Islamic State militants in Saudi Arabia are using favoritism to make sure family members and friends are bumped to the top of their suicide bombing waitlist, revealed a frustrated militant from Chechen. In a recent post on a website, that has been linked to Islamic State’s battalion in Chechen, Kamil Abu Sultan ad Daghestani regretfully said that Chechens have been continually robbed of their hard-earned opportunity to blow themselves up by fellow Saudis.
Daghestani pointed out that connections are the only way in which Islamic State militants can skip the line and become a suicide bomber before others. He alleged that this non-merit based procedure has led to Islamic State militants issuing complaints to their superiors.
According to Daghestani, one of his friends told their leader, “Those Saudis have got things sewn up. They won’t let anyone in. They are letting their relatives go to the front of the line using blat (connections).”
While a recently published guidebook by Islamic State was seen bragging about their high supply of suicide bombers, the militancy also requested potential martyrs to be patient after completing their training, as they might have to wait for their respective turns.
Daghestani said the problem with the waiting list, which could sometimes delay a militant’s turn by several months, is that it often leads to the death of a potential suicide bomber without even giving him or her, the chance to kill himself or herself. Reportedly, this faulty procedure has caused Islamic State militants to feel so desperate to get to the top of the list that they have been seen travelling to different areas of the caliphate with hopes that they will be able to blow themselves up sooner than expected. Daghestani said that he had gathered all this information from Abu Omar al Shishani, leader of Islamic State militants in Chechen.
“Amir (leader) al-Shishani told me about a young lad who went to Iraq for a suicide mission, and he went there because in Sham (Syria) there is a very long queue (of several thousand people),” he said.
An Islamic State militant in Britain was the first to expose the group’s suicide bombing waiting list in July 2014. The militant, Kabir Ahmed, was in Syria at the time of the BBC interview and he told the channel that he was trying to bump himself up in the waiting list. Ahmed’s efforts were successful after he moved to Iraq, where he killed himself as well as a senior police official during a suicide bombing in November that year.
Thomas Pierret from the University of Edinburgh believes death by suicide bombing is in high demand only because of tactical reasons and not theological ones. According to him, death on the battlefield as well as by suicide bombing are both considered martyrdom by Islamic State but the latter is preferred because of the amount of damage it inflicts on surrounding areas.
“In my view, the tactical advantage of suicide VBIEDs [vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices] largely outweighs their symbolic or propaganda value, hence (ISIL)’s heavy reliance on them,” Pierret said.
Vehicle borne improvised explosive devices played an important role in Islamic State’s recent takeover of Ramadi.
Photo Credits: PBS
