The murder of a Shia gathering in the territory of a shrine, Injil district, Herat, on 10 April 2026 is not a one more episode of the tragic history of violence in Afghanistan. It is an incontrovertible wake-up call that in Taliban-controllable land, Afghanistan has transformed into a terror-permissive state in which the Islamic State Khorasan Province, or ISKP, continues to exist, evolve, and strike with disastrous regularity. At least 10 people were killed and more than 30 injured in Herat, who included many ordinary civilians who were brought together to hold a religious gathering. All that is required to puncture a hole in the Taliban a common slogan that it has restored security. The regime is unable to stop sectarian massacres in shrines, restaurants, mosques, hotels and diplomatic offices, it cannot claim to be a stability force.

The meaning of Herat attack is that it is in an established pattern since now. The sporadic and marginal violence experienced by ISKP during the Taliban rule is not random. The group has been able to show that it has been capable of assaulting minorities, foreign nationals, diplomatic interests and city centres with an unprecedented degree of tenacity. That is what maintained operation space seems to be like. When the same organization can attack on various years, in various provinces and targeting several things, the inference is quite evident: the environment is loose enough to plan, recruit, move, facilitate and execute.

It is self-explanatory. On 19 January 2026, ISKP staged a suicide attack on a Chinese restaurant in the Shahr-e-Naw district of Kabul, killing over seven individuals and wounding over a dozen others. It was not a raid on a far out-post in the district, or a defenceless country convoy. It was a strike in the capital of Afghanistan which was targeted to a location linked to foreign nationals. Prior to that, on 12 December 2022, ISKP gunmen raided a hotel in Kabul where Chinese citizens are expected to stay, deploying explosives and small arms in the attack that revealed the inability of the Taliban to ensure even high-profile urban buildings. Suicide bombing of the Russian Embassy in Kabul on 5 September 2022 caused the deaths of diplomats and civilians, which proved that even in places where security was already considered very high, such as the diplomatic premises, it was possible to penetrate. 

The trend is even more significant and bloody when one takes into consideration the sectarian campaign of the group. ISKP carried out mass-casualty attacks on Shia mosques on 8 October 2021, in Kunduz and 15 October 2021, in Kandahar, killing dozens of people in the process. The bombings reflected ideological intentions and the capabilities. They also unveiled a very disturbing truth that minority groups are still vulnerable to massacre despite Taliban claims that they have ensured that religious security is guaranteed. The April 2026 Herat shrine attack is right in this path. It is not an exception to an organizational sectarian approach but is its continuation. These could not be overlooked as isolated instances of security breakdowns if the targeted population of victims remains an annual target of the Taliban in the same ideological style.

It is also important that ISKP continues to be present in the organization. The fact that the group is thought to have had a strength of between 2000 and 4000 fighters supports the idea that this is not an abandoned outfit of underground cells. It is a functional terrorist group that has manpower, command systems, logistical, propaganda and regional coverage. It is multi-node in Kabul, Herat, Jalalabad and the north provinces and does not have a pocket of insurgents. Such a large group does not labour and live in a vacuum. The fact that ISKP continues to hit and even has hubs in major and strategic locations is not only indicative of a system that is enabling and not preventing its continuation.

It is due to this that Taliban communications of having destroyed or subdued ISKP can no longer pass the test of seriousness. The Taliban would not have disintegrated the organization, so there would not be a steady stream of headline attacks since 2021 to 2026. There would be no repeat infiltrations of Kabul. Attacks on foreign targets, diplomatic compounds and Shia congregations would not be a part of it. There would not be continuity of the capability and intent. The facts themselves point to the contrary of this Taliban counter-ISKP claim; namely, that the frequency, magnitude and symbolic quality of the violence itself disprove their claims. The Taliban can announce the raids and arrests, but these announcements fail each time ISKP returns once again with another successful attack to another so-called safe area.

The broader terror environment in Afghanistan further raises concerns in the situation. Majority of the terrorist groups have more than 20 groups in Afghanistan with an estimated number of 10,000-13,000 terrorists in all as observed by the United Nations Security Council monitoring reports. That number is important as it contextualizes ISKP as a part of a greater militant ecosystem instead of an isolated anomaly. It is not merely that the Taliban rule in Afghanistan is struggling with one extremist problem; it is cultivating an atmosphere of thick and deadly terror. 

© Eurasia Review