Should the time come for a joint venture, Hekmatyar would feel just as comfortable in the Khakrez mountains. It was from there that iheHarakat i-Islami-yi Afghanistan (HIA) operated during the Soviet-Afghan War and cooperated well with Hekmatyar’s faction. Mostly Shiite and founded in Iran by Ayatollah AsefMuhsini, it had several bases in the region. One was near the HIK base of “Islam Dara” behind Shawadan mountain. There was also “Char Dewal” in the Malajat suburbs of Khandahar and “Char Bagh” in the Arghandab River Valley northwest of Kandahar. Harakat i-hlami allied with Rabbani’s JIA in 1993-1995. *¦’ Hekmatyar’s founding of a faction with a similar acron3Tn may be coincidental, but his years in Iran are more troubling.**''
In May 1996, Hekmatyar did ally himself with the pro-Iranian leader of the Northern Alliance—Massoud. In 2002, he was accepting Sepah's support through Ismail Khan.*" In this part of the world, former adversaries form new alliances. Just as they will attack from more than one direction, they will also resort to more than one offensive method. What sometimes results is parental representation on opposite sides of a dispute. On the surface, Pakistan and Iran are at odds. Beneath the surface, their intelligence agencies have been cooperating on many things. To confuse the opposition, they may be playing name games. It may be no coincidence that some of the “Hs ’ are "Harakat" and others “Ilezb," or that some of the “J’s” are “Jamaat” and others “Jamiat” That way, the West might naively assume that all were outlawed. “Hezb” means party, while “harakat"" means movement. Similarly, “Jamaat"" means party, while “jamiat"’ means society or organization.
World History
