Khartoum to Karachi: Global Islamic Jihad’s New Long Tail

Sudan is fast becoming the world’s next jihadist launchpad. Intelligence alarms are ringing that Khartoum’s chaos may birth a haven for Islamist terror, eerily echoing Hamas’s brutal October 7, 2023 onslaught on Israel. On that day, Hamas terrorists breached Israel’s borders in a coordinated surprise attack, killing over 1,200 people in an orgy of violence that shocked the world. Now evidence is mounting that Sudan – strategically perched on the Red Sea – is being groomed to host the next wave of Islamist terrorism modelled on those same tactics.

The implications reach far beyond the Middle East: what incubates in Sudan could ignite multi-front conflicts from Africa to South Asia, threaten vital global shipping lanes, and put innocents from Tel Aviv to Kashmir in the crosshairs. This urgent briefing lays out why Sudan’s spiral matters to every policymaker – and why an attack on Israel or India by these forces would be an attack on civilization itself.

Iran’s Red Sea Gambit in Port Sudan

Sudanese naval officers welcome an Iranian warship in Port Sudan (2012), symbolizing an enduring alliance that now threatens to reopen Sudan as a hub for militant activity. What was once unthinkable is now unfolding: Iran is actively building a drone and arms infrastructure on Sudan’s Red Sea coast, turning Port Sudan into an outpost of the Iran-led “Axis of Resistance.”

Desperate for weapons amid a civil war, Sudan’s ruling junta under Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan renewed ties with Tehran just two days after Hamas’s October 7 attack. In return, Iran has flooded Port Sudan with military aid – including advanced Mohajer-6 combat drones– to prop up Burhan’s forces. Satellite imagery confirms Iranian drones under Sudanese army control.

Alongside Iranian technicians have come Hamas terrorists in exile: regional analysts report that Hamas has relocated some top commanders to Sudan to build a new forward base. Their goal: to empower Sudan’s Islamist factions within the army and make Sudan a staging ground for long-range attacks, much as Gaza served Hamas. The partners in this enterprise are Sudan’s own Islamist generals and militias – the very men who once welcomed Osama bin Laden in Khartoum and built Sudan into an Islamist stronghold in the 1990s.

These veterans of Bashir’s Muslim Brotherhood–aligned regime, now back in influence under Burhan, have eagerly aligned with Iran’s agenda. In short, an Iran–Sudan–Hamas nexus is consolidating in Port Sudan, effectively planting the seeds of a new terror capital on the Red Sea.

Houthis-Style Drone and Missile Warfare – Now from Sudan

If Hamas’s Gaza tactics provided the inspiration, Yemen’s Houthis provide the blueprint for Sudan’s budding terror arsenal. Just as the Iran-backed Houthi rebels perfected long-range drone and missile warfare – striking deep into Saudi Arabia and even targeting ships in the Red Sea – Sudan’s Islamist alliance is now pursuing similar capabilities. Western security sources warn that Sudan could become a “new Yemen” – a multi-front threat base launching drones and missiles across the region.

The parallels are stark. In Yemen, Houthi terrorists armed by Iran have used swarms of suicide drones and ballistic missiles to hold enemies at risk hundreds of miles away. Now Iran is believed to be training Hamas operatives and Sudanese units in these same tactics on Sudanese soil, effectively cloning a Houthi-style drone army on the Red Sea coast.

The strategic danger cannot be overstated: with Houthis at the Red Sea’s southern chokepoint and Sudan as a new militant bastion in the north, Iran gains a pincer grip on one of the world’s most vital waterways. The Red Sea carries roughly 15% of global maritime trade and 12% of seaborne oil through the Suez Canal. An Islamist foothold in Sudan would enable Tehran’s proxies to threaten shipping, attack Israeli or Western vessels, and even jeopardize the sea route for Muslim pilgrims to Mecca.

In effect, Sudan and Yemen combined could allow Iran to project Islamist military power across the Middle East and East Africa simultaneously, opening a pincer “southern front” to complement the well-known threats from Lebanon or Syria in the north. The multi-front nightmare Israel and its partners fear – rockets from Gaza, missiles from Lebanon, drones from Yemen, and now a potential new front from Sudan – inch closer to reality if Sudan’s descent continues unchecked.

Khartoum to Kashmir: A Widening Web of Jihad

This burgeoning terror epicentre in Sudan is not operating in isolation – it is part of a widening web of Islamist insurgency that now stretches into South Asia. Shocking intelligence out of India indicates that Hamas and its backers are extending their ideological and operational reach into the volatile region of Jammu and Kashmir.

In April 2025, terrorists struck Indian Kashmir with a brutality chillingly reminiscent of Hamas’s October 7 massacre. Terrorists from a Pakistan-based jihadist group ambushed and killed 26 unarmed Indian tourists in a single attack, the worst mass-casualty terror incident in India in over a decade. Indian investigators quickly saw the signature of Hamas’s tactics: attacking civilians without warning or mercy. It soon emerged that just weeks before this Pahalgam massacre, senior Hamas leaders had secretly met with Pakistan-based militant commanders in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.

According to Indian and Israeli intelligence, Hamas is actively forging links with Kashmiri jihadist outfits, sharing know-how and inspirational zeal. Israeli officials have drawn sharp parallels between the Kashmir attack and Hamas’s assault on Israel, warning that Hamas’s October 7 tactics are inspiring terrorists globally. Indeed, Kashmir’s main culprit group (an offshoot of Lashkar-e-Taiba) claimed the attack while invoking Islamist rhetoric identical to Hamas’s, even separating victims by religion for execution – a cruelty both ISIS and Hamas have practiced.

The message is clear: the ideological fire that Hamas stoked is spreading. From the Gaza Strip to the mountains of Kashmir, a transnational Islamist insurgency is coalescing – one that views the Israeli and Indian’s fight against terrorism as a common jihad. Sudan’s role in this is pivotal: as a new sanctuary for Hamas and similar extremists, it can serve as the rear base for training, financing, and coordinating these far-flung fronts. Every global policymaker must grasp that these threats are interconnected. A jihadist safe haven in Sudan means not just more rockets in the Middle East, but potentially more terror from Africa to South Asia as terrorists trade resources and rally around a unifying cause.

The Pakistani Puzzle: Who Remains in Sudan’s War Zone?

Amid the exodus of foreigners from war-torn Sudan, one curious fact stands out: while Americans, Europeans, and even many Arabs have evacuated en masse, a substantial number of Pakistani nationals – roughly 2,000 – remain on the ground in Sudan. Ostensibly, many are long-time residents or small business owners, part of Sudan’s Pakistani diaspora.

Yet intelligence analysts are asking whether something more is at play. Could elements within this community form a latent support network for the emerging Islamist alliance in Sudan? Historically, Sudan and Pakistan have enjoyed warm relations through the Islamic fraternity (both are members of the OIC and were partners in past conflicts).

In the 1990s, Sudan under Islamist leader Hassan al-Turabi hosted assemblies of global jihadists – welcoming not just Arab terrorists but also Pakistani Islamists and Afghan mujahideen veterans in a grand ideologically charged conclave. Today, with Sudanese Islamists back in power and allied with Hamas and Iran, it’s conceivable that certain Pakistani fighters or trainers quietly slipped in.

Moreover, Pakistan’s military and intelligence services have a record of shadowy involvement in Middle Eastern conflicts (from training Arab fighters to allegedly aiding proxies). The presence of a Pakistani diaspora that did not evacuate – even as Western governments airlifted their citizens out – raises eyebrows. Strategists must consider a darker scenario: that a cohort of Pakistani nationals in Sudan may be serving as facilitators, logisticians, or liaisons linking Sudan’s Islamist factions with terror networks in South Asia and beyond.

At minimum, the situation demands scrutiny. If Sudan indeed becomes a terror hub, it may enjoy quiet sympathies or support from hardline networks in Pakistan – a country that itself has tens of thousands of jihadists and a history of “strategic depth” doctrine with friendly Islamist regimes. The long tail of global jihad can be very long indeed, and it may run from Khartoum to Karachi.

Israelis and Indians in the Crosshairs

The immediate targets of this emergent terror axis are plain: Israel remains the prime enemy, but India is now explicitly in the crosshairs as well. Hamas and Iran’s strategists in Sudan are plotting atrocities not only against Israelis, but also against the tens of thousands of Indian nationals who have recently moved to Israel for work. In the wake of the Gaza war, Israel sharply reduced its reliance on Palestinian labour and brought in a wave of foreign workers – notably from India – to fill jobs in construction and caregiving.

Over 16,000 Indian labourers arrived in Israel in the past year alone, with plans in motion to recruit thousands more. These Indians now live and work in cities like Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Jerusalem – and their presence has not gone unnoticed by Islamist propagandists. Hamas’s rhetoric has increasingly painted India as part of the “Zionist-Hindu alliance” it claims to be fighting.

By expanding its base to Sudan and linking up with South Asian jihadists, Hamas appears intent on making Israelis and Indians pay for the burgeoning Israel-India partnership. Consider the nightmare scenario: a coordinated terror attack launched from Sudan (or by Sudan-trained operatives) not only strikes Israeli citizens, but deliberately targets areas where Indian workers reside – attempting to kill Israelis and Indians side by side.

This is not far-fetched; ISIS and Al-Qaeda have long labelled both countries as common enemies of Islam. And just weeks ago, Hamas-aligned terrorists in Jammu & Kashmir massacred Indian Hindu civilians. implicitly warning New Delhi of the cost of aligning with Israel. For India – which has proudly deepened ties with Israel – the threat matrix now extends beyond Pakistan or local insurgents.

There is a real possibility that Indian nationals could become collateral targets (or even primary targets) of Hamas’s next terror campaign. Likewise for Israel, the inclusion of foreign workers means any mass casualty attack will instantly internationalize the tragedy. The two democracies’ destinies are thus intertwined: Israel under siege now hosts citizens of India, and India facing jihadist attacks finds the trail leading back to Israel’s enemies.

Both nations, representing pluralistic, free societies, have bulls-eyes painted on them by the Islamist extremist axis converging in Sudan. Policymakers in Washington, Brussels, and the UN must recognize this: an attack on an Israeli kibbutz or city now potentially means dozens of Indian innocents slaughtered as well. The terror threat is global, and our sense of outrage and response must be global too.

Civilizational Stakes: Appeasing the Viper or Confronting It

Beyond the geopolitical and security calculus lies a stark moral reality. What is unfolding with Sudan’s transformation into a jihadist launchpad is nothing less than a frontal assault on the values of civilization. Israel and India today stand at the frontlines of a civilizational battle between democratic pluralism and violent theocratic extremism. To allow Sudan to become a terrorist sanctuary is to feed the serpent and hope it will be satisfied.

Appeasing or ignoring evil only emboldens it. The world has tried tolerating extremist preachers, turning a blind eye to terror-financing states, hoping engagement would moderate them – only to be bitten again and again. We must not repeat this mistake with Sudan. The moral clarity of the moment is that Sudan’s Islamist coup-makers, their IRGC patrons, and their Hamas and Houthi allies are hell-bent on undermining the very fabric of international order.

They target not just certain nations, but the foundational principle that innocent life is sacred. Their doctrine glorifies massacring families in their homes, be it in southern Israel or in the valleys of Kashmir. Such an ideology cannot be placated – it must be confronted and defeated. As policymakers, influencers, and guardians of the global commons, we face a choice: stand united against this gathering storm or watch it wash away countless lives and decades of progress. History will judge us by our response to Sudan’s descent into a trans-national Jihadist hub.

A Call to Vigilance and Unity

Sudan’s strategic position on the Red Sea – once merely a geographic fact – is rapidly becoming a linchpin of a new Islamist axis of terror. From that 465-mile coastline, a regime empowered by Iran and manned by veteran jihadists aims to project violence across continents. This is a clarion call for urgent action. The world’s policymakers must treat Sudan’s slide into extremism as the global crisis it is – not as a distant African conflict to be ignored.

Concrete steps should include intensified intelligence sharing, pre-emptive sanctions and isolation of Sudan’s Islamist military leaders, and a robust security coalition (involving the US, Israel, India, and moderate Arab states) to stymie Iran’s designs in the Red Sea. The free world has confronted such evil before and prevailed, but only when it recognized that an attack on one is an attack on all.

Today, Jerusalem and New Delhi share a common peril emanating from Port Sudan’s schemers. In this high-stakes moment, unity is our most powerful weapon. We must respond to the warning signs from Sudan with the same resolve that we would if terror camps were sprouting in our own backyards – for in a globalized era, they essentially are.

The terrorists in Khartoum plotting the next October 7-style horror, the ideologues inciting Kashmir-style massacres, the IRGC operatives arming drones on the Red Sea – they are all connected, and they are coming for all of us who cherish freedom. Let Sudan’s lesson be a wake-up call: The snake has reared its head; now is the time to cut it off, not nourish it.

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