Emran Feroz

Enthusiasm on the left for Vladimir Putin’s bombing campaign in Syria has strong echoes of the Soviet invasion and occupation of Afghanistan that killed and displaced millions, including relatives of this author.

Recent footage of US soldiers drive-by shooting an Afghan truck driver fits a well-established pattern of cruelty and criminality—yet Afghans who report these abuses are still invariably met with disbelief.

Afghanistan’s dystopian reality on the ground, and what the West is doing there, is worthy of far more than a side note on daily news coverage.

Syrian intellectual Yassin al-Haj Saleh talks with Emran Feroz about his criticism of Western experts who claim that there is no alternative to Assad and that shoring up the regime would be the lesser of two evils.