ABSTRACT
The August 2021 re-assumption of power by the Taliban, twenty years after being ousted from power in Afghanistan by the military might of the United States of America (USA), was generally welcomed by Muslims in Malaysia. Many of them had treated the USA’s initial incursions into Afghanistan with ambivalence. While empathising with Americans who were at the receiving end of the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks, Malaysian Muslims generally frowned upon the USA’s military assaults and installation of a puppet government in Afghanistan as blowing things out of proportion. As far as Malaysians were concerned, in a space of twenty years, the USA’s reputation had plunged from a being a paragon of democracy to being a perpetrator of horrible human rights abuses in Afghanistan. As for Taliban 2.0, Malaysian Muslims treated with equivocation. They were aware of Taliban’s past unsavoury reputation in such matters as women’s rights, minority rights and modern education, but they were not prepared to see their Muslim brethren in Afghanistan suffer much longer under the rule of a foreign occupier. Taliban’s own record of regressive rule notwithstanding, they were at least fellow Afghans who were more in touch with the religio-cultural sensitivities of the ordinary Afghan populace. From the interviews we conducted among stakeholders of post-Taliban 2.0 Afghanistan-related policies in Malaysia, we discovered that Malaysian Muslims were open to giving the Taliban 2.0 administration a chance to prove its worth in the management of the country, for want of a better alternative. Continually viewing Taliban 2.0 as a terrorist entity, as the USA was inclined to do, would be counter-productive at a time when the national economy was in doldrums and the population was suffering. On the still the critical issue of how Islamists would respond, given the Islamic Party of Malaysia’s (PAS: Parti Islam SeMalaysia) media statements declaring support for Taliban 2.0, this research, found that PAS’s impulsive riposte was an isolated sentiment that did not resonate with other Islamists in Malaysia whose response was one of cautious optimism with regard to the rise of Taliban 2.0. Help to Afghanistan from Malaysian Islamists have focused on humanitarian assistance rather than jihadist accoutrements. While it would be too early at this stage to dismiss altogether the impact of Taliban 2.0’s triumph in Afghanistan to Islamist extremism in Malaysia, the researchers believe that the ramifications, if any, should not be exaggerated either.
