The Metastasizing Cancer of Pakistan- and Afghanistan-based Islamic Terrorism

The above image graphically shows the continued spread of terror wreaked by Islamic fundamentalist groups based in Pakistan and Afghanistan (shown in red as the new foci of international terrorism). All countries and regions affected by the terror, and those where funds are collected by these groups are shown in black.

Osama Bin Laden's network, which supports numerous terrorist groups in Afghanistan, collaborates extensively and shares training facilities with over a dozen Islamic terrorist groups based in Pakistan. The Pakistani groups that collaborate with Bin Laden's network are well known to be financed and sponsored by the Pakistani intelligence agency, ISI and its military (New York Times, October 10, 2000).

Many of the groups based in Pakistan and Afghanistan target India, especially Jammu and Kashmir state with holy jihad. Many of these same groups also carry out violent insurgencies and terrorist operations in such far-flung places as Chechnya, Xinjiang region of China, Philippines, Malaysia, Bosnia, Egypt. Geographically, the terror wreaked by these groups extends from Argentina and United States in the western hemisphere all the way to the Xinjiang region of China, the Philippines and Malaysia in the far east. A Pakistani national was arrested recently in the US on suspicion for involvement in the bombings of the Israeli embassy in Argentina in the early 1990s. Even Australia and New Zealand have not been spared. Prior to the recent Olympics, several Afghanistani citizens were arrested in New Zealand for suspected involvement in a plot to blow up the Sydney nuclear reactor during the Olympic Games.

The terror continues unabated today. Dozens of Hindu and other pro-Indian civilians, and security personnel, are butchered every week by Pakistan/Afghanistan-based Islamic terrorist groups such as Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, Lashkar-e-Toiba, Al-Badr Mujahideen, Tehrik-ul-Mujahideen and Hizbul Mujahideen, in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. These activities do not appear on the front pages of western media, which is much more sensitive when United States "interests" are targeted, an example being the October 12th attack in Yemen on the US naval ship Cole. The half-hearted US battle against international terrorism is exemplified by US Counter-Terrorism coordinator twiddling his thumbs over declaring the Lashkar-e-Toiba (one of the most dangerous and largest Islamic militant groups in the world) a terrorist organization. As many recent reports, including the Oct. 10 New York Times article indicate, groups like Lashkar see India, Israel, the United States and many other countries around the world as their eventual targets for Islamic fundamentalist rule.