ISLAMABAD - The Friday morning’s terrorist attack in Islamabad has raised many eyebrows as it has been recorded as the first-ever suicide blast in the federal capital after a gap of over eight and a half years. Though the timely action of police officials who were busy in routine checking has averted a major loss of lives in the capital, it is being believed that any congregation of Friday prayers might be actual target of the suicide bomber. The bomber could also have easily made its entry either into any main commercial area or major government building at a time when security checkposts in the city have been abolished since December 2020. Then interior minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed had instructed to remove all security barricades except that of the high-security Red Zone area. Prior to December 23 suicide attack in the capital city, the last suicide bombing was recorded in March 2014 when two suicide bombers had detonated themselves at the Judicial Complex in upscale Sector F-8, according to the official data of Islamabad-based Pakistan Institute for Conflict and Security Studies (PICSS). Since 2005, a total of 18 suicide attacks have taken place in Islamabad in which 165 people were killed and 616 injured. The think-tank’s militancy database shows that the first suicide bombing in Islamabad after 9/11 was carried out in May 2005. Prior to September 11 attacks, the only suicide bombing incident that happened in the capital was an attack on Egyptian Embassy in 1995. Overall, Pakistan has witnessed 504 suicide attacks since 9/11 in which 6,748 people were killed and 15,111 injured. Many security experts argue that the Islamabad suicide attack was an intelligence failure as the terrorist easily made its way into the main middle income residential sector of the city and no prior intelligence information was available in this connection. The banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has claimed responsibility for the attack as the group has intensified its terrorist activities after it formally ended the ceasefire at the end of last month. Before this, the group whose militants have been hiding in Afghanistan since 2014 had focused its activities in KP including its tribal districts the group’s suicide attack in Islamabad has sent shocking waves among the law enforcers.