Truth is the first casualty in war and terrorist attacks, and the focus of the recent mini-Mumbai-type attack in Dhaka has shifted from exploring underlying reasons of the barbarity to an intense debate on who did it
Those of us who fought for the creation of Bangladesh in 1971 and lived to see it reject the two-nation theory to maintain a liberal and secular society, are dismayed to see it fall back into a chasm of violence and religious extremism. BJP’s veteran politician Jaswant Singh would call Bangladesh the ‘revenge of geography over history’. But it was not just that. As the spiral of terrorist violence manifest last Friday in Dhaka, it bore the composite savagery and brutality of the Islamic State (IS). A comment of the defeated Pakistani 16 Division Commander, Maj Gen Nazir Hussain Shah at Bogra, after the surrender about the future of Bangladesh remains worrying. He said: “there will be no Bangladesh. It will be Disturbed-desh”. Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, some say, is in denial about the revival of Islamic fundamentalism with IS imprint which has shaken the socio-political stability of the state. The unending political war between the two Begums — Hasina and Khaleda Zia — has taken its toll. The execution of Jamaat-e-Islami (JEI) leaders allied with Zia for war crimes has worsened relations with Pakistan and fouled further domestic politics.
Truth is the first casualty in war and terrorist assaults. Conjecture and speculation have replaced facts. The focus of the mini-Mumbai type attack has got shifted from exploring underlying reasons of the barbarity to an intense debate on who done it. The immediate claimant for the attack was IS, followed by Al Qaeda in South Asia which is competing for space for terror with the IS. The other suspects are Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) and the Ansarullah Bangla Team. The Government has clearly blamed local groups ruling out the IS. In the last two years or so, nearly 50 persons are reported killed in some 20 or more targeted attacks by Islamist fundamentalists with IS claiming responsibility. The victims are liberals, secular Muslims, Hindus, Christians and Buddhists. According to Syed Badrul Ahsan from Dhaka’s Daily Observer, the modus operandi of the killers was: “three men on a motorbike, wielding guns and machetes”. In the Gulshan attack, the victims had their throats slit and given machete treatment to the accompaniment of gunfire and grenade explosions. Analysts believe that the seven local terrorists formed the IS module handled by the resident Emir, Abu Ibrahim Hanif, originally Tameem Choudhury. According to IS’s Amaq News and Dabiq magazine, JMB swears allegiance to IS and is inspired by their radical thoughts.
Military analysts in the West and some in Bangladesh say this big one was waiting to happen given the two-year history of extremist violence and targeted assassinations which the Government treated as a law and order problem. Most of the radicalisation has happened through IS propaganda, peer contact and networking. In April, Information Minister Hassan-ul Haq, who was a liberation war guerrilla fighter trained in India, told journalists in Dhaka that there are at least 8,000 Al Qaeda-trained extremists in Bangladesh who learnt their trade in Afghanistan and Pakistan with links to international terrorist networks .
During Prime Minister Zia’s period (2001-2006) the Bangladesh Nationalist Party-JeI coalition Government was soft on terror. The JMB’s famous 459 synchronised bombings in 63 districts in August 2005 and a spate of targeted assassinations had created mayhem. Hasina narrowly escaped a JMB bombing during an Awami league rally. In her previous spell as Prime Minister (2008 to 2014), six top JMB leaders were executed including the supremo, Maulana Abdur Rehman. In the crackdown JMB was eliminated from root but not before some cadres escaped to Assam and West Bengal. She put on notice, anti-India insurgents from Assam and the North-East, cleared their hideouts and handed over to India some of their leaders.
The JMB which was established to convert through armed struggle, a secular democracy into an IS, failed in its earlier mission. JMB 2.0 rose from the ashes to re-brand itself by mid 2015 as IS in Bangladesh with new leadership, strategy and tactics. This time, for starters, it has targeted un-Islamic institutions and crusader countries to create fear and radicalise the youth bulge to unseat the Government. Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) is fishing in troubled waters by funnelling funds to JMB. last year, a Pakistani diplomat was expelled for activities incompatible with her status. Bangladesh’s Home Minister was quick to blame ISI for enabling the terrorist strike and destabilising Bangladesh, though Hasina’s advisor, Gowher Rizvi, has denied this.
Bangladesh had earlier accused Pakistan of interfering in its internal affairs over Islamabad’s protests on the execution of JeI chief Motiur Rahman Nizami for war crimes in 1971 and misinterpreting the 1974 tripartite agreement between India, Bangladesh and Pakistan which had granted amnesty to 90,000 Pakistani prisoner of wars and 195 Pakistanis charged with war crimes. The amnesty did not apply to Bangladesh nationals which included JeI members involved in mass atrocity crimes.
lest we forget, the Army commando operation Thunderbolt to end the siege at Gulshan and rescue the hostages was launched within 10 hours (after the negotiations failedIJ) but not before the foreigners had ceased to live. Still it was a sharp and swift counter terrorism operation permitting minimum oxygen of publicity to IS/JMB. India can draw a lesson from the quick response and not delay operations for fear of collateral damage. New Delhi must raise the pitch for adoption of Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism in the United Nations General Assembly this year. The Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy members have to be convinced of the urgency of the convention. Similarly, the SAARC regional counter-terrorism convention needs to be re-configured subregionally to meet the new challenge. India must not let Bangladesh slip back into a terrorist haven.
Foreign travel advisories will have economic consequences not the least on export of garments from Bangladesh which is the leader. Japan has already cautioned its officials and citizens to lie low and undertake only essential travel. IS has proclaimed that Bangladesh will be its launch pad for attacks against India. Iconic Kolkata could be a future target.
When one asks about the brand of the attackers: “is it really ISIJ” one should look for extremist ideology, brutal strategy and savage tactics. The seven Bangladeshis — one unidentified — who executed the barbaric attack were young, affluent and educated and some Syria and Iraq-returned and committed to die for the cause. The one captured, the Ajmal Kasab of Gulshan, may hold the key to the brand and label of the attackers in Bangladesh.