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| I interviewed Hazrat Ali in May 2023 in Vienna, Austria. |
Hazrat Ali, the commander of a 1,000-strong unit of local forces who were present in the Tora Bora battle to capture Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri in November and December 2001, said in an exclusive interview with Independent Persian that the mountains of Afghanistan are now free of foreign terrorists because they have moved into the cities and are present within the Taliban's security structures.
The operation to capture Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, which took place from November 30 to December 17, 2001, in the Tora Bora mountain range in eastern Afghanistan, led to the destruction of one of al-Qaeda's most notorious strongholds in Afghanistan. During this operation, known as the "Battle of Tora Bora," Hazrat Ali was in command of the ground forces while American troops monitored the situation from the air.
According to Hazrat Ali, during that battle, dozens of al-Qaeda fighters, mostly from Arab countries, were killed, captured, or detained. At that time, al-Qaeda was a key ally of the Taliban in Afghanistan, and Osama bin Laden had the direct support of Mullah Omar, the Taliban leader.
Bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri survived this complex operation. Osama bin Laden was later killed on May 1, 2011, in Abbottabad, Pakistan, and Ayman al-Zawahiri was killed on July 31, 2022, in a U.S. airstrike in Kabul.
Now, 23 years later, Hazrat Ali says that al-Qaeda and other foreign terrorists are still present in Afghanistan; however, the location of these foreign terrorists has changed, moving from the mountains to the cities.
Hazrat Ali was born in 1964 in Laghman. After the formation of the jihadist parties fighting against the Soviet military invasion of Afghanistan, he joined the Islamic Party led by Yunus Khalis. Hazrat Ali is from the Pashtun ethnic group of Afghanistan. During the 1980s and 1990s, by forming armed forces in eastern Afghanistan, he became one of the powerful figures ruling parts of the border cities with Pakistan, including Jalalabad. With the emergence of the Taliban movement, Hazrat Ali joined Ahmad Shah Masoud's military front and now collaborates with the Jamiat-e Islami party.
In 2001, with the support of coalition air forces, Hazrat Ali expelled the Taliban from the city of Jalalabad and governed a large part of eastern Afghanistan until the formation of the interim government led by Hamid Karzai. He ran for parliament in 2005 and served as a representative of Nangarhar in the House of Representatives until the last days of Ashraf Ghani's government.
Like many Afghan political leaders who have fought against the Taliban, Hazrat Ali left Afghanistan with the collapse of the Republic government and now lives in exile in various countries.
Referring to the killing of Ayman al-Zawahiri in July 2022 in Kabul, Hazrat Ali said that the Taliban host foreign terrorists in their cities and offices, and all factions of the Taliban agree with the presence of foreign terrorists in Afghanistan.
According to Hazrat Ali, foreign terrorists work in Taliban security institutions, including the Ministry of Interior, Defense, and Intelligence Administration, in educational sectors, and their presence is public knowledge among all Taliban members. He added: “Al-Qaeda, ISIS, Central Asian and Chinese terrorists have no bases or military strongholds in any of the villages, as they are all in the cities and within the Taliban system.”
Hazrat Ali, who has experience fighting the Taliban in eastern Afghanistan, believes that while there are disagreements among Taliban leaders, they are united in their fight against their common enemy.
Hazrat Ali added that with the Taliban's return to power in August 2021, foreign terrorists have moved from their bases in the border regions between Pakistan and Afghanistan to cities in Afghanistan, including Kabul, Kandahar, Helmand, Mazar-i-Sharif, and other cities, and al-Qaeda members are now present in these cities.
ISIS-Khorasan began its activities in eastern Afghanistan, particularly in Kunar and Nangarhar provinces, in 2014. Hazrat Ali says he has extensive influence in eastern Afghanistan and knows the villages in this region "house by house." He claims that in recent months, the number of ISIS-Khorasan members has significantly increased due to the increased recruitment of ISIS from among the people. According to Hazrat Ali, ISIS-Khorasan has about 7,000 armed fighters in Afghanistan, but due to its guerrilla warfare tactics, it does not have specific military bases.
Hazrat Ali believes that neither ISIS nor the Taliban are present to govern Afghanistan, and both groups, with their specific agendas, "act equally in destroying Afghanistan."
Despite maintaining extensive popular influence in eastern Afghanistan, Hazrat Ali has not yet joined the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan, led by Ahmad Massoud, the son of Ahmad Shah Massoud, the national hero of Afghanistan. Hazrat Ali said: “I have a close relationship with Ahmad Massoud and occasionally visit him in Dushanbe, but I have not yet taken armed action against the Taliban.”
Hazrat Ali believes that the Taliban's actions in suppressing the people will pave the way for a public uprising against the group. Meanwhile, Taliban spokespeople have repeatedly claimed, referring to the general amnesty decree issued by the group's leader, that people are satisfied with the group's governance.
"Our mistake was supporting Ashraf Ghani"
Regarding the collapse of the Republic government in Afghanistan, Hazrat Ali said that the mistake of the mujahideen and political parties was supporting Ashraf Ghani. He describes Ashraf Ghani as a "power-hungry and monopolistic individual" and says that Ghani's performance in governance and monopolizing all affairs led to the collapse of the government.
Hazrat Ali added: “Our mistake, too, was supporting Ashraf Ghani.”
This former military commander says that it is once again time for the opponents of the Taliban to unite to end the group's dominance over Afghanistan. In response to a question about the disagreements among the leaders of the Jamiat-e Islami party, he said: “Recent efforts are underway for all leaders to unite and for Jamiat to function again as a cohesive and powerful entity.”
Hazrat Ali added: “People under the Taliban's rule feel they are prisoners. The economy has collapsed, there is no security, and everyone is fed up with the situation. Many people think that dying in a war is better than living in this situation
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