Ali was born in 1964 in Kabul to an ethnic
Pashayi family. He rose to prominence during the
Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. As a commander for
Hezb-e Islami Khalis, he quickly became an important leader for the Pashai community. Hazrat Ali has also been described as an
Afghan Army commander under the
government of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. He fled Afghanistan to live in
Mashad,
Iran, where he is believed to have married an Iranian woman. During the
war against the
Taliban, Ali is said to have been aligned with
Ahmad Shah Massoud. Following the fall of the
Taliban Ali joined with two other leaders in the
Jalalabad-
Tora Bora region,
Abdul Qadir and
Mohammed Zaman to set up the
Eastern Shura, a local provisional government. During late 2001 and early 2002 it was US policy to employ very few US ground troops, and to rely on air power and local allies, like Hazrat Ali to defeat al Qaeda. The
Asia Times reports that Ali was one of the warlords who allowed
Osama bin Laden to escape during the
Battle of Tora Bora. :
"By the time the merciless American B-52 bombing raids were about to begin, Bin Laden had already left Tora Bora - as a number of Afghan mujaheddin confirmed to Asia Times Online at the time. They said they had seen him on the other side of the frontline in late November. Hazrat Ali, the warlord and then so-called minister of "law and order" in the Eastern Shura (traditional decision-making council) in Afghanistan, was outsourced by the Pentagon to go after Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda in Tora Bora. He bagged a handful of suitcases full of cash. He put on a show for the cameras. And significantly, he was barely in touch with the few Special Forces on the ground." The
Pak Tribune described Ali as a "gangster" during the 2004 Afghan Presidential election. He and his private army have been accused of accumulating illegal weapons,
drug trafficking and opium trade, criminal
intimidation, land seizures for builders, looting and sexually assaulting women, for which Ali is under
Human Rights Watch monitor.
Hamid Karzai appointed Hazrat Ali as the
Jalalabad police chief in 2003 and sacked him in 2004 due to connection with Taliban and other militant groups. He got a seat in the
Wolesi Jirga of the
National Assembly of Afghanistan in the
2005 Afghan parliamentary election, representing
Nangarhar Province. He claimed he had been arrested, and sent to Guantanamo when he was stopped at an American checkpoint and the soldiers were confused as to why he was carrying multiple
ID cards.
Guantanamo detainee Awal Gul had worked, reluctantly, for the
Taliban, in administrative positions. He told his Tribunal of making multiple attempts to resign from the positions the Taliban had appointed him to. When the Taliban started to fall he took his chance and enlisted in Hazrat Ali's forces. However, a few months later, Ali forced him to surrender himself to American forces. ==References==