being abused.
Yet notwithstanding this heritage, neither India nor Central Asia has historically produced many figures in the international jihadist movement, launching attacks far from their borders. Indians have stayed involved in networks in India, or occasionally Pakistan. Central Asians have shown up in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but rarely farther afield. That is changing.
A major attraction drawing young men and women to jihadism has always been the idea of participating in a transnational religious movement and an epic global struggle. To focus only on a parochial local level misses the larger canvas of their narratives. This appears to be a gap that the Islamic State identified and filled.
A major turning point in Indian and Central Asian involvement in the global jihadist movement was Syria.
A major turning point in Indian and Central Asian involvement in the global jihadist movement was Syria.
A cauldron that continues to draw people in, it is a clear and significant marker in the international jihadist story. The battlefield was one that drew in Muslims from almost 100 different countries and from every continent. This included Indians and Central Asians, though their experiences were markedly different.

The Central Asians integrated well into the conflict, serving alongside both Islamic State and al Qaeda-affiliated groups. For example, Tajikistani former Colonel Gulmurod Khalimov rose to be a senior Islamic State commander. Large groups of Central Asians fought on the battlefield. In contrast, the few Indians who made it to the Levant had a different experience. Many received bad treatment at the hands of their Arab hosts, who tended to look down on them—reflecting the status of South Asians as poor laborers in much of the Arab world. This racism did not stop a significant number of Indians being drawn to the group, however. A more thriving community of Indian fighters made it to the conflict in Afghanistan to fight alongside ISKP there.
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Since the Islamic State’s emergence, Central Asians have been involved in repeated attacks in Turkey, including the assault on Istanbul’s Ataturk Airport in June 2016 and the high-profile massacre at the city’s Reina nightclub on New Year’s Eve 2017, as well as attacks using vehicles that were driven into crowds in 2017 in Stockholm in April, and New York City on Halloween that year, as well as an underground bombing in St. Petersburg.
For Indians, the international role has been more limited, with Indians for the most part appearing in attacks in Afghanistan and in limited numbers on the battlefield in Syria. The attack on the prison in Jalalabad follows the earlier decision by ISKP to use an Indian fighter to attack a Sikh gurdwara—a place of worship—in Kabul. Seen as “polytheists,” Sikhs are regarded as an acceptable target by the Islamic State like many other religious groups, though the decision to use an Indian attacker likely reflected a desire by the group to highlight their connection to India in particular.
The Islamic State officially announced the creation of an affiliate in India last year but has been hinting about involvement in Kashmir for years. The group was likely in part rejected by local Kashmiris who have long seen foreign Islamists as complicating factors in their struggles against the Indian state. However, it now seems as though the group is quite openly talking about its involvement. Al Naba, the Islamic State’s regular publication, recently listed the martyrdom notices of three Kashmiris who had reportedly fallen fighting for the group. These individuals join the growing numbers of Keralans and other Indians who are now reported to have died or fought alongside the Islamic State.
While the absolute numbers are small, this is an entirely new trend. Indians involved in external jihadist attacks have until now been the exception. The few Indians who pursued jihad tended to do it at home in a limited fashion, often with links across the border to Pakistan. Only a few ventured beyond, like Dhiren Barot, a British-raised Hindu convert who was close to 9/11 organizer Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and was ultimately jailed for a plot to detonate a bomb in the U.K. in 2005.
This is surprising, considering that India is home to the world’s third-largest Muslim community. However, today’s new generation of jihadists, is driven by a range of economic, political, and ideological factors.
Both Central Asia and India are home to large communities of young men who go and work abroad, sending home remittances that are a crucial pillar of local economies. It is often among these diaspora communities where radicalization takes place—for the Indians in the Gulf, for the Central Asians in Russia. In the COVID-blighted world, this workflow has slowed down, hurting economies, but also creating a pool of underemployed young men at home and abroad.
In the COVID-blighted world, opportunities to work abroad have dried up—hurting economies and creating a pool of underemployed young men at home and abroad.
This comes in the context of a tense political environment. In India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has advanced a series of policies promoting a Hindu nationalist narrative openly hostile toward Muslims. There has since been a notable uptick in jihadist propaganda toward India. In Central Asia, governments may not be stoking the same fires, but there has been an active pursuit of political opponents across the region. While there are numerous programs in place seeking to counter violent extremism, it is not always clear how effective they are, nor is it clear they are able to deal with problems of radicalization amongst diaspora communities.
And there is the continuing question of what will happen to the fighters from these countries who went to Syria and Iraq. Some may try to come home, but others may end up fostering new networks which create problems elsewhere.
The danger is that there may be an increasing number of Indian and Central Asian links to plots outside their regions. Earlier this year, German authorities disrupted a network of Tajiks linked to cells in Albania and in contact with the Islamic State in both Afghanistan and Syria. They were reportedly under orders to launch an attack in Europe. Other Central Asian cells have been reportedly disrupted across Europe, and authorities in Ukraine have made numerous arrests of fighters fleeing the collapsing battlefield in Syria.
India has seen less such activity, though there were Indian links to the 2019 Sri Lanka Easter attacks. Like many violent Islamist extremists, a Southern Indian cell involved appears to have followed the sermons of Indian prominent extremist preacher Zakir Naik, whose speeches have helped radicalize numerous different jihadists around the world.
Most of the current attention on new terrorist groups focuses on the extreme right—something that is understandable given the deeply polarized political environment in the western world. But violent Islamist threats have not gone away, and are transforming. The story of Central Asian and Indian jihadism is one that has historically received too little attention. Emerging from domestic environments that are creating more opportunities for disenfranchisement and radicalization to take place, they are exactly the sort of threats which may slip under the radar until it is too late.

Raffaello Pantucci is a senior associate fellow at Britain’s Royal United Services Institute and a visiting senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore. He is the author of We Love Death As You Love Life: Britain's Suburban Terrorists. Twitter: @raffpantucci
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TAGS: ARGUMENT, INDIA, ISIS, KYRGYZSTAN, TAJIKISTAN, TERRORISM, UZBEKISTAN
 
Pakistan should highlight Indian's supported terrorist network in Afghanistan, TTP and others. Through them India has carried out terrorists attacks in Pakistan regularly during last decades.
Killing thousands of Pakistanis. If India can falsely try to implicate Pakistan in anything going wrong in India, why we are not doing it internationally to expose India!!

There are photographs, video and other evidences of Indian's involvement in terrorism and running of terrorists camps in Afghanistan.
 
They are damaging the name of Islam, not India. So every peace loving Muslim should condem them irrespective their country origin.

Above all they are Indian. I know how good Indians irrespective of their faith love to project their nationality. The story highlights nationality above religion.
 
For Indians, the international role has been most part appearing in attacks in Pakistan,Afghanistan and in limited numbers on the battlefield in Syria.
participation of the India, is also because of the tense political climate. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has advanced a series of policies promoting a Hindu nationalist narrative openly hostile toward Muslims. There has since been a notable uptick in jihadist propaganda toward India.
It concluded that with time the faces of jihadism across the globe are changing and India is big examples of mother of all terrorism .They are exactly the sort of threats which may slip under the radar until it is too late.
 
:sad:

There was a time when young Muslims all over the world were part of progressive / leftist movements.
 
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This will help reduce the impact of religion, as the more religious ones would automatically be seen as fanatics.
 
report also indicated that Dhiren Barot, a British-raised Hindu convert who was close to 9/11 organizer Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and was ultimately jailed for a plot to detonate a bomb in the U.K. in 2005.
I don't think India obeyed the US because the US wanted India to attack China immediately. They didn't. They knew they had to be killed. The US was angry. They made the report now in foreign policy.
Now India has come under USA pressure. FP report is the first attempt to lure Indians more into achieving American interests. India can't run; they have to say YES to every USA call; otherwise, more such reports will come out. All evidence is verified, India must be blacklisted for its crime against humanity in FATF. Let's see western countries double standard will awake up.
 
The recent report of FP (Foreign Policy) shows that the influx of Indian citizens joining the global Jihadi Cocktail of ISIS poses a serious threat to India's un-safeguarded nuclear program.View attachment 677720
Pakistanis claiming Jihadis are a threat to Indian Nukes. Man this hilarious.
I will give an example about the Libya war of 2011. The Indian Air Force was looking to buy some foreign fighter jets. Western. The NATO invasion of Libya was full on. The European makers of the Eurofighter Typhoon jet held a presentation at IAF HQ where they played gun cam vids of the Typhoon jet bombarding Gaddafi's Bab al Azizia compound. The IAF didn't exactly protest this. Or even question this.
What's there to protest or question about it, it something to cheer and congratulate the pilots for, if I was in the briefing I would have. Gaddafi was scum in general and for India a direct co-conspirator in bankrolling an adversary's nuclear program.
 
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