Taliban Pose for Victory Selfies in Afghan City

[Insight]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/29/wo...ghan-city.html


Taliban Pose for Victory Selfies in Afghan City

SEPT. 28, 2015

Selfie With a Talib

In a video clip sent to the Afghan television channel Tolo on Monday, a resident posed with a Taliban fighter in the city of Kunduz after the insurgents expelled government forces.
By TOLO TV on Publish Date September 28, 2015. Photo by Tolonews. Watch in Times Video »




By ROBERT MACKEY

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As some veteran foreign correspondents pointed out, watching Taliban insurgents storm into the northern Afghan city of Kunduz on Monday and declare their intention to govern according to Islamic law seemed to echo the way the city was taken by Western-backed, Islamist mujahedeen in 1988, just days after the withdrawal of Soviet troops.
Then, as now, Afghan government forces vowed to retake the city swiftly, as a superpower that controlled the skies above the country seemed unable to impose its will on the ground.
There is, however, one obvious difference between the Islamists of the two eras. The Taliban of the 21st century, armed with mobile phones and Internet connections, moved quickly to declare victory on social networks before an expected counteroffensive from government troops massed at an air base on the outskirts of the provincial capital.



One image posted on Twitter by Zabihulla Mujahid, a Taliban spokesman, showed fighters waving the white flag of their movement in the town’s center.

د کندز ښارد فتحې په مناسبت د اسلامي امارت دمقام اعلامیه http://t.co/g4pEs45dw6 pic.twitter.com/tuTfoecVh8
— zabihulla.mujahid (@ZabihullaM) Sept. 28, 2015

Within hours of the entering of Kunduz, photographs and video of Taliban fighters roaming at apparent ease, and posing beside their flag with residents, spread on Facebook and Twitter.

Taliban and Maneuver of Power! #Kunduz pic.twitter.com/3lDUGR21GU
— Muslim Shirzad (@MuslimShirzad) Sept. 28, 2015

#Kunduz resident are taking selfie with Taliban members in city center. pic.twitter.com/7asUZ0fNPr
— Mustafa Deveci (@Mustafa_DVC) Sept. 28, 2015

Taliban with police vehicles in the streets of Kunduz city pic.twitter.com/aFVm8uxxSQ
— Mirwais Afghan (@Miirwais) Sept. 28, 2015

Fighters in hospital. pic.twitter.com/eAeekSvxJN
— Muslim Shirzad (@MuslimShirzad) Sept. 28, 2015

وضعیت در کندز به گونه است که #طالبان با داکتران در شفاخانه #کندز عکس یادگاری می گیرند pic.twitter.com/xfdwAGtoqk
— Saleha Soadat (@SalehaSoadat) Sept. 28, 2015

One observer in the city even had to persuade a Taliban fighter to look up from his own phone to pose with him for a brief video selfie, posted on the Facebook page of Tolo TV, a popular Afghan satellite channel.

رجل من مدينة قندز يأخذ سيلفي مع احد مجاهد #طالبان A Civilian of Kunduz City takes selfie with a #Taliban Mujahid haha pic.twitter.com/Als3DA4ePS
— أنصار إمارة إسلامية (@AnsarImarat1) Sept. 28, 2015

In the clip, as the fighter posed with a man who seemed to be a fan of the group — or thought it best to act like one — he calmly explained that the militants planned to impose Islamic law, or Shariah. “We want to say that we want to serve here and people should cooperate with us,” he said, according to a translation by Ahmad Shuja of Human Rights Watch in Kabul. “We want to implement Shariah. It is our wish to build madrasas, schools, pavements and roads.”
Within four hours, copies of the clip posted on Facebook by Tolo TV had been viewed more than 200,000 times.
Although some residents told reporters by telephone that they had remained in their homes, and some families fled the city, the militants seemed eager to convey the impression that they had been welcomed.

Taliban Maneuver in Kunduz City. pic.twitter.com/TpynPboC08
— Muslim Shirzad (@MuslimShirzad) Sept. 28, 2015

Bethany Matta, a freelance journalist who reported from Kunduz for Al Jazeera recently, suggested that the propaganda value of Taliban fighters pictured in the center of a major Afghan city they were forced to surrender 14 years ago might even have been one of the goals of the operation.

Goal of Taliban is to take city, even if just for five mints. Pics of fighters circulating on social media of capture/retreat is power enuf
— Bethany E. Matta (@BethanyMatta) Sept. 28, 2015

[Manzareh]

Surprised these guys don't ban photographs or imagery .. i mean these taliban lot or even the isis type people claim to be so strict and hardcore in their beliefs yet when it comes to showing off, taking photos and selfys they will be at the forefront.

[marwat]

Surprised these guys don't ban photographs or imagery .. i mean these taliban lot or even the isis type people claim to be so strict and hardcore in their beliefs yet when it comes to showing off, taking photos and selfys they will be at the forefront.

the reason is talib sharia does not comes as per islam but mixture of ignorance, islam, pashto, gherat, misogyny and insecurities. television was once big kufar and using loudspeaker was anti islam. yesterday picture was anti islam since it made mullah insecure today it's cool for everyone. who knows in a next decide talib will be out to celebrate valentine day, Christmas.
Aslo the hard core islamist IS is very moderate in dealing with women and sex, but the moderate talib is so harsh here

[Samandri]

I think they are copying from ISIS, in hope of gaining similar popularity. While ISIS guys are far more extremist, yet they are more in tune with modern world, being literate. Thats not the case with Taliban , they have not studied beyond their madrassas and are frogs in the well.

[Al-Afghani]

And here are Iraqis welcoming the US liberators

[randolph85]

And here are Iraqis welcoming the US liberators

Many Iraqis did in fact accept the American invasion, particularly the Shia for obvious reasons.

[DaZahroJaam.]

my cousin's husband who is currently in kunduz says that most of them don't even speak pashto or dari. they speak some version of arabic or some other language that nobody recognizes.

[Shamlawar Khurasani]

my cousin's husband who is currently in kunduz says that most of them don't even speak pashto or dari. they speak some version of arabic or some other language that nobody recognizes.

Sounds like another lie coming out of govt propaganda machine.

[DaZahroJaam.]

Sounds like another lie coming out of govt propaganda machine.

who said you could remove me from your ignore list?? take your behind the computer screen tableegh to hell with you and go join the rest of your popanak zada lofars on a battle field and die. munafiq.

[Shamlawar Khurasani]

who said you could remove me from your ignore list?? take your behind the computer screen tableegh to hell with you and go join the rest of your popanak zada lofars on a battle field and die. munafiq.

I don't have an ignore list. Never had one.

[AlternActive]

Just ignore her, it pisses her off way better. Make her waste her time, since it's all she has (with a personality like that, it's a wonder she's still alive, even). But don't put her on a list? Just READ whatever she puts up, and pretend it's not there. Ignore lists are for the weak.



Anyway, as someone from the west, what are you guys opinion's (real ones, not media influenced) regarding the Taliban and other groups? I'd actually like to hear this from someone who goes through this on a day to day basis, rather than trust some ****ing anchorman hypocrites who can't even read right.

Are there many groups like the taliban and what not nowadays? Do they have friendships/allies?...