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The Islamic State’s affiliate in Afghanistan, which calls itself the Islamic State in Khorasan, did not immediately claim responsibility, but normally it makes such claims only after an assault is over, and often the following day.
The Taliban immediately denied responsibility, according to a statement from their spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, in line with their recent promise not to attack predominantly civilian targets.
The Islamic State in Khorasan has its strongest Afghan presence in southern Nangarhar Province and has carried out at least nine other attacks against purely civilian targets in Jalalabad or nearby this year. The group turned to suicide attacks on civilian targets, particularly lightly defended ones, after being heavily battered by American airstrikes and American and Afghan special operations assaults last year.
Abdul Rahman Mawen, a civil activist in Jalalabad, blamed the extremists’ declining battlefield fortunes for the attacks on soft targets. “ISIS was fighting against security forces in the first stages, but when they were beaten and suppressed by the security forces, they started attacking women, children and civilian targets,” he said.
Nothing has proved off limits to the extremists. On Saturday, Islamic State fighters attacked a school for midwives in Jalalabad, killing three employees, although most of the 67 female students escaped unharmed. ISIS claimed responsibility the next day.
In May, they attacked during a government and Taliban cease-fire over the Ramadan holiday of Eid al-Fitr, killing 36 civilians at a celebration in Jalalabad.
On May 31, it was a boys’ school in the Khogyani district of Nangarhar Province, where the extremists beheaded three school workers. A day later, they attacked a group of minority Sikhs and Hindus waiting to meet President Ashraf Ghani while he was visiting Jalalabad; 19 were killed, including the country’s only Sikh candidate for Parliament.
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