Baghdadi’s Death Evokes No Response,Vindicates Kashmir’s ‘No’ to ISIS

Srinagar: Much against the perception given by a section of New Delhi-based media that Kashmir was a “fertile field” for the Islamic State activities, the reports of IS Chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s killing in northern Syria have only vindicated the Valley’s “No” to the global terror network.
While reports Tuesday said Baghdadi has been killed in an air raid in Syria by the US-led coalition, the news didn’t create any reaction in the trouble-torn Valley. There was no condolence message from any militant outfits or any reaction from the separatists, or the common man down the lane. Baghdadi died in an air strike on IS’s stronghold of Raqqa in northern Syria, Iranian state media and pro-government Turkish daily Yenis Safak said.
Kashmir’s separatist leadership has long reiterated that IS has no role in Kashmir and equally condemned the terror outfit for its un-Islamic activities.
Senior separatist leader and Hurriyat-G Chariman, Syed Ali Geelani, maintained that the chances of Islamic State expanding its operations to Kashmir were “almost zero” and dismissed the terror outfit’s reported claims in this regard.
“The chances of the Islamic State about reaching Kashmir are almost zero,” Geelani said. 
Reacting to the reported statement by the Islamic State on Kashmir, Geelani said the only thing it will do is ‘give the Government of India a chance to globally defame the movement of Kashmiris’.
Kashmiri separatists have often questioned the IS network. “If the group had any sincerity, they would have liberated the Al Aqsa mosque in West Asia. They would have gone to help the Palestinian brothers who are being tortured and brutalised for the past 60 years,” Geelani has been saying.
Separatists believe that instead of solving any issues faced by the Muslims, the advent of Islamic State has plunged the Muslim world into a civil war.
In May 2016, the IS released a new 22-minute Arabic-language documentary with content focused on India and South Asia. Thane engineering student Aman Tandel who travelled to Syria in 2014 along with three other men from the city, was the only individual reportedly identified in the video, in which he uses the pseudonym Abu Amr’ al-Hindi.
 “We will return,” Tandel vows, “but with a sword in hand, to avenge the Babri Masjid, and the killings of Muslims in Kashmir, in Gujarat, and in Muzaffarnagar.”
But Kashmir’s response to Bahgdadi’s death has been zero. “Except for the news of his killing having been carried out by the media, there has been no response, which only vindicates that Kashmiris don’t even want to talk of this terror outfit,” said a scholar of Political-Science.
Though last year there had been some incidents of IS flag-waving in old City, here, the state police was not unnerved.
Police says this was more of an attention grabbing move by the young men who waved the flags. Cases have been registered against men who waved IS flags but investigations have not shown any ideological connections to the terror group.
“Every case is being investigated, we didn’t find any such ideology (ISIS) anywhere, anti-infiltration and counter-terrorism operations are continues and ongoing, situation is under control and crime rate is also declining and terrorist actions are also on the decline,” Director General of Police, K Rajindra had maintained.