Afghan Commentary Post

      A confederation between Afghanistan and Pakistan could put an end to rising tensions and halt both nations from fueling proxies, which has become a destabilizing force for both sides and the entire region.   By Wahab Raofi Pakistan’s recent airstrike in eastern Afghanistan targeted members of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and resulted in the deaths of eight individuals. This recent escalation follows a series of retaliatory strikes and has intensified the already-fraught relations between the two neighboring countries. The backdrop of this incident is a complex tapestry of long-standing tensions, marked by mutual accusations and intermittent conflict. For nearly 70 years since Pakistan's inception, Afghanistan and Pakistan have been entangled in a de facto war, with each side accusing the other of leveraging proxies to advance their geopolitical interests. Despite the Taliban (once allies of Pakistan) now holding power in Kabul, this enduring...

What Created Political Islam?  by Pervez Hoodbhoy.   Political Islam does not owe to one single reason. Certainly, there was a time when it did not exist. Looking back to the mid-20th century, one cannot see a single Muslim nationalist leader who was a fundamentalist. Turkey’s Kemal Atatürk, Algeria’s Ahmed Ben Bella, Indonesia’s Sukarno, Pakistan’s Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Egypt’s Gamal Abdel Nasser, and Iran’s Mohammed Mosaddeq – all sought to organize their societies on the basis of secular values. They were part of the larger anticolonial nationalist current across the Third World. With Muslims and Arabs included, a nascent nationalism sought to control and use national resources for domestic beneft. The confict with the West’s greed was inevitable. The imperial interests of Britain, and later that of the United States, feared independent nationalism. Anyone willing to collaborate was preferred, even the ultraconservative Islamic regime of Saudi Arabia. In time, as ...

 By Pervez Hoodbhoy the author of Pakistan: Origins, Identity and Future e Maulana Abul Ala Maududi (1903–1979), whose life trajectory and political role as an ideologue we have already encountered earlier, was perhaps the most infuential among 20th century Islamic scholars in creating the notion of an Islamic state.18 Paradoxically, in the years before Partition, he had argued against a state with defned borders but, threatened by isolation and irrelevance, he eventually threw his lot in with those who chose to migrate to Pakistan. After that he did Why Couldn’t Pakistan Become an Islamic State? 289 not again question the need for Pakistan but contended that Muslims throughout the world were one single nation, and they would have to seize political power if they were to lead lives of piety.19 This explains why after his works were translated into Arabic, his insistence that Islam demands a single global Islamic state resonated across the Middle East. Maududi’s is a m...

 Excerpts from Pakistan: Origine and Identity by Pervez Hoodbhoy Islamic Scholars on the Islamic State Lacking specifc guidance from the Holy Book, or even those derived from the Prophet’s sayings and deeds, Islamic scholars have had to invent their own concepts of an Islamic state. Islam’s frst political theorist was Abul Hasan al-Mawardi (974–1058), a scholar who served the Abbasid Caliphs at a time when they were seriously weakened by Buyid Emirs.11 Al-Mawardi’s task was to ideologically protect the caliphate against the insurgent Emirs. He did this by giving justifcation to the notion of the caliph as the religious leader. His famous political handbook Al-Ahkām As-Ṣulṭāniyyah wal Wilāyāt Ad-Diniya (The Ordinance of Government and Religious Leadership) is a standard reference and key document in the evolution of Sunni Islamic political thought.Al-Mawardi posits the caliph as a vicegerent to Prophet Muhammad rather than vicegerent to God directly, identifying seven key...

  The Republican Party Needs to Save Itself from the Trump Cult By Wahab Raofi The Republican Party appears to be shifting toward autocracy. We should safeguard our government by preventing the party from being manipulated by elite groups or cults. Such influences erode the principles upon which the party was built, particularly inclusiveness and openness. Derailing from the rules of the game can herald ominous consequences domestically and internationally. When then-Texas Governor George W. Bush announced his decision to run for the presidency in June of 1999, I wrote a letter to the Republican Party headquarters. As a first-time voter, I offered suggestions to help the party shed its image of primarily catering to the rich and famous. My hope was and still is that the party will emerge as one that is more inclusive, with open doors for ordinary voters regardless of race, gender, ethnicity or social and economic status. Additionally, I suggested that there are many n...