Taliban Issues Humiliating Demand to Biden, With Deadline Sept. 11

[IceWizard]

Taliban Issues Humiliating Demand to Biden,
With Deadline Sept. 11

August 21, 2021






Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen said Biden should withdraw all U.S. troops
by Sept. 11 pursuant to a 2020 agreement the group had made with the
Afghan government.

Former President Donald Trump had negotiated the historic peace accord
between the warring factions last year, including setting a May 1, 2021 deadline
for the withdrawal of U.S forces from Afghanistan.

“I think they should get their troops out of Afghanistan,” Shaheen told Sky News
on Tuesday.

“They have already violated the time frame which was enshrined in the Doha agreement,
when they announced that they will withdraw all their forces until Sept. 11.
So they should withdraw all their forces.”

Shaheen added that “we are committed not to attack them and we have not attacked them.”

Of course, the implicit threat was that the Taliban could attack if U.S. troops are not
removed by the stated deadline.

Before this week, could you ever have imagined a scenario where the American
president — the leader of the free world – would’ve had to submit to an ultimatum
from a group of malnourished goat herders?

Could Biden be any more humiliated on the world stage?

This has been the worst week of Biden’s presidency. That’s saying a lot, given the
multiple crises ravaging the country right now, including daily border sieges,
skyrocketing inflation, soaring gas prices and nationwide crime waves.

And that’s not including the continuing revelations about the cringeworthy, drug-fueled
prostitution benders in which the president’s troubled son, Hunter Biden, has been entangled.

While the corporate media typically downplay or ignore Biden’s numerous scandals
and gaffes, he was nearly universally reviled this week for his poorly executed
withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan.

Even the left-wing apologists at CNN excoriated the 78-year-old career politician for his
abysmal lack of strategic planning.

CNN’s Jake Tapper on Afghanistan:

"[Biden] keeps trying to change the subject from this inept withdrawal.
Let’s be frank here, if you withdraw 2,500 troops then you have to send
6,000 back, that’s not planned. That’s on it's face an example of a failure.”

Julia Chatterley
@jchatterleyCNN

“It’s a failure of intelligence...lack of understanding...lack of planning...
lack of communications of honesty with the American people & with allies.”

@ianbremmer weighs in on President #Biden's role & response
in the #Taliban takeover.

On Tuesday night, Trump also laid into Biden during a wide-ranging interview with
Fox News host Sean Hannity.

Like many Americans, the former president also wants U.S. troops out of Afghanistan
after 20 years, thousands of dead soldiers and trillions of dollars wasted on another
country’s civil war.

However, it was the haphazard, chaotic manner that Biden executed the move that
drew bipartisan backlash.

“It is a terrible time for our country,” Trump told Hannity. “I don’t think in all of the
years our country has ever been so humiliated.”

He recounted: “I looked at that big monster cargo plane yesterday with people
grabbing the side and trying to get flown out of Afghanistan because of their incredible
fear — and they’re blowing off of the plane from 2,000 feet up in the air.
Nobody has ever seen anything like that.”

Trump said the harrowing scenes of America’s Vietnam debacle pale in comparison.

TRT World
@trtworld

Desperate civilians scramble to get a place on a plane at Kabul airport in Afghanistan
on Monday amid the US withdrawal.

For many, it brought back memories of Vietnam in April 1975

“That blows the helicopters in Vietnam away,” the former president said.
“That is not even a contest. It has been the most humiliating period of time
that I’ve ever seen.”

For the first time in years, there is bipartisan consensus on an issue:
Biden failed colossally, and he owns this historic catastrophe.

[Charon]

absolutely heart breaking. what has this man done to our country? to our image as good guys? And what about all the veterans whom lost limbs and lives only to have a weak man whom never served his country a day in his life screw up the entire evacuation plan. tossed it assunder.

Horse's padukkah.

[Charon]

AMERICANS KILLED: US Marines killed, wounded in ‘complex’ series of terror attacks rocking Kabul. hxxps://fxn.ws/3xOWFYv

[Furyan66]

This is a dark day in U.S. history

So far 12 service members killed, 15 injured with numbers expecting to rise.

I'd like to offer a prayer to all these veterans and families who have lost their loved ones not just today but throughout the last 2 decades. Prayers also going out to All Americans and Allies that are stranded in Afghanistan. And prayers to all the service members that are their right now in extreme danger. I Pray for you all

Only a completely incompetent or senile President would pull out all the troops before civilians and allies, fail to either remove or destroy all the weapons that were left behind while ignoring all the advice given by his advisors.

This President (if you can call him that) has ALL this blood on his hands now and I fear the situation will get nothing but worse with more lives lost.

This man has NO BUSINESS and is incapable of being President with what he has done to the United States of America. Our allies no longer trust us and I don't blame them.

I fully support the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan but not in this haphazard, chaotic way in which he did it.

Take the handcuffs off the military and let them do their job. NO ONE LEFT BEHIND!!!!

Prayers to all

Fury

[Charon]

Father God in Jesus name I ask that you help your children get out of that country. Every American and everyone whom helped America over twenty years. Save so many that the world looks upward toward you My Lord. This is horrifying. Way beyond what we can handle. Save our military, our people, our civilian helpers.





5 minute read
A screen grab shows people carrying an injured person to a hospital after an attack at Kabul airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan August 26, 2021. REUTERS TV/1TV/Handout via REUTERS
A wounded person is wheeled into hospital on a stretcher after explosions at the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, August 26, 2021. 1TV via REUTERS
Crowds of people show their documents to U.S. troops outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan August 26, 2021. REUTERS/Stringer


1/20
A wounded person is wheeled into hospital on a stretcher after explosions at the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, August 26, 2021. 1TV via REUTERS


Summary
Blasts leave dozens of bodies, wounded victims
Western nations had warned of Islamic State threat
Pentagon spokesman calls it a 'complex attack'
U.S. to shift focus to getting last troops out
Aug 26 (Reuters) - Islamic State struck the crowded gates of Kabul airport in a suicide bomb attack on Thursday, killing scores of civilians and 12 U.S. troops, and throwing into mayhem the airlift of tens of thousands of Afghans desperate to flee.

Kabul health officials were quoted as saying 60 civilians were killed. Video shot by Afghan journalists showed dozens of bodies strewn around a canal on the edge of the airport. At least two blasts rocked the area, witnesses said.


It was believed to be the most U.S. troops killed in Afghanistan in a single incident since 30 U.S. personnel died when a helicopter was shot down in August 2011. U.S. President Joe Biden was due to speak to the nation later on Thursday.


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Islamic State, which has emerged in Afghanistan as enemies both of the West and the Taliban, claimed responsibility in a statement in which it said one of its suicide bombers targeted "translators and collaborators with the American army". U.S. officials also blamed the group.

(Also Read: What is Islamic State in Afghanistan?)

Corpses lay in the canal by the airport fence, video from the scene showed, some being fished out and laid in heaps while wailing civilians searched for loved ones.

"For a moment I thought my eardrums were blasted and I lost my sense of hearing. I saw bodies and body parts flying in the air like a tornado blowing plastic bags. I saw bodies, body parts elders and injured men, women and children scattered," said one Afghan who had been trying to reach the airport. "That little water flowing in the sewage canal had turned into blood."


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The U.S. deaths were the first in action in Afghanistan in 18 months, a fact likely to be cited by critics who accuse Biden of recklessly abandoning a stable and hard-won status quo by ordering an abrupt pullout.


General Frank McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, said the United States would press on with evacuations, noting that there were still around 1,000 U.S. citizens in Afghanistan. But several Western countries said the mass airlift of civilians was coming to an end, likely to leave no way out for tens of thousands of Afghans who worked for the West through two decades of war.

Violence by Islamic State is a challenge for the Taliban, who have promised Afghans they will bring peace to the country they swiftly conquered. A Taliban spokesman described the attack as the work of "evil circles" who would be suppressed once foreign troops leave.


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Western countries fear that the Taliban, who once sheltered Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda, will allow Afghanistan to turn again into a haven for militants. The Taliban say they will not let the country be used by terrorists.

(Also Read: Recent major attacks linked to Islamic State in Afghanistan)

THREAT TO AIRPORT

Zubair, a 24 year-old civil engineer, who had been trying for a nearly week to get inside the airport with a cousin who had papers authorising him to travel to the United States, said he was 50 metres from a suicide bomber who detonated explosives at the gate.

"Men, women and children were screaming. I saw many injured people – men, women and children – being loaded into private vehicles and taken toward the hospitals," he said, adding that after the explosions there was gunfire.

Washington and its allies had been urging civilians to stay away from the airport, citing the threat from Islamic State.

In the past 12 days, Western countries have evacuated nearly 100,000 people. But they acknowledge that thousands will be left behind following Biden's order to pull out all troops by Aug 31.

The last few days of the airlift will mostly be used to withdraw the remaining troops. Canada and some European countries have already announced the end of their airlifts.

Biden ordered all troops out of Afghanistan by the end of the month to comply with a withdrawal agreement with the Taliban negotiated by his predecessor Donald Trump. Biden spurned calls this week from European allies for more time.

The collapse of the Western-backed government in Afghanistan caught U.S. officials by surprise and risks reversing gains, especially in the rights of women and girls, millions of whom have been going to school and work, once forbidden under the Taliban.

Biden has defended the decision to leave, saying U.S. forces could not stay indefinitely. But his critics say the U.S. force, which once numbered more than 100,000, had been reduced in recent years to just a few thousand troops, no longer involved in fighting on the ground and mainly confined to an air base. It was a fraction of the size of U.S. military contingents that have stayed in places such as Korea for decades.

(Also Read: U.S. military deaths in Afghanistan are Biden's nightmare scenario)

Fighters claiming allegiance to Islamic State began appearing in eastern Afghanistan at the end of 2014 and have established a reputation for extreme brutality. They have claimed responsibility for suicide attacks on civilians, government targets and ethnic and sectarian minorities.

Since the day before the Taliban swept into Kabul, the United States and its allies have mounted one of the biggest air evacuations in history, bringing out about 95,700 people, including 13,400 on Wednesday, the White House said on Thursday.

The Taliban have encouraged Afghans to stay, while saying those with permission to leave will still be allowed to do so once foreign troops depart and commercial flights resume.

The Taliban's 1996-2001 rule was marked by public executions and the curtailment of basic freedoms. The group was overthrown two decades ago by U.S.-led forces for hosting the al Qaeda militants who masterminded the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

Reporting by Reuters bureaus Writing by Stephen Coates, Robert Birsel, Nick Macfie, Peter Graff and Daniel Wallis; Editing by Clarence Fernandez, Simon Cameron-Moore, Frances Kerry, Edmund Blair and Grant McCool
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Asia Pacific
Kabul airport suicide bombings kill 12 U.S. troops; Pentagon says threat persists

Asia Pacific
U.S. military deaths in Afghanistan are Biden's nightmare scenario

World
Kabul attacks pull familiar adversary Islamic State back into U.S. sights



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[Charon]

[Charon]

[Charon]

[Charon]

[Charon]

Pentagon:    
Isaac Schorr - 1h ago

Pentagon: ‘Thousands’ of ISIS-K Combatants Released by Taliban

© Reuters
Taliban fighters march in uniforms on the street in Qalat, Zabul Province, Afghanistan, in this still image taken from social media video uploaded August 19, 2021.
Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said that “thousands” of prisoners affiliated with ISIS-K (Islamic State Khorosan Province) — the terrorist group responsible for yesterday’s attacks at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul — had been freed from Afghan prisons in recent months as the United States moved forward with a military withdrawal.

On Friday, Fox News’s Jennifer Griffin asked Kirby “how many ISIS-K prisoners were left at Bagram and believed to have been released from the prison there and why weren’t they removed before the U.S. pulled out to some place like Gitmo?”

Kirby responded by conceding that “clearly, it’s in the thousands” while maintaining that he did not have an exact number. Bagram Airbase fell to the Taliban on August 15, just a little over a month after U.S. forces abandoned the base in the dead of night without notifying the Afghan commander on site and even cutting the electricity to the base to aid their exodus.


The spokesman stressed that it was the U.S.’s belief that Afghan forces were responsible for the release of the prisoners by the Taliban.

While the Taliban and ISIS-K are known to be rivals with a history of bad blood — the latter being scornful of the former’s lack religious zeal — Kirby’s words would seem to indicate that Taliban forces had no qualms about releasing ISIS-K’s combatants alongside their own.

The revelation also calls into question previous estimates of the Islamic State’s capacity in Afghanistan and Pakistan. It was believed that at its height in 2016, ISIS-K boasted only 3,000-4,000 fighters, and that that number had been depleted in the years since.

Yesterday, in a press conference following the bombing that killed at least 13 U.S. service members, CENTCOM Commander Kenneth McKenzie revealed that the U.S. military had been sharing intelligence with the Taliban, citing a “common purpose” of finishing the ongoing evacuation mission by August 31 as justification.

More on National Review

Biden’s Deadly Afghanistan Gamble
The Cost to Our Security
The ‘Forever War’ Fallacy