Why Russia may be in the crosshairs of Daesh extremists
Just hours after gunmen stormed a popular concert venue on the outskirts of the Russian capital Moscow on Friday night, killing 115, wounding scores and setting the building ablaze, the extremist group Daesh took to Telegram to claim responsibility.
The group said that the attack was executed by its Afghan branch, IS-K, or Islamic State in Khorasan Province — the same group that was behind the twin bombings in Iran in January that killed 94 people at the shrine of former Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani.
“IS-K has a track record of attacking Russian targets,” Luke Coffey, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, told Arab News. “For example, IS-K was behind the attack against the Russian embassy in Kabul in September 2022. Also, IS-K is probably not happy with the deepening relations between Moscow and the Taliban.”
Founded in 2015 by frustrated former members of the Pakistani Taliban who sought more violent methods to spread their extreme interpretation of Islam, IS-K has primarily operated in the ungoverned spaces of rural Afghanistan.
From this initial obscurity, IS-K shot to global attention in August 2021 amid the chaos of the Taliban’s return to power when its members bombed Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, killing more than 170 people, among them 13 US military personnel.
US operations had reduced IS-K’s numbers significantly, but after the Western withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021 the group renewed and grew. The Taliban is now regularly engaged in combat against IS-K, as it threatens its ability to govern.
Daesh and its affiliates have previously claimed responsibility for random attacks that they had no direct hand in, leading to some initial skepticism about their role in the Moscow attack. However, US intelligence has since confirmed the authenticity of the claim.
In fact, the US issued a warning to its citizens in Russia as early as March 7, highlighting “reports that extremists have imminent plans to target large gatherings in Moscow, to include concerts.”
On the same day that the US embassy in Moscow issued this warning, Commander of the US Central Command in the Middle East — CENTCOM — Gen. Michael Kurilla, told a briefing that the risk of attacks emanating from Afghanistan was increasing.
“I assess Daesh-Khorasan retains the capability and will to attack US and Western interests abroad in as little as six months and with little to no warning,” he said, according to a statement issued by the US Department of Defense.
He added: “Daesh is now strong not only in Afghanistan but outside of it as well. It now possesses the capabilities to carry out attacks in Europe and Asia, with its fighters positioned along the border with Tajikistan.”
With Russia’s security apparatus and defense infrastructure focused primarily on its war with Ukraine, extremist groups such as Daesh appear to have sensed an opportunity to stage a comeback and plot audacious attacks while governments were distracted.
“There is no doubt that Daesh is taking advantage of Russia’s distractions in Ukraine,” Coffey said. “More than two years into Russia’s invasion, the war in Ukraine probably now consumes most of the attention and resources of Russia’s intelligence agencies, armed forces, security services and even law enforcement.
“Daesh probably saw an opportunity to strike while Russia is weakened. In the past, Daesh publications such as Al-Naba have contained articles about the ‘crusader against crusader war’ taking place between Russia and Ukraine, even suggesting that such a war presents opportunities for them.”
Hani Nasira, a political analyst and expert in terrorism and extremist organizations, echoed Coffey’s view that the conflict between Russia and Ukraine has created fertile ground for surprise attacks on a distracted region.
“Since the conflict in Ukraine started, IS-K has increased the flow of its fighters who have joined the war by going from their initial center of operations in Syria toward their countries of origin to relaunch operations in Northern Caucasus and Central Asian countries, such as Uzbekistan and Tajikistan,” Nasira told Arab News.
“The war in Ukraine constituted the starting point for the recurrence of what happened in Afghanistan, with foreign fighters from around the world joining the war alongside Ukraine against Russia, especially since the war, for the Western camp, has turned into a war of attrition with which it aims to inflict maximum losses on Russia or repeat the phenomenon of ‘returnees’ after the war is over,” he said.
“Some of the extremists of Chechen descent are fighting Russia in Ukraine to remove the humiliating stain left by the men of Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov, who support Russia and were described by Daesh’s members as ‘traitors and a disgrace to the Chechen nation’ because no true Chechen would fight in the ranks of Russian President Vladimir Putin.”
Russia also seems to be of particular interest to IS-K because, as it claims, the Russian military has a record of killing Muslims in Chechnya, Syria and Afghanistan.
Russia has been targeted by extremist groups numerous times over the past two decades — the Nord Ost theater siege in 2002 and the Beslan massacre in 2004 being the most notorious attacks.
For as long as the focus of its defense apparatus is dominated by the war in Ukraine, Russia may struggle to fend off further attacks by increasingly audacious extremist groups emerging from its restive south.
Why is ISIL attacking Russia?
Defence and security analysts say the group has targeted its propaganda at Russian President Vladimir Putin in recent years over the alleged oppression of Muslims by Russia.
“Russian foreign policy has been one big red flag for ISIS [ISIL],” Michael Kugelman, director of the South Asia Institute at the Washington-based Wilson Center told Al Jazeera. “The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Russian actions in Chechnya, Moscow’s close relationships with the Syrian and Iranian governments, and especially the military campaigns that Russia has waged against ISIS fighters in Syria and — through Wagner Group mercenaries – in parts of Africa.”
All of that has meant that Moscow has become a focus of ISKP’s “extensive propaganda war,” said Amira Jadoon, assistant professor at Clemson University in South Carolina and co-author of, The Islamic State in Afghanistan and Pakistan: Strategic Alliances and Rivalries.
“Russia’s engagement in the global fight against ISIS and its affiliates, especially through its military operations in Syria and its efforts to establish connections with the Afghan Taliban – ISIS-K’s rival – marks Russia as a key adversary for ISIS/ISIS-K,” Jadoon told Al Jazeera.
Should the Moscow attack be “definitely attributed” to ISKP, Jadoon said, the group hopes to win support and advance “its goal to evolve into a terrorist organisation with global influence” by demonstrating that it can launch attacks within Russian territory.
“ISK [ISKP] has consistently demonstrated its ambition to evolve into a formidable regional entity … By directing its aggression towards nations such as Iran and Russia, ISK not only confronts regional heavyweights but also underscores its political relevance and operational reach on the global stage,” Jadoon said.
Kabir Taneja, a fellow at the Strategic Studies Programme of the Observer Research Foundation – a think tank based in New Delhi, India – told Al Jazeera that Russia is seen by ISIL and its affiliates as “a crusading power against Muslims”.
“Russia has been a target for ISIS and not just ISKP from the beginning,” Taneja, author of the book, The ISIS Peril, said.
“ISKP attacked [the] Russian embassy in Kabul in 2022, and over the months, Russian security agencies have upped their efforts to clamp down on pro-ISIS ecosystems both in Russia and around its borders, specifically Central Asia and the Caucusus,” he said.
In early March, Russia’s Federal Security Service, better known as the FSB, said it had thwarted an ISIL plan to attack a Moscow synagogue.
“The most compelling current motivation for ISIS-K to attack Russia is the Taliban factor. The Taliban is a bitter rival of ISIS, and ISIS views Russia as a friend of the Taliban,” said Kugelman.
Moscow’s close relations with Israel are also anathema to ISIL’s ideology, Taneja said.
“So this friction is not new ideologically, but is so tactically,” he told Al Jazeera.
There’s another factor, too: Largely away from the world’s attention, the armed group has regrouped into a formidable force after setbacks in Syria and Iran.
“ISKP in Afghanistan has grown in strength significantly … and it’s not just ISKP, ISIS in its original regions of operations, Syria and Iraq, also sees [an] uptick in operational capabilities,” Taneja said. Today, he added, it is “ideologically powerful even if not politically, tactically or strategically … that powerful any more”.
That poses a challenge for a distracted world, he said.
“How to combat this is the big question at a time when big power competition and global geopolitical churn has put counterterrorism on the back burner,” Taneja added.
How has ISIL responded?
ISKP social media channels are “jubilant” following the attack on Moscow, said Abdul Basit, a senior associate fellow at the S Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Singapore.
“They are celebrating the attack,” Basit told Al Jazeera, adding that supporters are “translating and recirculating the responsibility claim” issued by the ISIL-linked Amaq News Agency.
Basit said that ISIL’s method of operations involves amplifying a propaganda campaign in advance of large-scale attacks and this had been observed in recent anti-Russian messaging. Such attacks “add to the credibility” of armed groups, Basit explained, which then “increases the scope of their funding, recruitment and propaganda”.
More attacks are possible in Russia and elsewhere, he added, given the key role that ISIL recruits of Central Asian origin – particularly Tajiks – played when the group held territory in Syria. They have now returned to the Central Asia region and their intent to carry out attacks has now materialised in capability, Basit said.
Previous attacks in Russia
Moscow and other Russian cities have been the targets of previous attacks.
In 2002, Chechen fighters took more than 900 people hostage in a Moscow theatre, the Dubrovka, demanding the withdrawal of Russian troops from Chechnya and an end to Russia’s war on the region.
Russian special forces attacked the theatre to end the standoff and 130 people were killed, most suffocated by a gas used by security forces to leave the Chechen fighters unconscious.
The deadliest attack in Russia was the 2004 Beslan school siege which was carried out by members of a Chechen armed group seeking Chechnya’s independence from Russia. The siege killed 334 people, including 186 children.
Source » arabnews.com
