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Iran: The Weapon We Already had: why sanctions Should Have been the Answer for Iran

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  The Weapon We Already Had: Why Sanctions Should Have Been the Answer for Iran By Wahab Raofi The smoke has cleared over the Persian Gulf, but the real damage to the Iranian regime is unfolding somewhere else entirely: the grocery store. Economic data out of Tehran, as of August 2026, paints a picture of a nation in freefall. Iran's inflation rate has surged past 89%, while food inflation has climbed even higher. Basic staples like meat and dairy have grown scarce on household tables. On the open market, the rial has collapsed to a historic low against the dollar. The country is facing its worst economic crisis in decades, weighed down by a budget deficit in the hundreds of trillions of toman. These figures are moving targets in an active conflict, and any writer citing them owes readers a date stamp — but even accounting for reporting noise, the direction is unmistakable. This financial ruin is the most overlooked element of the current Iran debate. It illustrates a point...
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The Contradiction of Taliban Supporters in the West

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  The recent remarks by Khalid Hanafi, the Taliban’s Minister for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, have once again sparked widespread debate among Afghans. He reportedly said that “reason, study, and research have no place” in divine Sharia and that religious commandments should not be questioned or examined according to personal judgment. But to me, the most surprising part of this controversy is not Khalid Hanafi’s remarks themselves. Hanafi is a religious figure and a representative of a system whose worldview and way of thinking have long been clear. He believes in a system that considers the enforcement of its interpretation of Sharia to be one of the fundamental duties of the state. The real puzzle lies elsewhere. The puzzle is that some Afghans who live in Western countries, and who themselves—along with their families—enjoy the freedoms and protections of secular societies, nevertheless defend the very Taliban mindset that Khalid Hanafi represents. Hanafi, at...
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Taliban After five years: Religious Law Struggles to Govern the Modern State

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  Anachronism of theocracy · The Anachronism of Theocracy: Why Religious Law Struggles to Govern the Modern State Today, August 15, 2026, marks the fifth anniversary of the Taliban's return to power in Afghanistan. Five years ago, the world watched in real time as Kabul fell and a Western-backed government collapsed. In the chaotic days that followed, Taliban leadership promised to build an "Islamic Emirate" modeled loosely on the early Caliphate — a society anchored in divine law, absolute obedience, and the Quran as supreme legal authority. Five years on, Afghanistan is mired in a severe humanitarian crisis, economic stagnation, and near-total international isolation. This anniversary invites an obvious question: can a state governed primarily by religious law function in the modern world? The honest answer is: rarely, and not without adaptation. Religion has historically governed the internal, metaphysical relationship between a person and God; the modern state e...
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Can Interethnic Marriage Solve the Afghan Protracted Conflict?

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  Can Love Solve Afghanistan's Prolonged Conflict? Interethnic Marriage Could Help — But Only If We're Honest About Why It Hasn't Happened Yet For decades, every ruler and regime in Afghanistan has tried to impose stability, and all have failed. The recent flare-up in Badakhshan is only the latest proof the country remains fractured. I believe intermarriage among Afghanistan's major ethnic groups — Pashtuns, Tajiks, Hazaras, and Uzbeks — could be part of a real exit ramp. But it won't work as a slogan launched from above. It only works if we're honest about why it barely happens now, who could plausibly encourage it, and what "voluntary" really means in a society where women rarely choose their own husbands. Much of Afghanistan's conflict runs along ethnic lines. Pashtuns, Tajiks, Hazaras, and Uzbeks have long lived in distinct regions and viewed one another as rivals more than countrymen. The Taliban's rise deepened this: the movement dr...
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Can Reeopening Gilr's Schols Solve Afghanistan's Main Problem?

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  Can Reopening Girls’ Schools Solve Afghanistan’s Main Problem? Afghanistan’s fundamental problem is not closed schools; it is a crisis of political legitimacy Hamid Karzai, Afghanistan’s former president, who is reportedly under house arrest in Kabul these days, occasionally raises his voice on political and social issues. His statements cannot be compared with those of an ordinary citizen. Karzai was once president of Afghanistan, and he still carries considerable political weight and influence. A few days ago, he once again called on the Taliban to reopen the doors of schools to Afghan girls. On the surface, this is a positive political message. No society can afford to remain indifferent to the denial of education to girls. But if we define Afghanistan’s problem simply as the closure of girls’ schools, we risk overlooking the country’s larger and more fundamental crisis. Afghanistan’s problem is not simply that the doors of schools are closed. The deeper problem is a crisis of...
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Saudi, Pakistan and Turkey Alliance. A Pact on Paper

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  A Pact on Paper: Why the Saudi-Pakistan-Turkey Alliance Faces a Difficult Test ANALYSIS Mecca, August 7, 2026 In 2015, Saudi Arabia learned an uncomfortable lesson about alliances. When Riyadh asked Pakistan to join its military campaign in Yemen, Pakistan's parliament debated the request for five days and then unanimously voted to stay out of the war. Islamabad promised to defend Saudi territory if the kingdom itself were attacked, but it refused to send troops into a conflict that Pakistani lawmakers feared could destabilize their own country and damage relations with neighboring Iran. Eleven years later, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan have signed a mutual-defense agreement with Turkey in Mecca, declaring that an attack on one of the three countries will be treated as an attack on all. The irony is hard to miss. The new agreement looks formidable on paper. Saudi Arabia has enormous financial resources and access to some of the world's most sophisticated weapons. Turkey has ...
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  Literacy Is Not Enough: Why Education Alone Cannot Build an Afghan Nation For much of my life, I believed that education was Afghanistan's best hope for overcoming tribalism. If more Afghans learned to read, attended universities, and studied history, philosophy, and science, I assumed they would gradually see themselves less as members of tribes and more as citizens of a single nation. I still believe education is indispensable. But after watching Afghanistan's political evolution over the past four decades—and observing debates even among the Afghan diaspora—I have come to question one assumption that once seemed self-evident: literacy and university degrees do not automatically create national thinking. Nearly a century ago, Soviet psychologist Alexander Luria conducted a remarkable study in Central Asia. Working among communities where some people had recently become literate while others had not, he discovered that literacy changed the way people reasoned. Illiterate ...
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