SATP: The principal actor responsible for the rising trend in suicide attacks is the IS-KP, which wants to replace the Taliban as the main ‘Islamic’ power center in Afghanistan, and to delegitimize the Taliban ideologically and militarily by showcasing the latter’s weakness to the Islamic world, including both its supporters and its detractors. Targeted attacks on pro-Taliban scholars such as Sheikh Rahimullah Haqqani could also send a chilling message to religious clerics not to openly take pro-Taliban and anti-IS-KP positions. Click here to read more (external link).