It's democracy they loathed most

Time: around 7:00am of July 2. Place: Holey Artisan Bakery. Inside the premises, 20 guests, most of them foreigners, are lying dead. Outside, military personnel are preparing for the final push to end the hostage standoff.

In such a chilling situation, Nibras Islam later known to be the leader among the five café attackers looked calm and preached sermon on what, he thought, Islam does allow and forbid to assistant chef Delwar Hossain and eight other staff of the restaurant.

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The staff broke open the door of a bathroom a few minutes ago as they were suffocating inside following hours of confinement.

They had taken refuge in the bathroom as the militants with arms launched an attack around 8:40pm the day before. Finding this out around 2:30am, the attackers had them come out and then asked them to move in only to lock the bathroom door from outside.  

Delwar, as he remembers, was trembling with fear as he would die anytime if Nibras pulled the trigger of his loaded gun. 

"Don't fear. We will not kill you. Listen to me," Delwar quoted Nibras as saying.

The mission was to kill foreigners as they are enemies of Islam and destroy Islamic culture, the attacker said, referring to some verses from Quran.

Delwar at first didn't understand what Nibras was talking about but figured out what he meant when he started speaking about politics.

"You never cast vote in any election. This is haram," Nibras said.

Giving a pause, he continued, "Never vote for the Awami League and the BNP."

The assistant chef recalled they had all agreed to do what the cold-blooded killer advised. Sometimes they shook their heads up and down, sometimes they said yes in a muted voice. 

The sermon lasted for around half an hour, said Delwar who identified Nibras when The Daily Star showed him photographs of the Gulshan cafe attackers.

Aged 22, Nibras, who along with four other assailants carried out the unprecedented massacre in Bangladesh, had gone to the North South University and the Monash University (Malaysia campus).

US-based Site Intelligence that monitors jihadi activities posted photos of the five youths holding guns, saying the images were released by the Islamic State, a global terror outfit fighting for establishing Caliphate where democracy has no place.

One of the nine militants killed in July 26 operation by law enforcers in the capital's Kalyanpur also spoke against democracy in his recorded statements. 

Shazad Rouf Orko, 24, gave his entire statement against his family, his father Towhid Rouf and those who “support Sheikh Hasina” and do not support Sharia Law. 

He said he gave everything up for jihad.

Citing a holy verse to justify his action, Shazad said, “Either you kill [us] or get killed, paradise is for us.”

“You guys support Sheikh Hasina … you support democracy… that is why I am happy to call my family all murtads... all kafirs [atheists]. So, repent… before it's too late so that you can be saved,” he said in English in his speech recorded before he along with other militants was killed.

The IS hasn't yet claimed to have any link to the Kalyanpur militants.

But Rakibul Hasan Reagan detained by police during the raid on the militants' den pledged allegiance to the IS.

His claim and belongings of the militants -- IS flags inscribed with “Allahu Akbar” in Arabic letters, black robes and red and white chequered keffiyeh -- seized from the flat where they had been living brought to the fore the issue of the IS presence in Bangladesh. 

After the operation, Dhaka Metropolitan Police Commissioner Asaduzzaman Mia at a press conference said the militants killed in Kalyanpur and the Gulshan café attackers might belong to the same group.

The dresses and backpacks found in the raid were similar to those used by the Gulshan attackers, he said, adding that even handkerchiefs that law enforcers had found in the house were similar to those recovered from the Gulshan cafe.

The IS in the latest issue of its online magazine Dabiq claimed that the café attackers were “inghimasi soldiers of Caliphate”.

Inghimasi is roughly translated as suicide fighter, according to jihadology.net, a clearinghouse of jihadi primary source material, original analysis and translation service.

In Dabiq, nothing was written about the Kalyanpur militants who were killed before they could cause any harm.