The Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and subsequent hostage crisis have put Qatar, the tiny Persian Gulf gas giant, in the limelight. Even as the State Department works with Qatari officials to free hostages, questions circulate within Congress about how much Qatar knew about the Hamas attack and when. Calls to designate Qatar a state sponsor of terror are increasingly mainstream. Qatar both denies culpability and insists its ties with the United States are stronger than ever. Qatari diplomats argue that its relations with Hamas and other radical groups are at the service and request of Washington and Jerusalem that encouraged Doha to play middleman with groups that neither wanted to engage directly.
Hamas is not the only radical Islamist or terror group that Qatar embraces, however. Doha has become a one-stop legitimation and money laundering service for radical Islamist and terror groups from the Middle East to Africa and from South Asia to North America. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton blessed the establishment of a Taliban political office in Qatar. It operated informally beginning in January 2012 though only opened formally the following year.
During both the Trump and Biden administrations, Qatar hosted the US-Taliban talks that culminated in the February 29, 2020, peace deal. The withdrawal was a strategic disaster; momentum matters. The Taliban, supported by Pakistan, swept through Afghanistan. Within weeks of the American withdrawal, the Taliban had captured every major city and town.
During both the Trump and Biden administrations, Qatar hosted the US-Taliban talks that culminated in the February 29, 2020, peace deal. The withdrawal was a strategic disaster; momentum matters.
The Biden administration abandoned most of those trained by the United States and the International Security Assistance Force. Many fled to Iran or Afghanistan’s Central Asian neighbors. Those who fled to Pakistan found their residence short-lived. Ironically, many wait in limbo in Qatar, where the US government pays most of their expenses. Tajikistan is the only country that allows Ahmad Masoud’s National Resistance Front, the main anti-Taliban resistance, to operate openly, if non-violently.
Masoud’s survival remains a Damocles’ sword over Taliban rule, for a simple reason: It was always easier for the Taliban to disrupt than govern. They never represented traditional Pashtun culture, but rather were proxies for Pakistan‘s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency. Masoud, an ethnic Tajik, has greater sway across Afghanistan’s ethnic mosaic than the Taliban and can call upon the legacy of his father, Ahmad Shah Masoud, whom Afghans revere for his heroism during the fight against the Soviet Union.
Two years after the American withdrawal, it should not surprise that cracks in Taliban control are obvious. Many of the Taliban occupying the Panjshir Valley have evaporated, forcing the Taliban and the ISI to rely on a limited number of Taliban drawn from just four provinces adjacent to the Pakistan border. The implication? The Taliban leadership can no longer rely on its one-time followers from Afghanistan’s other 30 provinces. Again, momentum matters, and the Taliban are fast losing theirs.
Enter Qatar. Sadiq Amini, program manager at the Observer Research Foundation America and an astute Afghanistan analyst, catches that Tajikistan President Emonali Rahmon departed suddenly on January 21 for Qatar. As Qatar, alongside Pakistan and Turkey, remains the Taliban’s greatest diplomatic supporter, the questions become why Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, the emir of Qatar, summoned Rahmon and what might be on the agenda.
The United States, its European allies, India, and moderate Arab states might today take a passive approach to Afghanistan, but any Qatari attempt to end the Tajikistan lifeline could snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Should Qatar buy off Tajikistan, the regional implications could be profound, transforming Afghanistan into a petri dish to grow and train terror groups in a way that could make events like October 7 too frequent an occurrence. Such a move would also strip the sheen off Qatari diplomacy. Its interest in Afghanistan and the Taliban is no longer strategic but purely ideological. Qatar wants Islamist victory. It can never be treated as an ally in the fight against terror.
