US Far Right Welcomes the Taliban
The Taliban have taken advantage of the American withdrawal from Afghanistan to overrun security forces with a rapidity that has shocked observers. In power from 1996 until 2001, the Taliban went into decline when the US invaded to root out al-Qaeda. With help from Pakistan, they remained intact during the American occupation, garnering support and deriving income from the opium trade. Now they have begun to make conciliatory remarks on the world stage, but have also signaled that they will continue to govern by Shariah law. For women this has meant, among other things, exclusion from public life, forced marriage and public punishment such as flogging and stoning.
Although it is unclear what form Shariah will take in the future, it is likely to be draconian, deadly for women, and unacceptable to Western democracies. Well, perhaps to many in those democracies, but not to all. Recent reporting by Mark Scott in Politico’s Digital Bridge newsletter indicates that the welcome mat is out for the Taliban on some doorsteps. Scott tracked social media accounts on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, and found “reams of militant propaganda that all three companies said was off-limits.” He also noted that 4Chan and encrypted Telegram channels are beginning to form a “burgeoning far-right community” praising the Taliban.
High-profile figures on the US far right have jumped on the bandwagon as well. Former president Trump was on Sean Hannity’s show on August 17, complimenting the Taliban as “smart” and “good fighters.” Trump Jr. got into the act on Twitter, retweeting with approval a Taliban critique of Facebook’s speech policy. The Taliban, of course, are known worldwide for their unstinting support of free speech, especially by women.
Matt Gaetz, the representative of Florida’s 1st congressional district, seems to regard the Taliban more highly than he does the previous government in Afghanistan, or the current American government for that matter. This is the same person who claimed that the FBI helped plan the January 6 attacks on the US Capitol, and who alluded to “armed rebellion against the government” in light of perceived social media censorship of conservative voices.
If armed rebellion is one the congressman’s interests, he’s barking up the right tree. The current leader of the Taliban, Haibatullah Akhundzada, is an unflinching hard-liner. His son became a suicide bomber with his father’s encouragement, and drove one of three Humvee’s loaded with explosives into an Afghan base in Helmand Province in 2017. Sirajuddin Haqqani, one of Akhundzada’s deputies, is wanted by the FBI for, among other things, “questioning in connection with the January 2008 attack on a hotel in Kabul, Afghanistan, that killed six people, including an American citizen.”
The attraction of authoritarianism is a serious threat to contemporary democracies, and the US is far from exempt. In a welcome change from the previous president’s indifference to autocracy, President Biden has announced a Leaders’ Summit to discuss the current challenges facing democratic governments. Perhaps this group will gain some insight into the rise of right-wing authoritarian movements across the globe, including those in Europe and North America. The ‘Hate Map’ of the Southern Poverty Law Center and their report on anti-government extremism are convincing evidence that the admiration expressed above for the Taliban is the tip of the iceberg in the US.
Photos and SPLC logo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons; the screenshots are from Twitter
