Undetected IS cells operate in Kabul

Recruit students, professors, shopkeepers as they are able to evade security

At the ready: A file photo of an Afghan policeman outside the ul-Uloom mosquein Kabul.

Middle-class Afghans turned jihadists have assisted the Islamic State group’s expansion from its stronghold in Afghanistan’s restive east to Kabul, analysts say, helping to make the capital one of the deadliest places in the country.

IS has claimed nearly 20 attacks across Kabul in 18 months, with cells including students, professors and shopkeepers evading Afghan and US security forces to bring carnage to the highly fortified city.

It is an alarming development for Kabul’s war-weary civilians and beleaguered security forces, who are already struggling to beat back the resurgent Taliban, as well as for the U.S. counter-terrorism mission in Afghanistan.

“This is not just a group that has a rural bastion in eastern Afghanistan — it is staging high-casualty, high-visibility attacks in the nation’s capital and I think that’s something to be worried about,” said analyst Michael Kugelman of the Wilson Center in Washington.

The Islamic State-Khorasan Province (IS-K), the Middle East group’s affiliate in Afghanistan and Pakistan, emerged in the region in 2014, largely made up of disaffected fighters from the Taliban and other jihadist groups in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Central Asia.

It claimed its first attack in Kabul in the summer of 2016.

Since then the Sunni group has struck at security forces and Shiites with increasing frequency, helped by its growing network in the capital.

There is no shortage of recruits, analysts say. IS has successfully tapped a rich vein of extremism in Afghanistan that has existed for decades and crosses socio-economic groups — fanned by growing internet access among urban youth.