Jihadi War Between Taliban and Islamic State Intensifies in Afghanistan

Deadly clashes between jihadi rivals the Taliban and the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) have intensified this week in eastern Afghanistan’s Nangarhar and Kunar provinces, reportedly leaving several terrorists dead and displacing hundreds of families.

Neighboring Nangahar and Kunar provinces border Pakistan, which the United States, India, and Afghanistan have repeatedly accused of harboring the Afghan Taliban and other jihadis.

In an interview with Khaama Press (KP) published on Thursday, Ataullah Khogyani, a spokesman for the governor of Nangarhar, confirmed that “clashes intensified between Taliban and ISIS militants in [the province’s] Khogyani and Shirzad district in the past two days, leaving several militants dead.” . . .

The Nangarhar spokesman revealed that the fighting has displaced at least 300 families, noting that there are efforts underway to provide them with aid. Officials in Kunar told KP similar battles between ISIS and the Taliban had taken place in the province’s Chapa Dara district. . .

Jihadis like the Taliban generate most of their funding from trafficking and cultivating opium, the primary ingredient in heroin, some of which is fueling the unprecedented number of drug overdoses in the United States. Afghanistan remains the world’s top producer of opium despite billions of American taxpayer funds devoted to counternarcotics in the war-ravaged country. (Read more from “Jihadi War Between Taliban and Islamic State Intensifies in Afghanistan” HERE)

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