Taj Hashmi

STRANGER THAN FICTION

Professor of Security Studies at Austin Peay State University. His recent publications include Global Jihad and America: The Hundred-Year War Beyond Iraq and Afghanistan.

Removal of Nawaz Sharif and the future of Pakistan

We know, since the assassination of the first Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan in 1951, no Pakistani Prime Minister has been able to complete his or her full term in office. However, someone's stating this becomes clichéd or worn-out unless one discerns the different circumstances leading to each removal and dismissal.

Two disasters, two countries, two peoples

Surprisingly, “baby boomers” (born between 1946 and 1960)—the generation that took part in the Liberation War—and “millennials” (born between mid-1980s and early 2000s) of Bangladesh (both supposed to be articulated, brave, and liberal), to put it mildly, also seem to be apathetic and opportunistic, even during times of national emergencies.

Trump's Riyadh rendezvous

Although there's no reason to take Donald Trump's erratic behaviour, and his ambivalent and unsavoury assertions seriously, we can't ignore what he staged in Riyadh in the name of defeating Islamist terrorism on May 21.

What's so “interesting” in Bangladesh today?

Interest-ingly, “interesting” is an English expression, which may hide one's actual opinion about something one considers “interesting”.

A gambit and a war crime

There are contrad-ictory opinions about who on April 4 used chemical weapons, which killed more than 80 civilians, including children in the rebel-held town of Khan Sheikhun in Syria.

ISIS threats in Bangladesh - Denials and Delusions

It has happened again! In the wake of the latest round of terror attacks in Bangladesh, with ISIS claiming credit for it, authorities in the...

Another regression therapy for Bangladesh?

A recent move by the Government to allow child marriage under special circumstances is tantamount to excluding many Bangladeshis from the benefits of growth and development.

Corruption in Bangladesh: Perceptions vs. reality

The country has already become a lower middle-income country. So far so good! However, these indexes don't always tell us the whole truth about the states of governance, corruption, poverty, inequality, and most importantly, frequent violations of human rights across the country.

Obama's legacy, racism, and Trump's victory in America

As there are multiple causes and factors behind most events, so is Donald Trump's election victory not attributable to any single factor.

Attacks on minorities in Bangladesh: No longer a “communal issue”

Recently, Muslim mob attacks on Hindu houses and temples in Nasirnagar (Brahmanbaria) and elsewhere in Gopalganj, Chittagong, and Sunamganj districts in Bangladesh have drawn wide media attention, within and outside the country.

Foreign Policy article on Bangladesh: A Most Unfortunate Conclusion

It’s absurd! It's preposterous to suggest that around 40 percent of Bangladeshis favour suicide terrorism. Yet this is what some American think tanks and “expert analysts” have recently come up with in their reports, to the detriment of Bangladesh's reputation.

Should America intervene in Yemen?

While Americans are engrossed in Donald Trump's vulgar and offensive comments on women, and allegations about his sexual misconduct with multiple women in the past, seemingly the US Administration is busy teaching the pro-Iranian Houthi rebels a lesson.

Suing Saudi Arabia for 9/11: Another American obsession

Americans since the founding of the United States seem to be in a perennial state of narcissist obsession.

Fifteen Years after 9/11: Is America any safer?

Is America Any Safer” is the cover story of this September's Atlantic magazine. CNN and other media outlets are also commemorating

Marzan was a Chhatra Shibir activist at CU

Terrorists in Bangladesh

The poor, marginalised, and uninformed madrasa students in Bangladesh are too weak and disorganised to spearhead any violent or revolutionary movement. This explains why urban, rich, and secular-educated – not rural, poor, and madrasa-educated – youths appear so far to be the main foot soldiers of Islamist terror.

Countering terrorism in Bangladesh

Politicians and law-enforcers in Bangladesh, from time to time, hype up both panic and complacency by publicizing the following: “terrorists everywhere” or “no terrorists anywhere”, in the country. The ambivalence is counterproductive to counterterrorism (CT) operation.

Is Kemalism on its way out in Turkey?

The enigmatic coup-attempt in Turkey on the night of July 15 and 16 signals something ominous about the future of Turkey, NATO, and the entire region.

When terrorism isn’t terrorism, to America

I find my White American students – even the very bright ones – totally confused, the moment I ask them if White police brutality against Black people in America amounts to terrorism. Most White students attribute the killings of black people by

Should there still be ambiguity?

Although some Bangladeshi politicians till the recent past – the home minister repeated his position on July 3 2016 that the Holey Artisan Bakery massacre has no ISIS link...

Maniruzzaman Miah, as I knew Him

Although he was more of a guru and mentor to me, Professor Maniruzzaman Miah was also a very good friend of mine. He was

Why was Muhammad Ali Greater than his legend?

Last Friday (June 10), the “Great” Muhammad Ali was laid to rest at his birthplace, Louisville Kentucky. Around 15,000 people

Conspiracy theories and beyond

The Democratic and Republican parties have made presumptive nominations of their presidential candidates, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.

Defiance of law and the state of impunity in Bangladesh

KARL Marx, among other critics of imperialism, had some kind words for British colonial rule in India, especially in regards to

Fallout from Narayanganj: Hope and Despair

Salim Osman might have put the last straw on the camel's back. His using of cheap, religious and communal sentiments of the people is absurdly wild and dangerous. It could wreak havoc on Narayanganj, and eventually on the whole country.

MP plays judge-jury-prosecutor!

An MP – who paradoxically represents the ruling coalition as well as its opposition in the parliament – recently played the proverbial role of the judge, jury and prosecutor.

Finding the beneficiaries of the killings

The way the U.S. and Indian governments, and some conservative think tanks in the U.S. are appraising the spate of killings in

Some unresolved issues

Not only the ruling coalition and its main Opposition (which is outside the Parliament) contradict each other as to who have been killing writers, bloggers and freethinkers in the country, but some ministers of the coalition government also contradict each other in this regard.

Terror in the East and West: Beyond Ankara, Lahore, Paris, and Brussels

Although Islamist or separatist terror groups bomb and kill hundreds of people in Iraq, Syria, Pakistan, Turkey, or Afghanistan on a regular basis...

A debacle in Pakistan

Am I an alarmist for believing elements of the Pakistani “debacle” might eventually trickle down to Bangladesh? I hope that it turns out so. But I don't think so.

Political violence, “rational ignorance”, and “political illiteracy” in Bangladesh

THERE was yet another shocking headline in this daily (February 22): “Priest killed, devotee shot”. Some “unknown” assailants raided a

The witch-hunt against Mahfuz Anam

Ever since this ridiculous debate cropped up – soon after Mahfuz Anam's TV interview with Munni Saha on February 3 – on The Daily

It's not a debatable proposition

IT'S unbelievable but true. Some people still believe Bangladesh needs “development” first, before its transition to democracy!

From Cairo to Cologne, and Damascus to Dhaka

Men not only molest uncovered/Westernised women at home, but also molest hijab- and even burqa-clad women in various Arab countries.

Politics, terrorism, and the state of denial

While Islamist terrorists have re-emerged recently, killing bloggers, writers, foreign nationals and Shias, and attacking an Ahmadiyya mosque, with impunity, one wonders how leaders, intellectuals, and ordinary people in Bangladesh can afford to waste time and energy in partisan politics!

Should Bangladesh provide mercenaries to the Saudi coalition?

What the Saudi Defence Minister Mohammad bin Salman al-Saud declared on last Tuesday (December 15) about the formation of a

Sad but not surprising at all

THE terrorist attack in Paris on November 13 has rocked the whole world. Some people have already started calling the attack the “French 9/11”.

TRIBUTE - MINTU BHAI

Time flies. This November 10th was the tenth death anniversary of Enayetullah Khan ("Mintu Bhai" to his younger friends and admirers)...

Tony Blair's “apology” makes no sense

What is evidently cynical and self-gratifying in the so-called apology are in defence of the West's periodic invasions of countries in the Third World since the end of World War II. Blair's blaming the so-called “faulty intelligence” for the 2003 Iraq invasion is not only a flimsy fig leaf, ominously, it is also an attempt to defend the ongoing Western involvement in Syria in the name of saving innocent lives from Assad's military.

THE REAL BOGEYMAN

Locating an easy scapegoat, the “businessman-politician” is no option at all. The problem of bad governance has nothing to do with some businessmen's entering the arena of politics – as MPs or ministers – but in the state of impunity and unaccountability the dysfunctional state ensures to the ruling party cronies and close associates / relatives of the ruling elite.

Creating disorder in Bangladesh

While attempts are being made to create disorder and insecurity in Bangladesh by killing foreign nationals – politicians are busy playing a no-holds-barred blame game against each other.

America's Muslim obsession

America's Muslim obsession is a post-Cold War phenomenon, further accentuated after 9/11. As sections of Americans are obsessed with Islam and Muslims, “Muslim” seems to be the new “Black” in the American psyche. “Muslim” is also the new “Red”, the equivalent of a “Communist infiltrator” during the Cold War.

HAS AYLAN KURDI DIED IN VAIN?

Although hundreds of nameless refugees from Africa and Middle East have perished in the Mediterranean in the last one-year, the world will never forget the image of the three-year old, cute and well-dressed Aylan Kurdi in a red shirt and blue pants, whose body was lying face down in the sand of Bodrum in Turkey.