America’s new ally in the battle against Isis: the Taliban

Isis are back. In fact, to borrow Gerry Adams’s remark about the IRA, they never went away. Now, they are regaining some of their previous strength in Syria and Iraq, and moving into fresh territory in Africa. Of most importance to the West, the Afghan branch of Isis – Isis Khorasan – is said to be plotting more direct attacks on the ‘far enemy’, as well as pumping out propaganda to create so-called ‘lone wolves’. But with the stakes rising, it seems the United States may have found a new ally in the battle against Isis: the Taliban. The enemy of my enemy…

We’re talking about Isis again because last week a convert drove his pick-up truck into a dense crowd out partying on Bourbon Street in New Orleans, killing 14 people. Shamsud-Din Jabbar acted alone, according to the FBI, and was also clearly a troubled man. He was in turmoil after getting divorced and recorded a video message for his family saying he’d like to kill them too. ‘I don’t want you to think I spared you willingly.’ As so often with lone wolves, the question is whether he became violent because he was radicalised or became radicalised because he was violent.

Lone wolf or lone nut, there was plenty of Isis material online to inspire him. One Isis media campaign has the slogan ‘Run them over without mercy’, along with a cartoon of a 4×4 crushing the skulls of unbelievers. This is a variation on a regular Isis meme, ‘Kill them wherever you find them’, a phrase from the Quran. This poison is injected into social media from many places, by Isis fanboys as much as by some central authority, but much of it seems to come from Isis Khorasan, or Isis-K, in Afghanistan.