Earlier groups Abdul Hameed (Abduhamit), Abdul Azeez Makhdoom (Abliz Mehsum) and Abdul Hakeem Makhdoom (Ablikim Mehsum) launched the
Hizbul Islam Li-Turkestan (Islamic Party of Turkistan or Turkistan Islamic Movement) in 1940. During the 1940s through 1952, the three led the movement in a series of uprisings against local warlords and later against the Chinese Communists. They were killed, imprisoned or driven underground by China by the late 1950s. In 1956, after the death of Abdul Hameed, the group reformed as
Hizbul Islam Li-Turkistan Ash-Sharqiyah (Islamic Party of East Turkistan or East Turkistan Islamic Party) under the new leadership of Mullah Baquee and Mullah Muhammad. The organization led a failed uprising, leading to a decline of the organization and its activity until the late 1970s or early 1980s. After being set free from prison in 1979, Abdul Hakeem Makhdoom instructed
Muhammad Amin Jan and other Uyghurs in his version of Islam. With the death
Hizbul Islam Li-Turkistan Ash-Sharqiyah founder Abdul Hakeem in 1993, the movement was briefly reborn under the leadership of Hotan natives Abdurahman and Memet Tohti. In 1998, Mahsum moved the ETIP (which China claims is ETIM)'s headquarters to
Kabul, taking shelter under
Taliban-controlled
Afghanistan. The leader, Hasan Mahsum, was killed by a Pakistani raid on a suspected Al-Qaeda camp in
South Waziristan in 2003, leading to the group's collapse. The group was mentioned again in 2007, when China announced it raided its militants in
Akto County.
From ETIP to TIP The new organization called itself the Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP) to reflect its new domain and abandoned usage of the name ETIP, although China still calls it by the name ETIM. The Turkistan Islamic Party was originally subordinated to the
Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) but then split off and declared its name as TIP and started making itself known by promoting itself with its
Islamic Turkistan magazine and
Voice of Islam media in Chinese, Arabic, Russian, and Turkish in order to reach out to global jihadists. Control over the Uyghur and Uzbek militants was transferred to the Pakistani Taliban from the Afghan Taliban after 2001, so violence against the militant's countries of origins can no longer restrained by the Afghan Taliban since the Pakistani Taliban does not have a stake in doing so. In 2013, the group announced it was moving fighters to Syria, its profile in China and even Afghanistan and Pakistan has decisively waned since then, while in Syria it has risen. In March 2025, the group announced it was returning to its former name of the East Turkistan Islamic Party (ETIP).
Al-Qaeda links The TIP has links to
al-Qaeda and affiliated groups such as the
Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, and the
Pakistani Taliban. The US has designated it as having received "training and financial assistance" from al-Qaeda. Meanwhile, specific incidents were downplayed by Chinese authorities as isolated criminal acts. However, in 1998 the group's headquarters were moved to
Kabul, in
Taliban-controlled
Afghanistan, while "China's ongoing security crackdown in Xinjiang has forced the most militant Uyghur separatists into volatile neighboring countries, such as Pakistan," Potter writes, "where they are forging strategic alliances with, and even leading, jihadist factions affiliated with al-Qaeda and the Taliban." and TIP member
Abdul Shakoor Turkistani was appointed military commander of its forces in the
Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan. Abdul Haq was considered sufficiently influential by the al-Qaeda leadership that he served as a mediator between rival Taliban factions and played a role in military planning. In the mid-2010s, TIP's relationship to al-Qaeda was still contested but they became more closely aligned and TIP leader head Abdul Haq confirmed loyalty to al-Qaeda in May 2016. In 2014, according to the
SITE Intelligence Group, the al-Qaeda aligned al-Fajr Media Center began to distribute TIP promotional material, placing it in the "jihadist mainstream". The East Turkestan independence movement was endorsed in the serial
Islamic Spring's 9th release by Ayman Al-Zawahiri in 2016. Zawahiri confirmed that the Afghanistan war after 9/11 included the participation of Uighurs and that the jihadists like Zarwaqi, Bin Ladin and the Uighur Hasan Mahsum were provided with refuge together in Afghanistan under Taliban rule. This was before the Bishkek Chinese Embassy Bombing. The Turkistan Islamic Party slammed and attacked Assad, Russia, NATO, the United States and other western countries in its propaganda outlets such as the
Islamic Turkestan magazine and its
Telegram channel.
Afghanistan and Waziristan In February 2018, airstrikes were conducted by American forces in Afghanistan's
Badakhshan province against training camps belonging to the Taliban and the Turkistan Islamic Party. Speaking with Pentagon reporters,
US Air Force Maj. Gen. James B. Hecker, commander of
NATO Air Command Afghanistan was quoted "The destruction of these training facilities prevents terrorists from planning any acts near the border with China and Tajikistan. The strikes also destroyed stolen Afghan National Army vehicles in the process of being converted to vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices. ETIM enjoys support from the Taliban in the mountains of Badakhshan, so hitting these Taliban training facilities and squeezing the Taliban's support networks degrades ETIM capabilities."
Syria TIP (ETIM) sent the "Turkistan Brigade" (
Katibat Turkistani), also known as the
Turkistan Islamic Party in Syria to take part in the
Syrian Civil War as part of a network of al-Qaeda linked groups alongside al-Nusra, most notably in the
2015 Jisr al-Shughur offensive where they were part of the
Army of Conquest coalition. They have been described as well organized, experienced and as having an important role in offensives against President
Bashar al-Assad's forces in Syria's northern regions. Fighters from the Turkistan Islamic Party participated in the
2025 massacres of Syrian Alawites. == Ideology ==