The photograph on the World pages of yesterday’s edition of The National said it all. Five men in hospital pyjamas were sat on gurneys displaying bandages that covered identical wounds to their hands. Each of them had had a finger cut off by Taliban militants for the “crime” of exercising the right to vote in Afghanistan’s presidential election run-off. They were among 11 victims of amputation in Herat alone. Elsewhere, more than 50 people were killed in bombings and other attacks for defying the insurgents.
This ugly spree of murder and amputation is in no way indicative of the “pure” Islam that the Taliban purports to represent. It is an instrument of propaganda in a campaign of fear. By cutting off fingers that have or will be used to register votes, the Taliban is crudely warning others to stay away from the polling booths. It is an attempt to subvert the democratic process that promises some kind of hope for that desperate, war-ravaged country.
The Taliban do not have anywhere near the popular support they need to retake control of Afghanistan by any legitimate means – and they know it. Instead, they are hoping to frighten the people into bending to their will.
There are parallels here with the actions of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) – an Al Qaeda offshoot with such a reputation for cruelty that it has been disowned by its parent. When ISIL took over the city of Raqqa in central Syria from the Free Syrian Army and other anti-Assad regime groups, its strict enforcement of religious rule raged from summary killings, to forcing people to pray and employing the wives of insurgents to beat up school girls who failed to follow an imposed dress code. As ISIL advanced into Iraq late last week, it released chilling photographs that appeared to depict executions of resisting Iraqis.
The Afghan Taliban and ISIL trade in fear because that is all they can offer. As its name suggests, ISIL’s adherents claim that they want to establish an Islamic caliphate encompassing Syria and Iraq. But killing and maiming civilians are not the actions of men of faith let alone goodwill, they are manifestations of a movement that is both morally and politically bankrupt.
