Three weeks after President Donald Trump announced the withdrawal of US forces from northern Syria, Islamic State (IS) chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, one of the world’s most-wanted terrorists, blew himself up along with three of his children. The US, which had offered a $25-million reward for his capture, the same amount as that for Al-Qaeda leader and 9/11 mastermind Osama bin Laden, has every reason to gloat over his death. Trump, in particular, has received a shot in the arm at a time when he is facing an impeachment inquiry in the US House of Representatives.

The Americans have perhaps only themselves to blame for letting Baghdadi run riot for so long. He was captured in 2003, the year he joined the Salafi jihadist insurgency and the US-led forces invaded Iraq. He was released about a year later as his captors thought he was a ‘civilian agitator rather than a military threat’. Iranian information minister Mohammad Javad Azari-Jahromi was not far off the mark when he tweeted after the IS head’s death: ‘Not a big deal, you just killed your creature.’ Iran holds the US and its allies responsible for creating the IS, a throwback to America’s unstinted support to the mujahideen during the almost decade-long Soviet-Afghan war.

Baghdadi is dead, but the ideology of sectarian hatred he propagated is well and truly alive. With the fall of its stronghold Mosul in 2017, the IS had lost all the territory it once controlled in Iraq. Despite the reversals, the jihadist movement remains a potent force as it has managed to establish a cyber caliphate that runs beyond borders. IS teachings are spreading fast online, heightening the threat of ‘lone wolf’ attacks from those who get radicalised through the Internet. India, which has been grappling with terrorism for decades, especially in Kashmir, needs to be more vigilant to counter the IS influence. The fact that terrorists owing allegiance to Baghdadi struck in the subcontinent, triggering the Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka in April this year, should spur New Delhi to aggressively join the global war against terror.

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Courtesy: The Tribune: 30th October,  2019