Talk:Taliban

Use of Mullah in the first paragraph

I've never made any edits to wikipedia before, so please take what I say with a grain of salt. In the first paragraph Mohammad Omar is described as "Mullah." It appears here to be used as an honorific. The same appears to be true with Akhtar Mansour, except the honorific hyperlinks to his page. (although his page's URL is still entitled Akhtar_Mansour) In the next sentence Mawlawi is used in a similar context, and like in the first sentence, does not hyperlink to Hibatullah Akhunzada's page. Is there an intentional distinction between Mullah when used for Mohammed Omar and Akhtar Mansour?

Discussion

Uzbeks and Turkmen are not significant enough in number to be considered as groups in Taliban. Tajiks are also not primary groups in Taliban. They are present in VERY small numbers according to the citation as well as news articles. If you include Tajik, Uzbeks, and Turkmen, you might as well include Punjabis and Sindhis because I'm sure they outnumber Uzbeks or other turkic people in Taliban, especially in Pakistan because no Turkics live there.

Are you referring to the info box at the top? I'm inclined to agree on that, Taliban rule was defined by adherence to traditional Pashtun norms, as far as I'm aware no other ethnic group is especially prominent. I'd also say the inclusion of Tajik is somewhat misleading given they are predominantly aligned with the Northern Alliance. Support cutting it down to "Primarily Pashtuns". Would also say that "groups" is too vague, support changing to "ethnic groups". Editor/123 21:32, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

Iran

They don’t support the Taliban… the Taliban killed many Iranians in Mazar e Sharif, Iran also supported the North Alliance, it has been denied by the foreign minister here… https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=djAdTep1mB0 (around 21:13), and by a security official… http://french.presstv.com/Detail/2019/12/18/614010/Iran-Taliban-US-weapons-Afghanistan-Shamkhani-Daesh (you may not find PressTV reliable but it’s a word-for-word quote). And I would argue that UAE/Saudi funded (source: https://theintercept.com/2017/08/09/gulf-government-gave-secret-20-million-gift-to-d-c-think-tank/) Middle East Institute is not reliable at all for this particular situation.

The foreign policy article is speculation (Mullah Mansour’s trip to Iran may well have been a simple trip to the doctor. But the trip may have had more nefarious purposes, too. Despite the differences between Tehran and the Taliban, they share some key interests and have often cooperated operationally. Indeed, Tehran and the Taliban have a more symbiotic relationship than meets the eye. In particular, they are both wary of the West and particularly the United States. And each seeks to undercut Washington’s influence.) and a NATO claim (the weapons thing). That is like saying the US is allies with ISIS because Iran claims it.

WSJ I don’t know because it has a paywall but US media is quite often not neutral (as can be seen with General Soleimani’s assassination) when it comes to Iran. Better sources would be Al Jazeera, Russian / Chinese media — Preceding unsigned comment added by 103.70.152.26 (talk) 21:44, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Looking at how its worded I'm afraid your point is mostly moot. The first para addresses the historic conflict between the two, the rest are preceded by qualifiers such as "x believes that...", "US Intelligence Officials assess...". I agree that if there are reliable sources on the other side of the argument they would be a valuable addition, especially regarding Iranian denials etc, but these are clearly portrayed as opinions of experts rather than facts.

Not sure what to make of your second paragraph, you seem to be arguing both ways? Given recent hotilities between Tehran and Washington it's not unbelievable that Tehran would look to their enemies enemy. Support doesn't mean ideological agreement, it merely means that one assists the other. In any case that is speculative, the first two sources would need support from something stronger. The third source is at best tangential, that line of argument would likely fall within Original Research.

In terms of suggested sources, yes to Al Jazeera, Russian and Chinese media is notoriously unreliable, they mostly parrot the states viewpoint so not better in any way. Given that this section cites a large number of generally reputable sources such as Washington Post, CNN, CBS, Bloomberg, the Guardian, as well as several middle eastern sources I'd be strongly inclined not to remove anything. Editor/123 22:00, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

Western media (including Americans) are notoriously more trustworthy due to their reputation and objectivity. If we talk about bias, of course there may be but there is less bias than in the media that you mention as the Arabs, Russians and Chinese who take the position that the adversaries of the United States have. Ironically, you and I would be defending a position like any other from a non-neutral point of view, on the other hand, the media along with the quotations (they are American media) are reliable given that if they are not and be the wrong news you would have to submit more evidence and citations to disprove its reliability. To say that Iran supports Al-Qaeda is the same as saying that the United States supports ISIS is not the same, because it is rather that these entities share a common ideology and it is to be anti-Western, not to mention that there are reasons for this as can see in appointments. Not to mention, that a YouTube video plus an article from an untrustworthy medium are not enough to refute it, because as everything is a lie that the minister is going to say `` Yes, we support the Taliban or Iran will remain silent. because both parties recognize that both nations are adversaries in tension. The American media do not always take the American position, unlike those who suggested us that this yes or yes take the position of the Russian, Chinese or Qatari state. I recommend that you provide better sources and do not attempt to remove or change the citations, as the sources are reliable until you provide a better or equally reliable source to change that. --OfficeBlue (talk) 20:11, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

Hazara

If you want to include the Uzbek and Turkmen Tajik minorities, I suggest including a Hazara minority because we could see that the Hazara were more and more present in the Taliban ranks with Malawi Mahdi. « The Taliban group has for the first time appointed a Shia (Shi’ite) Hazara as the shadow district chief of the group ». My source is the Khaama press news agency. AfghansPashtun (talk) 20:51, 21 May 2021 (UTC)