Ashura Attack In Bangladesh Raises Troubling Questions
Unlike Pakistan, which experiences terrorist attacks during Murrham annually (last week, Pakistan suffered multiple mass casualty bombings), Bangladesh does not have a history of sectarian terrorism. That’s why Saturday’s tragic bombing during the Shia holy day of Ashura came as such a shock. As with other recent attacks in Bangladesh, persons claiming to represent the so-called “Islamic State” terrorist group (ISIS) claimed responsibility, but there has been no solid evidence of ISIS’s involvement in any of these attacks, and terrorism experts have expressed doubt about the claim. The attack against the Ashura procession, however, does raise some troubling questions.
The timing of the attack is particularly interesting. While ISIS is adamantly anti-Shia, most jihadi literature – including that produced by ISIS – vilifies the government of Bangladesh for maintaining close relations with India and promoting religious harmony, particularly with the country’s Hindu population. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina recently visited Hindu temples and spoke about her respect for religious pluralism and her government’s dedication to defending the rights of religious minorities.
“We want the people of all religions to live here in peace. Members of the Hindu community are the children of this soil. You’re living in this soil, you’re the children of this soil, so you’ll live here with confidence.”
The Hindu festival of Durga Puja was celebrated just a few days prior to Ashura in Bangladesh without serious incident. In fact, media reports even describe Bangladeshis from varying faiths coming together to show respect for the ancient tradition.
ISIS has condemned the Bangladeshi regime as “taghuti” – an Arabic term meaning “to rebel” which is used in Islamic theology to describe idolaters. In contrast, ISIS literature tends to use the term “Rafidah” – an Arabic word meaning “those who reject,” a reference to the controversy over the succession of the Islamic Caliphate in the first century – when denigrating Shia. This suggests that the group’s primary complaint with Bangladesh is with the syncretic Bengali culture and the government’s commitment to protecting its Hindu community, not the influence of Shi’ism.
Even in Pakistan, whose Shia have suffered astonishingly regular attacks in recent years, anti-Shia militancy is almost always carried out by domestic sectarian groups such as Ahlay Sunnat Wal Jamaat and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi which have ties to Saudi Arabia. Bangladesh has no such history of sectarian militancy.
The governing Awami League has again rejected the claim that ISIS is responsible for attacks, and has once again blamed the opposition BNP-Jamaat-e-Islami alliance for orchestrating violence as part of an ongoing effort “to destabilise the country and disturb the law and order situation.” Curiously, Jamaat-e-Islami leader Moqbul Ahmed responded to the attack not by expressing concern about religious intolerance, but by declaring that the attack “is a clear sign of a deteriorated law and order.”
Today, police in Bangladesh announced that arrests have been made in connection with the killing of Italian citizen Cesare Tavella. According to reports, the murder was not an ISIS attack, but a political one.
The assailants’ plan was to ‘murder any white person’ to lead the other countries to believe that ‘Bangladesh was not safe for foreigners’, the law-enforcers claim.
Like the murders of Cesare Tavella and Kunio Hoshi, many have noted that Saturday’s Ashura attack carries few of being carried out by ISIS who prefers spectacular attacks with specific and identifiable goals. Investigations are ongoing into the actual perpetrators, and Bangladesh’s media has responded with a call for communal solidarity and religious tolerance. If ISIS is not responsible for this attack, though, who is? Political parties should know using terrorism as a strategy to destabilize a government and gain power will only end up consuming them and further harming the entire country in the long term. The US and Bangladesh’s other Western allies must convey to opposition groups that, however valid their concerns, terrorism is never an acceptable tool for a legitimate political party.