 On Thursday, two blasts outside Kabul Airport led to the death of nearly 85 people. Many more have been injured. The attacks have believed to have been conducted by Islamic State Khorasan, which is an outfit of the Islamic State Organization. This has caused a huge amount of chaos, not only in Afghanistan, but in the entire region. A lot of questions about what is likely to happen in the coming days as the US plans to complete its withdrawal as do its NATO allies. You're watching Mapping Fault Lines and we'll be discussing these issues. We are joined by Prabir Purkayasar. Prabir, there are two basic questions. What happens to Taliban's plans of reconciliation and what about the US and NATO withdrawal that is supposed to be completed in a few days? You know, it's very clear that Taliban's plans for reconciliation never included ISIS and its various offshoots. So I think that's really, has always been off the table. It's always been the argument that is Taliban going to give them Afghanistan as a place for which to conduct their activities outside Afghanistan. Taliban has said from the beginning that they do not like ISIS, then have no sympathies with them and they will not allow their territory to be used against other countries. So I think that issue had been settled long back. It's only the media campaign that Taliban is a protector of ISIS and a protector of al-Qaeda that's been going around. And I think Taliban from the beginning has made this issue clear. Whether they will also behave better, will they also be a new Taliban is an open question. We are not getting into this today. But this was never on the cards. And they have been warning the United States, the NATO allies of the United States that the situation is becoming dangerous in this evacuation. Because ISIS as a force is there, ISIS-Korastan, all this is basically various names for very similar outfits and therefore they did expect the terrorist attacks of this kind to take place particularly because other parts of Kabul are at the moment under their control and it seems peaceful. There are no crowds over there but there are large crowds over there and plus the United States forces are there. Therefore there are also targets which they could then be considered for attack spices. So given all of this, they had been warning of this for some time and it is also now clear that the United States was coordinating with Taliban on this issue. They also had received warnings as we know the CIA head, Mr. Burns was there in an undisclosed meeting with Taliban. So they seem to have known about it and preparing for it but at the same time if there are a huge number of people which there were outside Kabul airport wanting to be airlifted the last days of the NATO presence on Afghan soil which is the Kabul airport then it is difficult for anybody to control that situation in terms of security. There is no security perimeter then you can set up like this in such large crowds. So Taliban wasn't happy about this call for evacuation of all Afghan nationals who have been a part of the NATO maybe various outfits, social outfits, whatever it is, NGOs working with their embassies. So they were not happy about the very large number who are rushing in terms of wanting to get out of Afghanistan and therefore one of their consideration was really that NATO should not stay beyond 31st August and that this becomes a ready-made target of attack and therefore they need to depopulate is a wrong word but see that not many people are there. So only those who have hold passports, foreign passports etc should be going and Afghans should not go at this stage for various reasons. So I think that expectation that there is going to be an attack on both sides and it does seem to indicate from what we can see of the reports that both Taliban and the United States were coordinating whatever efforts they had to see that there can this be prevented. But as I said it's clear if the suicide bomber attack it's always been difficult to protect against that and with such large number of people over there it's almost impossible to prevent them for something like this happening. So I think what we see is very unfortunate. 85 people died, number of people injured. There seems to be two explosions definitely. We don't know if there are more. There seems to be also been firing. We don't know against whom. So all these question marks are there which will become clear over a period of time. But what it puts at risk is those wanting to leave Afghanistan now before 31st. I think that is going to be much more difficult and only those who hold foreign passports will probably in this phase be able to leave and others probably not. And they will have to wait for civilian flights to come and then take them for those who the Taliban allows to leave. So I think that question has now gone a bit into the back burner and I don't think people will now be going in very large numbers in that airport perimeter either. So we have to wait and watch what happens. But one thing is very clear that ISIS or its offshoot, ISIS-Khorasan as it's been called is something that worries Taliban and of course worries all the neighbors because they have been from the beginning worried that can these things spill over to their territories and ISIS-Khorasan, ISIS being something which is destabilizing for the region as a whole. All of them are concerned that they should not find any place in Afghanistan. But of course, as we know, the control of Taliban over Afghanistan has to be firmly established. They're still negotiating in Pansheer Valley. So it's clear they don't want to go into offensive in any of these places. They would like all forces to come together so that they can try and isolate ISIS. What their internal policies are going to be towards their own people, towards women, education of girls, all of this is an open question. And I don't think we can conclude on that. But it is the common interest of both countries outside Afghanistan and for Taliban within Afghanistan to see that ISIS does not take roots in Afghanistan. Because if that is allowed to grow, then it's a threat to all over across regions and of course across countries, it would be a threat. Absolutely. Praveer, it's interesting you mentioned the region because quite a lot of developments taking place to the west of Afghanistan as well. So we see that there are reports that Iran and the Gulf monarchy is at Saudi Arabia and the UAE are likely to meet in Iraq. That's tomorrow, that's Saturday. Now it's not clear at what level these meetings will be, what the agenda will be, but it seems to be a continuation of a process that began some months ago. And it has to do with Yemen, of course. It has to do with the nuclear deal. But also Afghanistan coming into the picture because many of these countries have various kinds of stake in Afghanistan, especially Iran. So how do we see the process of this rapprochement or dialogue taking place considering that these have been very traditional rivals, Iran on one hand and the Gulf monarchy's on the other? You know, earlier it was almost felt that the overall global hegemon, the United States, will play the role to bring people together. Now when the United States itself becomes a problem, like with Iran for instance, or now with Afghanistan, then you get the problem that how do you bring everybody together if you are against a particular party, which is actually quite important in the region, in this case Iran. So I think what it does is it makes the relationships between the countries of the region much more difficult because they have to now deal with the overarching presence of the United States. And the United States has always looked at the West Asia as their property because of oil, as you know, Carter doctrine itself said. And there's the same Carter who also did allow the intervention of Afghanistan to start inviting in the Soviet Union. And that is as Brzezinski said at that point of time. This is their Vietnam. So all of this if you see and you go back and look at it, it's clear that a lot of the dynamics of the region got completely distorted, if you will, or completely sidelined. Because what happens is the United States with its overarching presence and it's what it wants then becomes the driving force in the region. So what we have seen in West Asia for instance, they have had essentially supporting extreme right-wing forces, Islamist ISIS kind of forces aligning with them in Syria against the secular Assad regime. In Iran, of course, they were using an anti-sheer platform to attack Iran, trying to get the Gulf monarchies together. At the same time in Iran, they also did the same by trying to make shears versus Sunni battles take place. All of this means that they were acting as a force for breaking up the region rather than bringing people together. Now that the United States is withdrawing from Afghanistan, as we have discussed earlier, their entry to Afghanistan had to do with West Asia, Iran, as well as Central Asia. Now they're withdrawing from Afghanistan. I think the region as a whole is also seeing that instead of getting United States to side with A or B, can we actually try and sort our differences together? And I think Yemen is a first big test case. If Yemen can be resolved in Saudi Arabia, Iran acting on two sides, Saudi Arabia is basically the aggressor against Yemen. So if that gets resolved, Yemen civil war and the Yemen war, the Saudis have launched stops. I think that's a huge boon for the region. And it is also important for all these countries then to sort out their differences among themselves. And that is the long-term trajectory. I think the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan is sending a signal to the region that this is the way to go. Let's look at solve our own problems. Let's not look at what the outside powers want us to do. How far? Again, wait and watch. How much can U.S. players a spoiler? It will depend also on Israel. And I think that is the joker in the pack in West Asia. Not so much United States alone, but also Israel, who seems to hold U.S. policies hostage. Absolutely. It's interesting you mentioned Israel because just a few weeks ago there was an incident of an Israeli-owned tanker being attacked. And there was a huge hue and cry, the United States, the United Kingdom, G7, all of them blaming Iran. The interesting thing, of course, is that a lot of Iranian tankers have been attacked and everyone has been very silent. You can see some of these on the map here. And there have been many more instances which are not really marked so far because I think they've been about 20. But what we see, as you said, is that Israel remains a huge possibility, the possibility of Israel being a spoil sport, very huge. It's a right-wing agenda continuing under the new government. It has been leading the effort to not bring back the nuclear deal. So how do you think Israel might play, what kind of a role might Israel play in this situation? You see, there has been a big partnership going with the issue of oil tankers, other tankers, shipping. Iran has been blamed earlier for some of the attacks. Now Israel has been identified by Iran as the party which is also attacking its tankers and ships. So this has been going on for some time. Does it have the potential for spilling over into an open war? This is the test case now is going to be what Hezbollah has said, that Lebanon needs oil and if Israelis do anything to the Iranian tanker which is coming to Lebanon, that is going to be extremely damaging for Lebanon. Therefore they will react, what they will do, we don't know, again. So they have given a clear warning that this they will not allow. What does Israel do? We don't know. But Israel has been, and Neftali Bennett is right now the United States, Israel has been talking about that they will take military action to see that Iran's nuclear refining, refining uranium refining does not go above a certain limit. And they are willing to take military action on that count. If they do, then of course we are in for a really open war in West Asia. And this is going to be extremely destructive for the region. Whether it is an empty threat, it's a real threat. Again, future will show. But it is poised at this point, where we don't know what actions, one or two sets of people can take, which can spill over into an open war. United States has its eyes at the moment, seems to be in Afghanistan. How to extricate itself from there? How can Biden protect his image after it is taken a beating? People are talking about, is it his Carter moment? Remember the Iranian hostage crisis? Is it the same damage that he's going to take? His ratings have tanked. So does he have enough focus at the moment to prevent Israel from doing what can be only called an extremely adventurous act we have to see? But yes, it is possible Israel's actions, and it is Israel's actions, which can provoke a war in the region. And if that happens again, things are going to get extremely dangerous for everybody because this is where India's oil comes from, China's oil comes from, Europe's oil comes from. So this is not a region that is just going to be something that happens in Afghanistan. But that is something which is going to affect almost the entire globe, particularly Asia, Europe, and of course Africa as well. Thank you so much for being. That's all we have time for today. We'll be following these issues in the coming weeks as well. Until then, keep watching NewsClick.