#ismailov

[roughridingrednecks]

Ismailov

[finleyforevermore]

Genuinely unrelated to this post,

Link to AnonyMous version!

Link to Tally Hall version!

Please feel free to explain why! Preferably in a reblog so that the poll gets around! /nf

[thephoenixandthecrocodile]

My Love for Central Asian Literature Part 1 – Abdurauf Fitrat, Abdulla Qodiry, and Cho’lpon

I’m currently working on a script for my history podcast, the Art of Asymmetrical Warfare, about three Central Asian literary giants: Abdurauf Fitrat, Abdulla Qodiry, and Abdulhamid Sulayman o’g’li Yusunov also known as Cho’lpon and it got me thinking about their influence on my historical interests, reading tastes, and writing style.

If you’re wondering why a podcast about asymmetrical warfare is talking about three Central Asian writers, you should check out my upcoming podcast episode. 😉

How I Became Interested in Central Asian Literature

My interest in Central Asia has been a long time percolating and it was just waiting for the right combination of sparks to turn it into a hyperfixation (sort of like my interest in the IRA). I went to the Virginia Military Institute for undergrad and majored in International Relations with a minor in National Security and my focus was on terrorism. So, I knew a lot about Afghanistan and Pakistan and the “classic” “terrorists” like the IRA, the FLN, Hamas, etc. and I knew of the five Central Asian states (one of my professors was banned for life from either Turkmenistan or Tajikistan and sort of life goals, but also please don’t ban me haha), but my brain bookmarked it, and I went on my merry way. 

Then I went to University of Chicago for my masters, and I took my favorite class: Crime, the State, and Terrorism which focused on moments when crime, government, and terrorism intersect. This brought me back to Pakistan and Afghanistan, but this time focusing on the drug trade which led me to Uzbekistan and Tajikistan and their ties to the Taliban and it was sort of like an awakening. I suddenly had five post-Soviet states (if you know me, you’ll know I’m fascinated by post-Soviet states) with connections to the drug trade (another interest of mine) and influenced by Persian and Turkic identities. I was also writing a scifi series at the time that included a team of Russian, Eastern European, and Central Asian scientists and officers, so the interest came at the right time to hook my brain. Actually, if you buy my friend’s EzraArndtWrites upcoming “My Say in the Matter” anthology, you’ll read a short story featuring Ruslan, my bisexual, Sunni Muslim, Uzbek doctor who was inspired by my sudden interest in Central Asia.

Hamid Ismailov’s the Devils’ Dance

I wanted to know more beyond the drug trade and usually when I try to learn about a place whether it be Poland, Ireland, or Uzbekistan, I go to their music and literature. This led me to one of my all-time favorite writers Hamid Ismailov and my favorite publishers Tilted Axis Press.

Tilted Axis Press is a British publisher who specializes in publishing works by mainly Asian, although not only Asian writers, translated into English. They publish about six books a year and you can purchase their yearly bundle which guarantees you’ll get all six books plus whatever else they publish throughout the year. I’ve purchased the bundle two years in a row, and I haven’t regretted it. The literature and writers you’re introduced to are amazing and you probably won’t normally have found unless you were looking specifically for these types of books.

Hamid Ismailov is an Uzbek writer who was banished from Uzbekistan for “overly democratic tendencies”. He wrote for BBC for years and published several books in Russian and Uzbek. A good number of his books have been translated into English and can be found either through Tilted Axis or any other bookstore/bookseller. Some of my favorites include Dead Lake, the Manaschi, the Underground, and the book that inspired everything the Devils’ Dance.

Tilted Axis’ translation of The Devils’ Dance came out the same year I was working on my masters, and I bought it because it is a fictional account of Abdulla Qodiriy’s last days while in a Soviet prison. He goes through several interrogations and runs into his fellow writers and friends: Fitrat and Cho’lpon. Qodiriy is written as detached from events while Cho’lpon comes across as very sarcastic, as if this is all a game, and Fitrat is interestingly resigned to the Soviet’s games but seems to have some fight in him. Qodiry distracts himself from the horrors around him by thinking about his unwritten novel (which he really was working on when he was arrested by the NVKD). His novel focuses on Oyxon, a young woman forced to marry three khans during the Great Game. His daydreaming takes a power of its own and he occasionally slips back to talk with historical figures such as Charles Stoddart and Arthur Connolly-two British officers who were murdered by the Khan of Bukhara (not a 100% convinced they didn’t have it coming).

We spend half of the narrative with Qodiriy and the other half with Oyxon as she is taken from her home and thrown into the royal court of Kokand’s khans where she is raped and mistreated and has to survive the uncertain times of Central Asia during the Great Game. She is passed from Umar, the father, to Madali, the son, to the conquering Khan of Bukhara, Nasrullah who eventually murders her and her children. From a historical perspective, I have a lot of questions about Nasrullah because a lot of sources write him off as a cruel tyrant and nothing more which usually means there’s more…Before Oyxon and Qodiriy are taken to their deaths, there is a poignant scene where the two timelines merge into one that will stay with you long after the novel is over.

The book is a masterpiece exploring themes of colonialism, liberty, powerlessness in face of overwhelming might, the power of the human mind and spirit, the endurance of ideas, even when burned and “lost”, as well as being a powerful historical fiction about two disruptive periods in Central Asian history. It’s also a love letter to the three literary giants of Uzbek fiction: Abdurauf Fitrat: a statesmen who crafted the Turkic identity of Uzbekistan, a playwright and statesmen, Abdulla Qodiriy who created the first Uzbek novel (O’tgan Kunar which was recently translated by Mark Reese and can be bought in most bookstores), and Cho’lpon who created modern Uzbek poetry (you can buy his only novel Night translated by Christopher Fort and a collection of his poems 12 Ghazals by Alisher Navoiy and 14 Poems by Abdulhamid Cho’lpon translated by Andrew Staniland, Aidakhon Bumatova, and Avazkhon Khaydarov in any bookstore).

City of Kokand circa 1840-1888, thanks to Wikicommons

All three men were Jadids (modern Muslim reformers) who worked with the Bolsheviks to stabilize Central Asia, helped create the borders of the five modern Central Asian states, and were murdered by the Soviets during Stalin’s Great Purge of the 1930s. It was illegal to publish their work until the glasnost. Check out my history podcast to learn more about the Jadids and the Russian and Central Asian Civil Wars.

From a literary perspective however, Ismailov wrote the Devils’ Dance similarly to Qodiriy’s own O’tgan Kunlar and Cho’lpon’s Night (whereas Ismailov’s other books: Dead Lake and the Underground are more Soviet era Central Asian literature and his newest book the Manaschi is more post-Soviet). Like Qodiriy and Cho’lpon, Ismailov writes about MCs who are not the master of his own fate, but instead are going through the motions of a fate already written, one of his MCs is a woman unfairly caught in a misogynistic system that uses women as it sees fit (although I would argue that Hamid gives his women characters more agency than either Qodiry and Cho’lpon), and he writes about the corruption and inefficiencies of whatever government agency is in control at the time – whether it be a Russian, a Khan, or an indigenous agent of said government. All three books end in death, although only Cho’lpon’s Night and Ismailov’s the Devils’ Dance end in a farce of a trial. Even stylistically Ismailov mimics the rich and dense language of Qodiriy whereas I find Cho’lpon’s style crisper although no less rich for it.

Abdurauf Fitrat’s Downfall of Shaytan

While Ismailov led me down a historical rabbit hole which is captured on my history podcast, I also wanted to see if any of Fitrat’s, Qodiry’s, or Cho’lpon’s work had been translated into English.

So far, I can’t find anything by Fitrat except excerpts in the Devils’ Dance and Making Uzbekistan by Adeeb Khalid (one of my all-time favorite history books by one of my favorite scholars who also happens to be very kind and patience and I still can’t believe I interviewed him for my podcast).

Fitrat wrote a specific play I really want to read called Shaytonning Tangriga Isyoni which Dr. Khalid translated as Shaytan’s Revolt Against God. According to the summary provided by Dr. Khalid it is a challenging take on the Islamic version of Satan’s downfall.

According to Dr. Khalid, in Islamic cosmology God created angels from light and jinns from fire and they could only worship God. When God made Adam, He commanded all angels and jinn to bow before him. Azazel (who would become Shaytan) refused claiming he was better than Adam who was made out of clay. He was cast out of heaven and became Shaytan/Iblis.

Fitrat reimagines Shaytan’s defiance as heroic. He is disgusted by the angels’ submissive nature and God’s ability to create anything and yet he chooses to create servants. Azazel has seen God’s plan to create another being out of clay and have the angels worship him as well, which Azazel sees as a betrayal on God’s part. Gabriel, Michael, and Azrael try to convince Azazel to see reason and instead he brings his grievance to the other angels who are confused. God intervenes and the angels give in, but Azazel continues to defy God. God strips him of his angelic nature, and he turns into Shaytan who warns Adam of God’s treacherous nature and vows to free him and all other creatures from God’s trickery.

Doesn’t it sound amazing?! Fitrat has outdone Milton in terms of completely overturning God’s and Satan/Shaytan’s rules (also no wonder he was marked for execution right? Complete firebrand and pain in the ass (and I mean that with love)) and I really want to read it. So, either someone needs to translate this into English, or I need to learn Persian/Uzbek, which ever happens first, haha (judging on how my Russian is going…)

Abdulla Qodiry’s O’tgan Kunlar

While I can’t find any of Fitrat’s work in English, there have been two translations of Abdulla Qodiriy’s novel and the first ever Uzbek novel O’tgan Kunlar. In English, the title translates as Days Gone By or Bygone Days. There are two translates out there: Days Gone By translated by Carol Ermakova, which is the version I’ve read, and Otgun Kunlar by Mark Reese, which I haven’t read yet but I’ve heard him speak (and actually spoke to him about his translation – thank you Oxus Society) so you can’t go wrong with either one.

O’tgan Kunlar is an epic novel set in the Kokand Khanate in the 18th century and is about Otabek and his love Kumush. There’s also a corrupt official, Hamid who hates Otabek because Otabek is a former who wants to change the society Hamid benefits from. Hamid tries to get Otabek killed for treason because of his reformist believes, but the overthrow of the corrupt leader of Tashkent (who Otabek worked for) saves Otabek’s life. However, the corrupt leader’s machinations convince the Khan to declare war against the Kipchaks people, who are massacred. Otabek and his father vehemently disagree with the massacre of the Kipchaks.

Once Otabek is released and gets revenge against Hamid, he marries Kumush without his parent’s approval and is torn between the two families. His mother hates Kumush and forces him to take a second wife, Zainab. Obviously, things go terribly wrong as Otabek doesn’t even like Zainab and Kumush doesn’t know how to feel about her husband having a second wife. Zainab hates her position within the household and eventually poisons Kumush.

Abdulla Qodiriy thanks to Wikicommons

O’tgan Kunlar is considered to be an Uzbek masterpiece that is central to understanding Uzbekistan. Not only is it a great tragic love story, but it also highlights some of the things Qodiriy was thinking about as he engaged with other Jadids. Just as Otabek argued for reforms especially in the educational, social, and familial realms, the Jadids were making the same arguments. We can also see the Jadid’s struggle with the ulama and the merchants in Otabek’s struggle with Hamid. Qodiry attempts to capture the struggle women went through by writing about the horrors for arrange marriages and polygamy, but Kumush is an idealized version of a woman. She is the pure “virgin” like Margarete from Faust while the other two female characters; Otabek’s mother and Zainab are twisted, bitter woman who hurt those they “love”. One could argue they’ve been corrupted by the society they live in, but they also lack the depth of Otabek and even his father.

One of the most interesting parts of the novel is the massacre of the Kipchaks because it is written as the horror it was and both Otabek and his father condemn the action. His father even claims that there is no sense if hating a whole race for aren’t we all human? Central Asia is a vast land full of different peoples who share common, but divergent histories and while these differences have led to massacres, there have also been moments of living peacefully together. It’s interesting that Qodiriy would pick up that thread and make it a major part of his novel because this was written during the Russian Civil Wars and the attempts to create modern states in Central Asia. The Bolsheviks really pushed the indigenous people of Central Asia to create ethnic and racial identities they could then use to better manage the region and so one wonders if Qodiriy is responding to this idea of dividing the region instead of uniting it.

Cho’lpon’s Night

While O’tgan Kunlar is a beautiful book and Qodiriy is a masterful writer, I prefer Cho’lpon’s Night (although don’t tell anyone). Night was supposed to be a duology, but Cho’lpon was murdered before he could finish the second book. Cho’lpon wrote Night in 1934, after years of being attacked as a nationalist. It was a seemingly earnest attempt to get into the Soviet’s good graces. Instead, he would be murdered along with Qodiriy and Fitrat in 1938.

Night is about Zebi, a young woman, who is forced to marry the Russian affiliated colonial official Akbarali mingboshi. The marriage is arranged by Miryoqub, Akbarali’s retainer. Akbarali already has three wives and, like in O’tgan Kunlar, adding a new wife causes lots of problems in the household. Meanwhile Miryoqub falls in love with a Russian prostitute named Maria and they plan to flee together. While they are fleeing they met a Jadid named Sharafuddin Xo’Jaev and Miryoqub becomes a Jadids. Meanwhile Akbarali’s wives conspire against Zebi and attempt to poison her but she unwittingly gives it to Akbarali instead. Zebi is arrested and found guilty of murdering her husband and sentenced to exile in Siberia. The book ends with Zebi’s father, who encouraged her marriage to Akbarali, is driven made by his daughters fate and murders a sufi master while Zebi’s mother goes mad, wandering the streets and singing about her daughter.

Like Qodiriy, Cho’lpon is interested in examining governmental corruption, the need for reform, and women’s plight, but Cho’lpon is less resolute than Qodiriy. Cho’lpon’s novel is constructed similar to poetry: an indirect attempt to capture something that is concrete only for a moment.

His characters are own irresolute or ignorant of important pieces of information meaning they are never truly in full control of their fates. Even Miryoqub’s conversion to Jadidism is to be understood as a step in his self-discovery. In Cho’lpon’s world, no one is ever truly done discovering aspects of themselves and no one will ever have true knowledge to avoid tragedy.

Cho'lpon courtesy of Wikicommons

It is interesting to read Night as Cho’lpon’s own insecurity and anxiety about his own fate and the fate of his fellow countrymen as Stalin seemingly paused persecuting those who displeased him. While Qodiriy crafted and wrote O’tgan Kunlar in the 1920s, which were unstable because of civil war, but promised something greater as the Jadids and Bolsheviks regained control over the region, Cho’lpon wrote Night during the height of Stalin’s Great Terror, most likely knowing he would be arrested and executed soon.

Both novels are beautifully written historical novels about a beautiful region, but I prefer Cho’lpon’s poetic prose and uncertainty.

Conclusion

Reading the works of Fitrat, Qodiriy, and Cho'lpon not only introduced me to a history I knew little about, but also introduced me to a whole literature I never knew existed. The books mentioned in this blog post are beautiful pieces literature and will challenge how you see the world and how much literature we miss out on when we don't read beyond authors who work in our native tongues.

The canon of Central Asian literature is immense, with only a handful of books and poems translated into English. I hope more works are translated so other people can engage with these books and poems and learn about these writers and the circumstances that shaped them. And, if you haven't, go check out Tilted Axis who are doing amazing work translating books so people can engage with them.

If you're enjoying this blog, please join my patreon or donate to my ko-fi

[iiireflexiii]

Yevgeny Khaldei: “There were four of us [on the roof of the Reichstag], but I well remember your fellow countryman from Kiev Alexei Kovalev, who was tying the flag. I photographed him for a long time. In different poses. I remember that we were all very cold then ... He and I were helped by the foreman of the reconnaissance company of the Guards Red Banner Order of Bogdan Khmelnitsky of the Zaporozhye Rifle Division Abdulkhakim Ismailov from Dagestan and Leonid Gorychev from Minsk.

[orsacchiotto-rugbista]

[8dpromo]

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[iishmael]

Can anyone recommend me books from Uzbek authors that play in Uzbekistan before 1920? 😅 They need to be translated into English, German, or French please 😭

[loveoldmen24world]

Tagir Ismailov - Ректор ДГТУ Главы РД

[scrumjock]

Dominant Ismailov

[happypuppypuppy]

🇰🇬 Enjoy Amantur Ismailov stud, kyrgyz wrestler of 67Kg, 1.68m & 26yo who couldn't win any olympic medal for his country (credits to kyrgyztan_wrestling_official)

[capn-o-my-soul]

12 for the ask game

hmmmb see i have only listened to i think (?) four operas in completion which were Samson et Dalila, Wozzeck, and Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk/Katerina Ismailov, and The Nose of which i think my favorite was lady macbeth! (i do a little bit prefer the 1934 version instead of the 1962 revision but they're both pretty great!)

i think if i listened to wozzeck more it would also be up there bc i listened to it once in the background (after seeing you post about it actually) and i really liked it but i haven't yet seen a recording of the opera itself (i hope to one day though! the music was fabulous)!

[thephoenixandthecrocodile]

Hello! I’m interested in reading Uzbek literature and just came across an old post of yours, so I hope it’s okay I’m barging into your ask box to ask questions! 😅 I coincidentally went to two museum exhibitions in Paris about Uzbekistan, and now I need to Read Books About It. I am particularly interested in anything pre-1920s, and I came across Days Gone By by Abdulla Qodiriy. I struggled to find a comprehensive summary that didn’t spoil the story, so I wanted to ask if it’s a good book that depicts pre-Russian (or at least pre-Stalinist) Uzbek culture? I would be super grateful for any other recommendations. Did Hamid Ismailov write anything that’s set pre 1920s? Anyway, please feel free to only answer as much or as little as you’re in the mood for, sorry to bother you!! 💕

Oh wow thank you so much for this ask! I love talking about Central Asian literature. I will confess that most of the books I've read so far deal with Central Asian life either during or after the Soviet Union and that is a bias reflective of my time period of interest (Central Asia during WWI and the Russian Civil War) and the fact that I only read and speak English and most of the books translated into English are either Soviet or post-Soviet literature. So my recommends are in no way exhaustive, but they should be a good place to start your journey.

The first book I'd recommend is Days Gone By by Abdulla Qodiriy. it's set in the 1800s, so the Russians haven't fully colonized the region yet, but they have taken a lot of land in the Steppe and relations with the khans are growing tense. It takes place in Turkestan and is about Atabek, a wealthy merchant, and the love of his life, Kumush, and the many struggles they face to be together. It's a fascinating read as it gives great insight into life before 1920 and how the Jadid's felt about women's rights and issues. I'm not sure what is your preferred language, but there are two English translations. One by Carol Ermakova, which is the one I read and enjoyed and one by Mark Reese, which I haven't read yet, but I got to speak to him about translating the book and I really liked his passion for the story and Central Asia.

The other book I'd recommend is Night by Cho'lpon (which I actually like better than Days Gone By, but don't tell anyone ;)). It's set in the 1900s, so much later than Days Gone By, but before the Russian Revolution or WWI. It's about a young woman who is married to an official who is also a sexual glutton and the chaos it causes in his household. Even though it is a Tsarist Central Asia, the focus is on the Central Asian people and life in Central Asia and again it provides an interesting look at how the Jadids felt about women's rights and the issues they faced (and Cho'lpon gets to poke some fun at the Jadids themselves which is fascinating). Christopher Fort did a masterful job with the translation and provided an phenomenal introduction that explores Cho'lpon's life and provides a great analysis of the novel itself.

If you like poetry, I'd also recommend the book 12 Ghazals by Alisher Navoiy and 14 Poems by Abdulhamid Cho'lpon. The poems were translated by Andrew Staniland, Aidakhon Bumatova, and Avazkhon Khaydarov. Navoiy was a poet who write in the 1400s and is considered a father of Central Asian poetry. Cho'lpon, of course, is the father of modern Central Asian poetry.

Actually, Staniland just came out with another poetry collection I haven't read it (but i've just ordered it). It's called Nodira and Uvaysiy: Selected Poems. Nodira was a Central Asian Queen in the 1800s famous for her poetry and Uvaysiy was a woman poet who lived in the palace with Nodira.

For a more contemporary writer, Hamid Ismailov wrote two books that deal with multiple timelines, including a pre-1920 Central Asia. The first book of his I'd recommend is one of my favorites. It's called The Devils' Dance and it is about the last days of Abdulla Qodiriy, Cho'lpon, and Abdurauf Fitrat, as well as Central Asia during the Great Game. It follows the fate of Emir Nasrullah and Madali's Khanates as the Russians and British start to infiltrate the region (the connection between the two story lines is that Qodiriy, in real life and in Hamid's book, was working on a novel about Madali's wife: Oyxon before Qodiriy was arrested and murdered by the Soviets). Actually, Nodira and Uvaysiy, who I mentioned above, play a prominent role in this book as well.

Hamid also wrote a book called Of Strangers and Bees. it's about a modern day Central Asian expat and his connection with a charming bee and the famous physician Ibn Sina. It jumps from the 1000s Central Asia with Ibn Sina and modern day with the expat. I'll admit I've had to reread this book many times because it borrows heavily from Sufism and there are a lot of references that I'm still trying to catch and understand simply because I'm not as familiar with Sufism as I'd like to be.

A little bit of an aside, but Tilted Axis Press, who published both the Devils' Dance and Of Strangers and Bees is a great press that focuses on translating books from the Global South into English and they have a great catalog of Central Asian and South Asian Writers, so definitely check out their entire catalog as well.

Finally, i have to recommend Amanat, even though the stories are set far beyond your interested time frame (most of them are either soviet or post soviet era Central Asia and Russia). The reason I recommend it is because it's the first and only anthology of all Kazakh women writers and it was published just last year, so it needs all the support we can give it. It's also a great look at life in Central Asia as a Kazakh woman.

I hope this was helpful and please keep in touch. I'd love to hear your thoughts as you engage with Central Asian literature. ^_^

[mariacallous]

A decade ago, when foreign fighters were flowing into Syria, the Islamic State’s capital, Raqqa, became a sort of Epcot of global jihad: New arrivals from different nations clustered together in their national groups. If you were a recent arrival from France or just wanted to know where to get a croissant, you could visit a café full of French people and ask. Tens of thousands of foreign fighters came from places as distant as Chile and Japan. Russia alone contributed as many as 4,000, according to President Vladimir Putin, and by all accounts, their cluster focused not on pastry but on warfare. The only countries that put up numbers to rival Russia’s were Tunisia and Turkey.

Yesterday, terrorists murdered at least 133 concertgoers in suburban Moscow. The Islamic State’s news agency, Amaq, posted the group’s claim of responsibility, as usual in language balanced between wire-service precision and rabid derangement. The claim described an attack “against a large gathering of Christians”—an odd way to describe a nonreligious prog-rock concert. Videos from the scene show gunmen firing into piles of huddled civilians and stalking others. The style resembles the Bataclan massacre, which ISIS perpetrated in Paris in 2015, and the October 7 attack, the handiwork of ISIS’s enemy Hamas. The Amaq report says the killers “withdrew to their bases,” which suggested that they remained at large and capable of attacking again, and that they had more than one base. By Saturday, Russia claimed to have arrested all four perpetrators and several accomplices. Putin suggested the killers had been on a run for the Ukrainian border.

In Russia, as in many authoritarian states, rumors proliferate fast after shocking events like this. Many repeated the crazy theory that ISIS was deliberately invented by America. The exiled chess master and dissident Garry Kasparov suggested that Russia had attacked itself to drum up ethnonationalist sentiment. Putin’s intimation of Ukrainian involvement makes little sense to me. It beggars belief that the most hunted men in Russia would immediately drive in a white Renault toward the most heavily militarized and monitored zone in the entire region when they could drive in any other direction and be alone in a birch forest somewhere. But Putin’s version is consistent with the theory that he will use the attack to demonize Ukraine.

Everything we know about Russia and its history with ISIS supports the theory that ISIS perpetrated the attack. ISIS has been reviving its capacity, particularly in its Khorasan affiliate, the one identified by U.S. intelligence as responsible for the attack. Islamic State Khorasan Province “has taken on a more central role in planning attacks abroad,” Tore Hamming, a jihadism researcher at the risk-management consultancy Refslund Analytics, told me by text. He said a number of recent events, such as the arrests of suspected members in Turkey, suggest that the group is planning attacks outside its usual area of operations.

ISIS had a huge Russian and Central Asian contingent in its heyday. And the fault lines in Russian politics and society have foretold this kind of atrocity for literally centuries. It would be a surprise if four guys piled into a car and sped toward Ukraine after committing mass murder. Nothing could be less surprising than an ISIS attack in a region susceptible to just such an attack.

About one out of every five Russian citizens is Muslim, but that population is not evenly distributed either geographically or socioeconomically. In cities, a lot of taxi drivers and hard-luck laborers have names like Magomedov and Ismailov, indicative of Muslim ancestry. Many have roots in majority-Muslim Central Asian countries and have come to Russia in search of jobs. A very large proportion of the ISIS fighters from those countries came through Russia and developed violent tendencies there, away from the moderating influence of friends and family. The four alleged perpetrators arrested by Russia are reportedly from Tajikistan, a Central Asian republic bordering Afghanistan.

The center of geographic gravity of Islam in Russia is the Northern Caucasus, the site of domestic strife and bloodshed in a series of episodes going back centuries. In lieu of perfecting croissants, some groups around Dagestan and Chechnya have become proficient guerrilla warriors, and Putin perfected his own harsh methods on them during the Chechen Wars of the 1990s and 2000s. Those wars ended with a decisive Russian victory and the installation of micro-Putins, such as Ramzan Kadyrov, so that Moscow could rule Chechnya indirectly. These figures’ loyalty is such that two years ago, in the early days after the invasion of Ukraine, Kadyrov’s Chechen fighters were among the first deployed to fight on Putin’s side.

The problem is that decisive victories are never as decisive as they seem. Most residents of formerly restive regions in the Caucasus enjoy peace as much as anyone. But discontent is easy to detect. On my last visit to Dagestan, a taxi driver sheepishly turned down his music player when a jihadist song came on. Some people remain eager to fight.

The rise of ISIS was useful for Russia, which could imagine no better destination for its domestic jihadists than a faraway conflict with a conveniently high mortality rate. Anyone so inclined could go to Iraq or Syria with Moscow’s tacit blessing. That is one reason the number of ISIS members coming from Russia was so high: They were more or less permitted to go, so that they would self-detonate or run into machine-gun fire there, rather than make trouble within Russia’s borders. Many of those who went are now dead, as hoped. Some are not, and many of those have not lost their fervor. They just need a new object for it.

The connection between Russia and ISIS is, in other words, overdetermined. The cruelty of the killing and even the choice of venue—a concert hall—are all awfully familiar to anyone acquainted with jihadism in Russia. What comes next will be familiar too. The horrific videos and claims of responsibility have already arrived. Next will be a brutal reply from the Russian state. Whether that reply will be addressed to the attack’s actual authors is an open question.

[amielbjacobs]

Progress on 'A Traitor in Love'

It was late at night on the Moscow Metro, full of tired men and women waiting for their stops. A middle-aged woman in the corner seat was asleep next to her daughter, who gazed with weary eyes at the newspaper in her hands. A group of men, lightly drunk, was laughing and talking a little too loudly as they clung to the subway bars. 

A slim Central Asian man with a worn round face stood by the doors, gazing out the windows at the tunnel walls flashing by in a hypnotic blur of concrete. His name was Oktyabr Kerimuly Ismailov. 

Moscow had never felt quite real to him. He had come here a decade ago to live with his cousin after being released from prison; before that, he had lived in the middle of nowhere. Moscow felt as unreal as the Gulag, two dream-places that could not possibly coexist in the same world. Moscow was a flood of life, where people ate and fucked and argued about petty things, where people went where they wished in big flocks or on their own, where you could fly on a train from one side of the vast city to the other in under an hour. And yet Ismailov had come here from the Gulag, and so had others.The Metro, too, had been built by Gulag laborers. This world could not exist without that one. 

He pulled back the sleeve of his jacket, surreptitiously, to check his watch. It was an expensive, foreign piece, with a big shiny band of metal links and an English brand name written on the face. It wasn’t the kind of thing it was wise to wear out and about on the Metro, but it was a gift from his lover Winston, who did not understand such things. 

10 PM. Perhaps Winston would still be awake when Ismailov got back; reading, if it had been a good day, or drinking, if not. Ismailov always worried when he left Winston alone. He had been doing better, these last few months - drinking less, smiling more. But it was hard to believe in Winston’s stability; there was a fragility to the man, like a British flower that could not survive the harsh Russian winters. 

The Metro car came to the Dzerzhinskaya stop. Ismailov climbed out of the depths of the earth. As he walked, he glanced up at the squat shadow of the KGB headquarters - the Lubyanka, with its split gray-and-gold facade. The joke went that it was the tallest city in Moscow - because you could see Siberia from its basement. Winston regarded it as his place of work, although he was only occasionally to be found there. 

Ismailov stopped at the white-and-brown pre-revolutionary building that housed Glasby’s flat and pulled out his keys. There was a light on in the living room, and Ismailov smiled to himself. Perhaps Winston had waited up for him. 

He turned the key, pushed the door open - and started screaming.

[thesportish]

Easy 30 million. Ismailov avenged Shlemenko and made good money

Easy 30 million. Ismailov avenged Shlemenko and made good money

Photo: © Anadolu Agency / Contributor / Anadolu Agency / Gettyimages.com The Bald Predator won his second boxing fight in a row. Russian MMA fighter Magomed Ismailov entered the boxing ring in order to put in place a guest from Serbia, Alexander Ilic, who brought confusion to his rivalry with Alexander Shlemenko. The Joker questioned Storm’s class, and at the same time the level of martial arts…

[goalhofer]

2024 olympics Kyrgyzstan roster

Athletics

Sardana Trofimova (Bishkek)

Boxing

Munarbek Seitbek-Uulu (Osh)

Judo

Kubanychbek Aibek-Uulu (Bishkek)

Erlan Sherov (Bishkek)

Swimming

Denis Petrashov (Bishkek)

Elizaveta Pecherskikh (Bishkek)

Wrestling

Bekzat Almaz-Uulu (Bishkek)

Ernazar Akmataliev (Orto-Nura)

Aiaal Lazarev (Verkhnevilyuysk, Russia)

Zholaman Sharshenbekov (Talas)

Amantur Ismailov (Bishkek)

Akzhol Makhmudov (Bishkek)

Uzur Dzhuzupbekov (Bishkek)

Aisuluu Tynybekova (Bishkek)

Meerim Zhumanazarova (Bishkek)

Aiperi Medet-Kyzy (Bishkek)