This article appeared in the Jerusalem Post on 22 June 2021
Today Israel is home to more than 10,000 Jews of Afghan descent. In Afghanistan itself there are no Jews at all – except one. Zablon Simentov is convinced that he is the last Jew in the country. Simentov lives in Kabul’s only synagogue, housed in an old building in the center of the Afghan capital. He has survived a Soviet invasion, deadly civil war, brutal rule by the Taliban and the US-led occupation of his homeland. Over the decades all his relatives have left, including his wife and two daughters. He has been imprisoned by the Taliban four times. Still, he refused to leave.
Come the autumn, however, Simentov will almost certainly be making his way to Israel. He has vowed that if the Taliban ever return to power he will leave Afghanistan – and this they are highly likely to do once US and NATO troops pull out. US president Joe Biden has set the iconic date of 9/11 – September 11, 2021, exactly twenty years since the attack by al-Qaeda on the USA that triggered the American invasion – as the absolute deadline for the total withdrawal of US armed forces, although they may all have gone by the end of July.
However neither Biden, nor NATO, nor any of the coalition nations, has put in place an effective military presence or a strong administration to follow their withdrawal. Meanwhile the Taliban are seizing the initiative by launching intensive attacks on government forces, and are threatening the capital, Kabul.
Turkey, both a Muslim country and a member of NATO, is making the most of its equivocal position. During the NATO conference on June 14, Turkey – which has been hosting talks with the Taliban and the Afghan government – undertook to safeguard the air link out of Kabul after US forces had left. This was taken to mean that Turkey would prevent Hamid Karzai International Airport from falling into Taliban hands. How much reliance can be placed on this undertaking is doubtful, but US officials are reported to have seized on it.
The Taliban, which emerged
following a 10-year occupation of the country by the Soviet Union, swiftly
became a formidable military machine. Towards the end of 1996 it captured the
Afghan capital, Kabul. By 1998, the Taliban were in control of almost 90
percent of Afghanistan.
Initial support from
some of the population quickly faded as the fundamentalist group imposed
hardline Islamist practices, such as amputations for those found guilty of
theft, and public executions of adulterers. Television, music and cinema were
banned, and girls aged 10 and over were forbidden to attend school.
Meanwhile, they continued to wage their two-handed war against the US presence
in the country on the one hand, and the Afghan government on the other. That
conflict continues.
Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who has twice served as Afghanistan’s prime minister, is reported as warning that what he terms the “irresponsible” American withdrawal is leaving behind a government unable to avoid a certain war, as the Taliban attempts to take back control of the country. “It seems very improbable for the Afghan government and its military to be able to sustain this fighting.” he said.
There is just a chance that Hekmatyar’s fears may prove
premature. Despite Biden’s announcement
about the US military withdrawal, reports have appeared in the media suggesting
that an internal debate in the Pentagon is under way over what level of Taliban
resurgence would amount to a national security threat to the US, and therefore
justify military action. For example, if
the Taliban tries to retake Kabul or another key capital in the wake of US
forces withdrawing, airstrikes in support of the Afghan government, involving US
aircraft or armed drones, may be justified.
Since there would be no US
aircraft remaining in Afghanistan, any future attacks would have to be launched
from bases elsewhere. Biden, who would himself
have to approve any such action, is likely to require a good deal of
convincing.
Meanwhile the UK has
decided to allow over 4000 Afghans who worked for the British military, mostly
as interpreters, to settle in Britain together with their families. Defence minister Ben Wallace explained that those
being relocated were people who might otherwise "be at risk of
reprisals" from the Taliban. He
said those who worked for the British had "sacrificed a lot to look after
us, and now is the time to do the same".
Secretary of State Priti
Patel said: "It's our moral obligation to recognize the risks they faced
in the fight against terrorism and reward their efforts."
The US, who employed
many more local Afghans, is working on a similar scheme to protect those who
worked as translators for US forces and now fear for their lives once foreign
troops leave Afghanistan. On June 10 General
Mark Milley, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, said: “The United States
government will do what is necessary in order to ensure the safety and
protection of those that have been working with us for two decades.”
Defense Secretary Lloyd
Austin gave the same message to the Senate Armed Services Committee.
In disengaging from Afghanistan, the Western alliance is tacitly acknowledging that its involvement and its effort has failed. It has tried for twenty years to ensure that a democratically elected Afghan government was backed by a well- trained professional military capable of maintaining the peace. Yet the extreme Islamist Taliban are currently occupying a large area of the country and, heavily armed, seem poised to defeat the government and take control of the nation. The 3,500 American lives and the $2.26 trillion expenditure seem an inordinately heavy price to have paid for so little gain.
https://jewishbusinessnews.com/2021/06/18/the-us-leaves-afghanistan-to-its-fate/
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