Islamic State – Bengal Province (IS-BP) is an administrative division of the Islamic State, a Salafi jihadist militant group and former unrecognised Quasi-state. The group was announced by ISIL as its province in 2016. The first emir of Wilayat al-Bengal, Abu Ibrahim al-Hanif, is believed to be (born as Sajit Chandra Debnath, 1982) a Bangladeshi Japanese economist who went to Syria in 2015 and joined IS. A Hindu convert to Islam, he reportedly lead the 2016 Dhaka attack. He was detained in Iraq in 2019 and Abu Muhammed al-Bengali was announced as the new emir of the province.
Neo-Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh, an offshoot of Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh, effectively operates as the main IS branch in Bangladesh.
It has been designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization under the SDN by the United States Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control, with addresses in Dhaka, Rangpur, Sylhet and Jhenaidah.
Background
IS in South Asia
ISIL activity originated in Iraq, and has spread from the Middle East to the African countries of Egypt, Mali and Somalia; South Asian countries such as Bangladesh, Pakistan and India, and southeast Asian countries such as Indonesia and the Philippines. The group aims to retake Greater Khorasan, a historical region which covers Afghanistan and part of Central Asia. The Khorasan branch of ISIL is based in South Asia.
The terrorist organisation has used social unrest, the dissolution of language barriers, and local underground support to recruit South Asian militants for global jihad. The flow of Rohingya Muslim refugees from Myanmar has been targeted for recruitment by ISIL when the refugees enter Bangladesh. Some of these refugees are also targeted and supported by Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami (BJeI), the country's largest Islamist political party.
In 2002, the Bangladeshi extremist group Jamatul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) formed a committee in Malda City, India. JMB is the most active extremist group in Bangladesh, and has linked itself to ISIL. The group exploited permeable borders between India and Bangladesh to transport explosives, and are believed to be responsible for the Bardham bombing near the India-Bangladesh border in 2014. JMB, which was funded and militarized by the Taliban in the AfPak region before receiving ISIL support, targets minorities in Bangladesh.
Attacks inspired by ISIL have occurred across South Asia, including Quetta, Pakistan, Kabul, Afghanistan and Dhaka, Bangladesh. Youths from these countries have increasingly travelled from South Asia to Syria and Iraq. ISIL influences, recruits, strategises and organises with social media. Indian cells of ISIL have been identified by Indian forces in Madhya Pradesh, Kalyan, Kerala, Hyderabad, and Uttar and Madhya Pradesh. ISIL is most present in India through online social networks. The group has also attempted to infiltrate the unstable union territory of Jammu and Kashmir, a region disputed by India and Pakistan for religious and territorial reasons.
IS in Bangladesh, 1971-2015
Bangladesh is a secular democracy with a majority-Muslim population and a low median standard of living. Since its independence from Muslim Pakistan in 1971, Islamic extremism and the push for a united Islamic state across the subcontinent has been a catalyst for homegrown action and international interest in Bangladesh. Bombings, shootings and stabbings have been claimed by ISIL, targeting Westerners and other foreigners and Shia Muslims. Most attacks in Bangladesh are made by proxy groups later claimed (or attributed) to ISIL, and the amount of direct ISIL influence is unclear.
In June 2014, ISIL declared themselves a worldwide caliphate with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi as their leader. That August, ISIL distributed a video of Bengalis pledging allegiance to the group in Bengali. Bangladesh was not included in the group's five-year plan published that year, despite its being a Muslim-majority country. Since 2015, the government of Bangladesh has adopted a vocal, zero-tolerance policy towards terrorism and Islamic extremism. ISIL has admitted targeting (and attacking) secular Bangladeshis, Shia Muslims, foreigners, bloggers and other individuals who oppose their goal. The group has a sizable online presence in Bangladesh through social media, and a growing physical influence (despite government denial).
