CONFLICTED

Thomas introduces a whole hour of extra content, as Aimen gives evidence to the Foreign Affair Committee in the UK Parliament. To hear more about this trip to the palace of Westminster, as well as other bonus content, sign up to the Conflicted Community!

Members also get access to our chatroom on Discord, where you can engage in riveting post-episode debates, and ask questions for upcoming exclusive Q&A episodes.

All the information you need to sign up is on this link: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm/ 

This audio is available to the public on and taken from the Parliament TV website.

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The second episode for our Conflicted Community is here! 

This bonus episode is the final one going out to all of our dear listeners on this feed, so to keep listening, you’ll need to subscribe. Subscribers can also join our Conflicted Community chatroom on Discord, which is already brimming with conversation and analysis.

All the information you need to sign up is on this link: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm/ 

For our second episode, Thomas and Aimen are returning to their bread and butter: jihadi terrorism. The attacks on a Moscow concert hall in March 2024, carried out by ISIS Khorasan Province, have revealed the return of a kind of terror not witnessed for a few years. But there’s a difference: could they have been jihadi mercenaries? Are they in fact jihadis for hire? Thomas and Aimen discuss how Afghanistan has once again become a hotbed of terror, and what this all means for the country and the rest of the world.

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Welcome to the first episode for our Conflicted Community! 

We’ll be coming to you every two weeks with interactive episodes for our subscribers. We’re giving the first couple of episodes out for all of our dear listeners, but to keep listening, you’ll need to subscribe. And don’t forget, subscribers can also join our Conflicted Community chatroom on Discord, to discuss everything you hear, and so much more.

All the information you need to sign up is on this link: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm/ 

In our first Conflicted Community episode, Thomas and Aimen discuss the unavoidable topic of war in Israel and Gaza, giving you an update on where things stand, what they’ve been hearing about the Hamas leadership and the threats posed by Iran and the wider axis of resistance. They also dig deep into Netanyahu and the ways in which Israel is prosecuting the war – does it legally constitute ethnic cleansing? Even a genocide?

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The Conflicted Community is now live! 

Want to hear bonus episodes of Conflicted and chat with fellow Dear Listeners? Now you can! We’re going to be putting out new interactive episodes every two weeks for subscribers, as well as giving access to our Conflicted Community chatroom on Discord, where you can engage in riveting post-episode debates.

All the information you need to sign up is on this link: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm/ 

This is a paid for community and these new episodes and access to the chatroom will be for subscribers only. We’ll be releasing the first couple of these episodes to all of our dear listeners on this normal Conflicted Feed, but you’ll have to join the Conflicted community to continue listening…

Episode one for our Conflicted Community is coming next week on April 17th – so watch this space!

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On Friday, January 12th, the Houthis added their muscle to the spreading conflict in the Middle East. By attacking commercial shipping lanes in the Red Sea, they have brought reprisal strikes from a US and UK led coalition which could bring the west into the war and even reignite the Yemeni civil war which has engulfed the country since 2014.

We covered Yemen extensively over 5 episodes at the end of Conflicted season 4, so it was only right that Thomas and Aimen come back together to answer our dear listeners’ questions about this huge new development. 

We answer your questions like: What are the Houthis’ objectives in the Middle East? Was the Western military response the right move? How will Iran and its proxies respond in turn? And what does this all mean for the future of the war in Israel, Gaza and the wider Middle East.

This episode is also a taster of the kind of content you’ll get as we launch a new platform - the Conflicted Community. This will be your community hub on Discord for all things Conflicted. Discord is essentially an instant messaging community platform which will allow you to discuss all things Conflicted with fellow dear listeners, share resources we mention in the show and engage in riveting post-episode debates. 

This is a paid for community, and for a small monthly fee you’ll get access to the Discord chat channels, the opportunity to chat with Thomas and Aimen, exclusive content and bonus episodes like this one, as well as ad-free listening.

Please do register your interest through the link: www.levellr.com/conflicted 

We’ll be launching the Conflicted Community very soon, so keep an eye out for further details on it once you have registered interest.

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The state of Yemen in 2023 is precarious. After the Arab Spring revolution descended into civil war, the Houthis have cemented their power over large swathes of Northern Yemen, while the traditional ruling parties have fractured and, in many cases, disintegrated. In this final episode of our mammoth exploration of the history of Yemen - and indeed season 4 of Conflicted - we bring things up to the modern day, stepping back from historical narrative to try and make sense of what has happened and what it means for the country and the region.

Over the course of this season, we've taken listeners through all the historical antecedents to modern Salafi Jihadism from Ahmad Bin Hanbal in the eighth century to Sayyid Qutb in the 1960s. We've looked at the Muslim Brotherhood, President Erdogan of Turkey, Iran, and their proxies across the region like Hezbollah. And now, as the conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza continues, we can see so many of the themes and ideas that we've talked about this series playing out in real time.

This final episode, which sees us joined for the final time by Yemeni political activist Baraa Shaiban, attempts to make sense of current events in Yemen and beyond in the context of 

Salafi and Shia jihadism. We ask what the future holds for the Middle East, and what we can learn from the tumultuous history of the region as the world attempts to bring peace to the geopolitical situation of today.

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The Arab Spring of 2011 may have brought with it hope for a new dawn in Yemen, one of democracy and liberal reforms outside the rule of strongman Ali Abdullah Saleh. But the years that followed saw this quickly undone. The GCC Initiative brokered by Gulf States quickly broke down due to an intense culture of mistrust between all the parties within it. And with the insurgent Houthis growing ever more confident in the north, their malign influence ensured that this move for democracy was doomed to failure.

In this penultimate episode of our Yemen series, and indeed season 4 of Conflicted, we look at Yemen’s road from revolution to civil war. It’s something that our returning guest, Yemeni political activist Baraa Shaiban, witnessed first hand as a member of the GCC initiative. He tells us about the role he played in trying to keep the peace as his country fell into conflict, and how the delicate art of Yemeni politics - dancing on the heads of snakes - was one which soon became too difficult for all involved.

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2011 was a pivotal year for Yemen, and indeed the entire Middle East. After years of wars against the insurgent Houthis in the North, and with years of protests against President Ali Abdullah Selah’s attempts at radical constitutional changes, the Arab Spring which engulfed so many Muslim countries came to Yemen, too. It saw a bottom up revolution take hold in Sanaa, quickly filtering out across the country. It was a cry for democracy from a people fed up with their strongman ruler’s increasingly authoritarian rule. But would it lead to a new constitution for the Yemeni people, or political chaos which radical groups could exploit for their own gains?

In this episode of Conflicted, the third part of our series on Yemen, we welcome back Yemeni journalist and political activist, Baraa Shaiban. He wasn’t just there during the Arab Spring, he played a really significant part in leading it. He tells us his story of leading protests in Sanaa, and all the hope he and his fellow liberal activists had for a new dawn in their country. But was it a dream that could ever be fulfilled? Or would the many other complex factions in Yemeni politics have other ideas?

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Ali Abdullah Saleh, the president of Yemen from 1990 - 2012, described the process of governing Yemen as akin to “Dancing on the heads of snakes”. Such were the profound splits in Yemeni society, and with other strongmen, tribes and insurgent groups vying for their own power, Saleh knew that to keep his newly unified country together from the 1990s onwards would take a dance of real precision.

In this second episode of our five part series on the history of Yemen, we find out if Saleh was nimble enough to hold onto power as the vipers beneath him began to show their force. From the civil war of the 1990s to the rise of the insurgent Houthis in the 2000s, we cover the period from 1990-2010, to see how these divisions in Yemeni society would ultimately lead to the civil war which continues to ravage the country today.

And to help us on our way, we welcome back our first ever guest Baraa Shaiban, a Yemeni journalist and political activist, who this week tells us about his extraordinary first hand account of growing up alongside the growing Houthi insurgency in northern Yemen.

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Ask anyone from the Middle East about Yemen, that country on the southern tip of the Arabian peninsula, and they’ll tell you tales about the Queen of Sheba, Frankincense and Myrrh. It’s a place steeped in ancient history and paints a vivid picture in the imagination. But it’s also a place currently riven by conflict, engulfed in a civil war which has now been raging since 2014. But how did it get there? And what can the country’s history tell us about the bleak current state of affairs? For the next five episodes, Conflicted tells the country’s story.

We begin in the 20th century, with two Yemeni states - one in the North and one in the South - at odds with each other. With chaos caused by interventions from Nasser in the North, and the British Empire usurped by a Marxist regime in the South, for decades it seemed they could never be united. But with the rise of a certain strongman, Ali Abdullah Saleh, by the late 20th century this seemed possible.

To help Thomas and Aimen find out more about this quest for unification, today Conflicted welcomes our first ever guest, Baraa Shaiban. Baraa is a Yemeni journalist and political activist who was previously the advisor to the Yemeni Embassy London and has done some amazing work in bringing the crisis of the past decade to the world. He’ll be bringing his extraordinary first hand account of many of the recent events in Yemen’s political history to the table as we seek to unwrap this riddle of a country.

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In the last episode of Conflicted, we saw Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shia terror group, grow in power in the midst of the brutal Lebanese civil war of the 1980s. But after a precarious peace came to the country, an Israeli occupation of the south remained throughout the 1990s. This allowed Hezbollah to remain an active and armed militia, a fact which would come to haunt the country over the following decades until today.

In this second part of our two episode exploration of Hezbollah, we look at the destabilising effect the group have had on the politics of Lebanon and the security of their southern neighbour, Israel. We’ll see how Hezbollah’s leader, Hasan Nasrallah, has held the country to ransom in the never ending game of political poker Lebanon is stuck playing. And with Hezbollah now poised to join the 2023 Israel-Gaza conflict from the north, we’ll take you through what their long term motivations for such a move would be, and why their Iranian puppet masters would be keen for them to do so.

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Some four decades ago, out of the chaos of the Lebanese civil war, a Shia militant group was born who would grow into one of the most dominant and malign forces in Lebanese politics. A proxy for Iran, staunchly opposed to Israel and aggressive in their aims, they have now effectively established themselves as a state within a state within Lebanon. Who are they? Hezbollah.

Over the next couple of episodes, Conflicted takes on this fascinating and sinister terror group, charting their rise amidst the Lebanese civil war, digging deep into the figures who created them and seeing them cement their political position by the early 1990s. All to find out how an Islamist vanguard movement - as proposed by Sayyid Qutb - evolves to achieve its power aims.

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Emergency Episode: On Saturday October 7th 2023, Hamas terrorists broke through the border of the Gaza Strip and carried out a brutal assault on Southern Israel. As of publication, the death toll stands at some 1,200 Israelis, 900 citizens in Gaza, and some 1,500 Hamas fighters have been found dead inside Israel. It is the most deadly attack on Jewish civilians since the holocaust.

As the world reels from these horrific events, we recorded an emergency episode to explain how this happened, the motivations of Hamas and what the likely repercussions will be from Israel, and for the region as a whole. It ties together many of the larger forces we’ve described across this season and previous ones. Be sure to listen to previous episodes on the Israel/Palestine conflict to discover more about how we got here.

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It’s always difficult to know exactly what is going on in Iran - that isolated, Shia theocracy that dominates so much of the Middle Eastern land mass. It's a diverse and divisive state, ruled with an iron fist by Ayatollah Khamenei, whose supreme power means he can dictate what the country does and how it is run, at home and abroad. But in recent years, protests against the regime have been growing, leading to many people hoping that an end to the Islamic Republic and its Islamic Revolution could be on the horizon.

In this episode of Conflicted, we move away from looking at the world of Sunni Islam to focus again on the Shia minority, who still retain a real influence over the region’s geopolitics. After getting the state of play in Persia, we’ll try to analyse how the Iranian system actually works, before looking ahead to what a future outside of Khamenei’s despotic regime could look like. 

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President Erdogan’s time in power has been a fascinating period for Turkey - at once nodding to the liberal West, while simultaneously winking at the more Conservative East. It’s his country in a nutshell, and his policies in economics, social welfare, secularisation and his relationship with the EU all prove it. But one thing has always haunted him: the army, and their historical proclivity towards coups.

In this second episode on the life and times of Erdogan, we analyse his time at the top of Turkish politics. We’ll see him saying one thing while doing another, and securing Turkey’s status as one of the globe’s most significant geopolitical players. And finally, we’ll show how he overcame an underground opposition that tried to force him from power, allowing him to consolidate his own. Could this be the thing which let his mask slip, revealing his Muslim Brotherhood credentials?

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Over the past couple of episodes we explained the inner workings of the Muslim Brotherhood - that mysterious organisation based in Cairo who have their sights set on a new Caliphate for the Muslim world. But who are their allies across the region? Is there a figure who is simultaneously working to further their aims? Well, many people point to Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the president of Turkey, as just that figure.

In this first of our two episode exploration of Erdoğan life we focus on his rise to power - one filled with genius politics and classic Islamist moves to cement his hold on the country. We’ll follow him from a poor boy growing up in Istanbul, to eventually becoming the city’s mayor, and after that, the country’s leader. But how did this enigma of a man gain such control over the geostrategically vital country of Turkey? And could he be a kind of Muslim Brotherhood sleeper agent in disguise?

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In last week’s discussion of the Muslim Brotherhood, we told you how this clandestine group are structured - headed in Egypt, but with chapters across the globe. But we tip-toed around their ideology, and we didn’t discover what the Muslim Brotherhood actually want. On the one hand, people claim they are an organisation promising peace and charity across the Muslim World. On the other, they are seen as the sinister puppet masters of various Islamic governments. So what are they trying to achieve with their international organisation?

In this second part of two episodes on the Muslim Brotherhood we’ll dig deep into the Muslim Brotherhood’s ideology, attempting to get to the bottom of the question: are the Muslim Brotherhood radical, or moderate?

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After finishing our extensive exploration into some of the most colourful and fascinating characters in Islamic History - figures who influenced modern Salafi jihadism as we know it today - Conflicted aims its sights on a modern group with an equally significant position in the Muslim world. This is a group whose nebulous, clandestine structure makes them tricky to unravel. A group based in Egypt but with tentacles across the Middle East and beyond. A group who once boasted our previous subject, Sayyid Qutb, as a member. The Muslim Brotherhood.

But who are they really? How are they structured? And are they the radical Islamists that many claim, or in fact a moderate group with relatively modest aims? In this first of two episodes on the Muslim Brotherhood, we try to unlock their structure, discovering how they function in countries across the Muslim world, to answer these questions and more.

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If the start of Sayyid Qutb’s life was defined by the evolution of his thought, the second part was defined by a calcification of his beliefs. With revolution brewing in Egypt following the Second World War, Qutb turned from analysing the aesthetics of the Quran to Islamism, explicitly calling for a new socio-political and economic order based on the Qur’an and the Sunnah of the Prophet. Following a trip to America, where he saw decadent Western society in stark relief, he returned to preach it at home, joining the Muslim Brotherhood and eventually coming up against the new regime of Gamal Abdul Nasser. It was in prison that he would write his most famous works.

In this second episode on Sayyid Qutb’s life, we plot the end of his journey, showing how he became the most influential Islamic thinker of the modern era. We also round off our series looking at the antecedents to modern Salafi Jihadism, showing how their thought has come together to influence terrorists in the modern era. Because to understand the mind of fundamentalists today, we have to understand their legacy.

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When it comes to the modern era, no Islamic intellectual has influenced modern Salafi Jihadism more than Sayyid Qutb. This unlikely Egyptian, steeped in Western literature and poetry, would come to define the ideological basis for modern Islamism. He was a poet, a writer and an aesthete who was a classic product of the tumult of the early twentieth century. How he became the most significant Islamist thinker today is quite the story…

In this first of two episodes on this radical romantic, we take a look at Qutb’s formative years in Egypt, a time which saw his anti-Western thought grow and his intellectual prowess and writing flourish, as Egyptian nationalism went into full throttle and the spectre of the Second World War began to rear its head.

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When Muhammad Ibn Abdul Wahhab gained the patronage of Muhammad Ibn Saud, it was a fusing of ideology with power on the Arabian peninsula. This was the time when Wahhabism really took shape, and the militancy of Ibn Abdul Wahhab’s mission became clear. As the Emirate of Diriyah expanded, war and conquest against the Ottomans came with it, as they sought to dominate Arabia with their new radical doctrine.

Join us as we explore the second half of Ibn Abdul Wahhab’s life, to discover how these thrilling events of the 18th century with secured the legacy of Ibn Abdul Wahhab as a militant mujaddid whose teachings would live on through the centuries, still held onto by salafi jihadists to this day.

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While many trace the roots of Saudi Arabia to Muhammad Ibn Saud, its ideological roots can be traced to his contemporary - the radical, militant and hugely controversial, Muhammad ibn Abdul Wahhab. This was a man who provided the doctrinal backbone to the burgeoning state, and created the ideology which bears his name: Wahhabism.

While many now see it as a derogatory term, Wahhabism has been hugely influential in salafi jihadist circles. Wahhabi texts are frequently quoted by jihadi scholars and leaders, who see themselves as heirs to the Wahhabi tradition.

Continuing our search for the ideological forebears of modern jihadism, this is the first of two episodes about the fascinating life of Ibn Abdul Wahhab. We’ll see him emerge from the Najd mountains of Saudi Arabia, develop his doctrine, face great opposition, and finally find a patron to help spread his radical message.

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The later part of Ibn Taymiyyah’s life saw continued invasions from Mongol Hordes from the outside, and a battle against Sufi mystics in his own society. And for the man himself, it was defined by a continuation of one thing more than any other: a zeal against irreligion. While confronting the Mamluk Sultan and preaching anti-Mongol fatwas, he cemented himself as the great mediaeval scholar and warrior he is now remembered as. And he set an ideological precedent which modern Salafi jihadists continue to follow to this day.

This week’s episode of Conflicted sees us delve into the latter part of Ibn Taymiyyah’s thrilling life to understand what it can tell us about the Middle East today, and how the ripples of his fundamentalist ideology continue to influence the thought of so many radical Muslims.

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Ibn Taymiyyah is known as the “Sheikh of Islam” to his admirers, and to his detractors, one of the most significant antecedents of modern Salafi Jihadism. Simultaneously a genius scholar, brutal warrior and unflinching polemicist, he is one of the most important pioneers of a militant form of Sunni Islam, and is now quoted more than any other scholar by Islamist terrorists today.

Continuing our series exploring the historical forebears of modern Salafi Jihadism, this week sees us begin two episodes on Ibn Taymiyyah, the great mediaeval Islamic scholar. We’ll explore the world in which he grew up, with Mongol invasions constantly at the gates, alongside the many contradictions that defined his life and how he rose to prominence in the 13th century Middle East.

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This week’s Conflicted sees the second episode of our deep dive into the thrilling life of 7/8th century Muslim scholar, Ahmad bin Hanbal, founder of the Hanbali school of jurisprudence. Continuing our series looking at the historic Islamic thinkers who have inspired modern Salafi Jihadists today, we look at the fascinating and drama-filled second half of the life of the first fundamentalist.

Expect more battles with Abbasid Caliphs, more stubborn refusals to renounce his teachings, floggings, dancing, and the infamous mihna.

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On this week’s episode of Conflicted, we begin a multi episode exploration into the historical figures who function as antecedents to the modern jihadi movement, beginning with two episodes on one of its earliest examples: Ahmad Bin Hanbal.

When Islamic fundamentalists today look back in history, one of the earliest figures they will mention for inspiration is the 7th/8th century scholar, Ahmad Bin Hanbal. His writings, hadith collecting and ascetic life are used as an example for many in the modern salafi jihadist movement.

Join Thomas and Aimen for part one to explore his early life filled with drama, determination and defiance, as we take you on a rollercoaster ride through Byzantine border wars, fights with Caliphs and more, to see why he is so significant for Muslims today.

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Islamic radicals have been a scourge on countries across the Middle East for decades, but what drives the person who commits terrorist acts? What causes some Muslims to adopt a fundamentalist ideology? And what do these terms even mean in practice?

On this week’s episode of Conflicted, we explore the socio-political and psychological causes of Islamic radicalism. We’ll discover why certain countries end up fostering these ideologies, while also exploring the lives and psyches of Thomas and Aimen to understand what drove them down their different paths of fundamental religiosity.

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In the first episode of season 4 of Conflicted, hosts Thomas Small and Aimen Dean attempt to get to the bottom of the current state of play with Islamic terrorism, asking: where have all the terrorists gone?

In 2023, it feels like there has been a kind of stasis in terms of Islamic terrorism, with other geopolitical issues taking their place on the global stage. But is this a sign that it’s gone for good? Or is the cycle of terror forged by our old friends Isis and Al-Qaeda about to come back around the corner? And if so, where will the potential future hotspots for instability in the Muslim world be?

Find out on this episode of Conflicted, now coming to your podcast feeds every week.

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Join Islamic scholar Thomas Small and ex-jihadi turned spy Aimen Dean as they explore the fascinating chains of events that have created the patchwork of the Muslim world today, and how the region’s history has impacted the story of the entire world.

Expect answers to questions like: What do Turkey’s 2023 election results mean for the future stability of the region? What role will the Middle East play in the new multipolar world? And is Islamist Terrorism still a thing in 2023?

We’ll be coming to you every week from June 28th - subscribe to Conflicted wherever you get your podcasts to never miss an episode.

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In a special LIVE end of season event (recorded on the 30th November) Thomas and Aimen sat down to answer your questions about the latest headlines from the Middle East. No stone is left unturned as the two discussed a potential invasion of Northern Syria, increasing tensions in Iran and the possible rehabilitation of Saudi Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud.

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A special announcement from Thomas.

Find tickets to the Live Q&A on Eventbrite.

Or join our FB Discussion group

Or follow us on Twitter or Facebook to have your say on what topics you'd like Thomas & Aimen to discuss.

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In the final episode of this season, Thomas & Aimen come full circle again, back to the latest chapter in Aimen’s extraordinary life—a new, sad chapter that has forced a difficult and fateful decision upon him. The two friends also roll up their sleeves and resume their age-old ongoing argument: is the clash between Western modernity and Islamic civilization bound to end in bloody conflict, or can the Islamic world make the adjustments required to reap the benefits of modernity—without losing its soul in the process?

Listen to Aimen on Blethered: https://pod.co/blethered/aimen-dean-21st-centurys-most-valued-spy-on-why-hes-leaving-scotland

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As Conflicted approaches the end of season 3, Aimen & Thomas turn their attention to a country which hasn’t featured much on the podcast so far: Algeria. Often overlooked due to the Algerian regime’s isolationist policy, for those with eyes to see Algeria has been at the vanguard of Middle Eastern developments for over two hundred years. For this reason, it’s the perfect prism through which to revisit all the historical themes from this season: traditional Islamic civilization, the challenge of Western modernity, the indignities of colonisation, the triumph of nationalist independence and petro-statehood, and the slide into disillusionment and decline thanks to Cold War geopolitics, political Islamism, and the rise of global jihadism.

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With the assassination of Al Qaeda leader Aymen al-Zawahiri ringing in their ears, Aimen & Thomas turn their attention once again to Afghanistan, focusing this time on the Soviet invasion in 1979 and the rise of global jihadism that followed. What led the Soviets to invade? What was Kabul’s Cold War relationship with Moscow like in the run-up to the invasion? What was the U.S.’s true role in the anti-Soviet jihad? And most importantly: why did thousands of young men from the Arab role sign up to fight? Through an in-depth look at the life of the most celebrated ideologue of modern jihadism, Abdullah Azzam, we’ll answer those questions and more, as we continue to assemble the geopolitical puzzle of the modern Middle East.

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In our previous episode on the Iranian revolution, we left the Ayatollah Khomeini sitting high and mighty in Tehran. Little did he know, next door in Baghdad, an Arab strongman nursed revolutionary, expansionary ambitions of his own: Saddam Hussein, the Lion of the Arabs and Defender of the Eastern Gate, the ultimate symbol of corrupt and tyrannical dictatorship. Taking up where we left off back in episode 9, with Iraq reeling from the bloody 1958 coup that replaced the Hashemite monarchy with a military dictatorship, this episode describes Saddam’s blood-soaked rise to power and his tragic and ultimately futile decision to invade Iran, thus inaugurating the 20th century’s bloodiest and costliest conventional war.

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We’ve reached the Iranian Revolution of 1979! The great showdown! The watershed moment when the tensions which we’ve been tracing—between reform and reaction, modernism and tradition—erupted into sweeping rejection of the Western model of modernity and its replacement with something apocalyptic, something both ancient and strikingly new: a Shi’a Islamic Republic. It was out with the Shah, in with the Ayatollah; and the consequences have been without parallel—for the Middle East, and the world.

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In this episode, Aimen and Thomas talk about one of the many governing institutions which arose out of the wreckage of the old imperial and colonial world, and which still underpins the way the world functions today: OPEC. The only great governing institution founded and run by statesmen outside the Western corridors of power, since its founding in 1960, OPEC has played a big role in every major geopolitical event since its founding in 1960. War, terrorism, kidnappings, assassinations, and an ever-present threat to the global economy—the story of OPEC has it all!

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Circling back to the Arab world after a brief excursus further afield, this episode of Conflicted takes up the themes of sectarian strife and political radicalism and applies them to the country that has perhaps been most affected by the Clash of Civilizations: Lebanon. What is Lebanon? Who are the Lebanese? Why did the country crack up in 1975? Answering these questions and more, the episode climaxes with what must be the fastest, most breathless description of the Lebanese Civil War ever attempted!

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Having flitted around the edges of the Ottoman Empire for most of this season, now we’re going straight to the jugular: the heart of that empire, the city of Istanbul (or Constantinople, if you prefer). In this episode of Conflicted, we tell the thrilling story of the epic historic conflict between two peoples, Turks and Greeks, practising two faiths, Islam and Orthodox Christianity, a conflict still manifest today, most painfully on the divided island of Cyprus. The invasion of Cyprus by Turkish troops in 1974 was yet another egg in the face of the declining British empire, one of the defining events of the Cold War period, and a living witness to the ongoing clash of civilizations in the Middle East.

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From the Arab world, we now journey eastward to the Indian Subcontinent. Ancient, vast, and spiritually rich, the lands that comprise the nation-states of Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh underwent one of the great traumas of the 20th century: the end of British rule and the Partition of the Raj. In this episode, we’ll tell this story, which includes a panoply of immense political personalities—Gandhi, Nehru, Jinnah—and which reverberates down to the present day in the ongoing crisis over the Himalayan province of Kashmir.

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Now that we’ve told the story of the rise and fall of Nasserism, we turn to Libya and its handsome and charismatic dictator, Col. Muammar Gaddafi. Believing himself to have inherited Nasser’s mantle of Arab leadership, Gaddafi’s brazen narcissistic insanity is the stuff of legend, and Aimen’s got a caravan-load of funny anecdotes to illustrate just how nuts he was. But more seriously, Gaddafi symbolizes the tragic turn toward unhinged dictatorship which much of the Arab world underwent in the second half of the Cold War. Gaddafi, Assad, Saleh, Mubarak, Ben Ali, and of course Saddam Hussein—they all stalked the Middle East like undead zombies of Nasser, a nightmare from which the Arab world is still recovering.

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We’ve finally reached the climax of the Cold War in the Middle East: the 6-Day War of 1967 and its dramatic sequel, the Yom Kippur War of 1973. The outcomes of both wars are well known; less so the political machinations leading up to them. We’ll do our best to take you behind the scenes of the corridors of power and into the minds of Arab and Israeli leaders. No one wanted war, yet war arrived. Why? These two wars were transformative: Nasserism was out and radicalism was in, and in the ongoing clash of civilisations in the Middle East, a new and improved player emerged from the wreckage of war: radical Islamism.

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As we race toward the 1967 and 1973 Arab-Israeli wars, we’re putting our final duck in its row. After the fall of the Ottoman Empire, Jordan and Iraq both received Hashemite monarchs—and the rivalries and ideological conflicts that followed still reverberate today, perhaps nowhere more powerfully than on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Focusing mainly on the tragic history of modern Iraq, this episode engages with the clash between modern Arab republicanism and something like traditional monarchism (Aimen’s favourite!), as competing versions of Pan-Arabism violently spread throughout the region, prompting the Hashemites into ever more desperate acts of self-preservation.

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In this episode, we talk about Syria. Or ask the question, really: What is Syria? Syria has been described as a “ fulcrum of geopolitical hegemony...” — a bit like Ukraine, interestingly — “...in the Middle East.” For that reason, for thousands of years Syria has been fought over and smashed up several times by invading armies from all directions, making the country somewhat amorphous, a patchwork of peoples practicing a huge variety of religions. More than perhaps anywhere else, Syria’s road to modern nationhood has been strewn with conflict—which we’ll explore through the prism of our continuing journey across the Cold War Middle East.

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Before the next episode, we have something a little different for your ears - an introduction to a whole new podcast - Behind the Sun.

In Behind the Sun, Nadia, a young Syrian woman in the diaspora, struggles to come to terms with what the world knows about what’s happening in her country. She speaks with Riyad - her father's friend - whom she had first met in the strangest of circumstances.

In episode 1, Nadia and Riyad explore the true meaning of "safety and justice" in Syria. He tells her the story of his disappearance in Syria for 21 years and how he formed a close friendship with Diab between the walls of the infamous prison Sednaya. 

Behind the Sun is co-produced by Message Heard and The Syria Campaign, in collaboration with the Association of Detainees and the Missing (ADMSP) and the Syrian Center for Justice and Accountability (SJAC) under its project On the Margins No More.

Subscribe to Behind the Sun wherever you get your podcasts. Episodes out weekly.

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Having avoided it for as long as possible, Aimen & Thomas finally turn their attention to the state of Israel: its backstory, its modern re-emergence, and its impact on the civilizational fault lines crisscrossing the Middle East. In the present day, Arab statesmen have never been closer to their Israeli counterparts, both sides united around a shared enemy: Iran. This marks a dramatic sea change from the past, and to help explain it, as so often this season, this episode reaches back into the Bronze Age, establishing the mishmash of peoples who have long called the Holy Land home, before returning to the pivotal late-Ottoman period, as Jewish migration to that corner of the Ottoman Empire, under the banner of Zionism, inspired the local Arabs to respond with nationalist ambitions of their own—culminating in the first Arab-Israeli war of 1948

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Following on from our last episode, another CIA adventure in the Middle East kicks off this episode on Egypt. King Farouk’s removal from power is the starting pistol for the Egyptian Revolution—a landmark event in modern middle eastern history. The figure of Nasser reigns supreme, whose dogged attempts to resist incorporation into the new U.S.-led Western order precipitated a crisis that might have led to World War 3: the Suez Crisis. All eyes remain fixed on Egypt today, as the war in Ukraine threatens fatal food shortages there, and regional rivalries over the River Nile could turn ugly.

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In this episode, we shift our focus to Iran. Nobody could have known this at the time, but with hindsight we can see that at the beginning of the Cold War, Iran had somehow become a whirlpool swirling with all of the 20th century’s clashing ideological and political forces. All the players are there: an autocratic monarch in the old style; a newly formed Communist party conspiring revolution; aristocratic Liberals demanding economic and constitutional reform; Islamist terrorists; Big Oil; a declining European empire; the Soviet Union reviving Tsarist geopolitics; and America, the new superpower. These clashing interests and ideologies would result in Operation Ajax, one of the most notorious episodes from the Cold War.

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In the last episode we talked about how the American half of the Cold War was established in Saudi Arabia. Today, we’re shifting our focus to the other half of that epic conflict: the Soviet Union. What were the Soviet Union’s designs on the Middle East? Or were their forays into Middle Eastern geopolitics simply countermoves in a Cold War chess game, attempts to wrongfoot their American opponent? And now, as the spectre of war between Russia and Ukraine hangs over Europe, to what extent can Soviet history, and indeed the earlier history of imperial Russia, help us to understand what’s going on?

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In this week’s episode, we focus attention on Aimen’s homeland: Saudi Arabia. Arabia is as old as time, and we explore how the depth and profundity of its history inform the present day. Saudi Arabia is also, as we’ll show, where the Cold War began, and to understand how, we’ll explain the way in which long-standing British power in the region gave way, fitfully and almost without anyone noticing, to those upstart imperialists from Thomas’s homeland: the United States. And we’ll see how the Cold War world of spycraft, ideological conflict, and state paranoia continues into the present, through Aimen’s take on the notorious murder of Jamal Khashoggi.

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Introduced in the first episode, we raise the all-important question: what is the “Clash of Civilizations?” We lay the groundwork by explaining the concept and how it relates to the “New World Order” covered in Series 2. Listen as Thomas and Aimen travel back to the end of the Cold War, this time zooming in on a little-known regional conflict, the explosive dispute still raging between Azerbaijan and Armenia. Their struggle over Nagorno-Karabakh offers a topical example of how the Clash of Civilizations manifests on the ground, and how small conflicts cast widespread reverberations, across both space—and time. Find out on all platforms.

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We pick up where we left off, narrating the failure of America’s Afghanistan policy, its chaotic pull-out, and how the future of Afghanistan rests on a game of geopolitical poker—and the dealer is the Taliban! In our first episode of the season, Thomas and Aimen fully unpack Afghanistan’s modern history and its potential future all while introducing us to the idea of the ‘Clash of Civilizations’… Buckle up.

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Join us on January 19 for Season 3 as we dive even deeper into the history of the Middle East by looking at the Cold War and travelling as far back as the Bronze Age. We also reflect on today’s state of affairs and digest its complexities to answer the question: is a clash of civilizations really to blame for the Middle East’s history of conflict? Or is the real problem our blindness to the region’s reality?

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This year marks twenty years since 9/11 and the start of the war in Afghanistan. A war which is now reaching a tragic and extraordinary finale. In this special episode, Thomas and Aimen are back for a deep dive into the ancient and modern history of Afghanistan, Aimen's first hand experiences with the Taliban and an exploration of why the country has been in disarray for decades now.

And we can also confirm that we are coming back for Season 3!

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In November, Iran’s top nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh was assassinated, and so Thomas and Aimen return to discuss the regional context of Iran’s nuclear program, what’s next for the region once Joe Biden takes office, and Aimen reveals how the assassination unfolded step-by-step. Plus, you will hear an update on Season 3 and a very special guest.

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In this bonus episode, Thomas introduces a new show from the producers of Conflicted about the Srebrenica genocide. Tune in to hear the first episode of Untold Killing in full.

The story of the last European genocide starts with the Bosnian War in 1992. Tens of thousands of Bosnian Muslims fleeing from persecution found their way to Srebrenica, a town where they were meant to be protected. And before genocide was carried out in that very town in 1995, the Muslims survived a siege that lasted for years.

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Thomas introduces a new podcast about a subject familiar to Conflicted listeners: the Bosnian War. Untold Killing is a deep dive into one particularly tragic event during the war - the Srebrenica Genocide. Listen to the teaser and subscribe to the new show at https://bit.ly/untoldpod

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In this special episode, Thomas and Aimen sit down to answer your questions. They dig deeper into past discussions as well as touch on topics we haven’t covered in the podcast before. Expect to hear discussion about how COVID-19 is impacting the Middle East, western intervention in the Balkans and the role of Faith in Saddam’s regime.

A massive thanks to the listeners who sent in questions for this episode and filled our audience survey.

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Question Time Codes:

Q1. 1:42

Q2. 21:57

Q3. 34:38

Q4. 41:07

Q5. 57:34

Q6. 1:10:58

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As the financial crisis moved off the front pages, activists and politicians began to organize around another global emergency: climate change. In this episode, Aimen and Thomas discuss and debate their way through the science and politics around this hot topic.

If you’d like to help us develop Conflicted for future seasons, please take a few minutes to fill out our questionnaire at bit.ly/conflictedq (and maybe win a little treat!). Thank you!

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From a bomb maker to double agent to… banker? In this episode, Aimen draws on his experience helping banks combat financial terrorism as our hosts explore the 2008 Financial Crisis and its impact on the New World Order.

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From the protests in Hong Kong, to the persecution of the Uighurs and the building of the New Silk Road, this episode explores the role China has played in the New World Order.

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After the Iron Curtain fell, America aimed to bring Russia into the fold of their New World Order. Things didn’t go according to plan. In this episode, Thomas and Aimen discuss the rise of Putin, the Second Chechen War and Russia’s role in Syria.

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In 1990, George Bush proclaimed the dawning of a New World Order. The Cold War was over, the nation-state and capitalism had won, and the US was ready to deliver their strategy for global governance of the world. Aimen and Thomas discuss how this played out in the Middle East and where the grand vision fell short.

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With the assassination of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani, the world found itself teetering on the edge of a conflict, the scale of which has only been threatened a few times since 1945. Aimen and Thomas kick off Season 2 looking at who Soleimani was, his role in defeating ISIS, as well as the place of privatised espionage and drone technology in modern warfare.

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Find out what topic Aimen and Thomas will be tackling first in the new episode of Conflicted, and how it ties in to the wider scope of Season 2 — the collapse of America's vision for a New World Order. Our hosts also share the launch date and details of our new release schedule. For more info, exclusive updates and to chat with other listeners you can now join our facebook discussion group: http://bit.ly/37cqJAY.

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Conflicted is coming back for a second season! After examining the War on Terror in Season 1, hosts Thomas Small and Aimen Dean are back with a new focus: The New World Order. Take a listen to our teaser for what to expect in the upcoming episodes.

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In this special episode, Thomas will introduce you to Jake Warren, the host of a new podcast called Undiscovered. He'll share with you an episode we think you'll enjoy - it's the incredible story of a bear, a lion and a long-abandoned zoo in the heartland of ISIS occupied Iraq.

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What compels a jihadi to take up arms in defence of Islam? How are they recruited – and where are they recruited from? In the final episode of this series, Aimen gets into the specifics of the importance of a prophetic narrative and why so many fighters travelled to Syria from every corner of the globe to join ISIS. We’ll also find out how Aimen was finally outed as an MI6 spy inside al-Qaeda and how he escaped.

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This episode brings us to one of the most complicated conflicts raging in the Middle East. Thomas and Aimen both know the country well and walk us through the actors and their motives. They’ll also explain how Syria became such a killing field as a result of the Arab Spring and how Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, a onetime eye-doctor in London, played a direct role in the failure of the American post-war project, as he released Syria’s jihadists from prison and facilitated their migration to Iraq.

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The Yemeni civil war is one of the most brutal civil wars in the Middle East. As it continues to rage on, Thomas and Aimen explain who the players are in this conflict, why it is all about water, and the reasons Saudi Arabia and UAE are using it to fight an existential war of future survival with their arch rival, Iran.

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Last week Aimen left listeners with a final thought: the biggest mistake in the War on Terror was the invasion of Iraq. This week, Aimen explains how this explosive conflict played into the jihadists’ apocalyptic dreams, how it spurred Osama bin Laden and other conflicts forward in neighbouring countries, and his frustrations as a double agent as he watched the region falling deeper into war.

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The War on Terror has lasted 18 years with no clear end in sight. What would it take to resolve a conflict this sprawling and complex - and resolve it successfully?

In episode two, Aimen and Thomas grapple with this question, piecing together the historical context, religious issues and modern politics that bred jihadism in the Middle East, and exploring how the counter terrorism efforts of the west have spurred fundamentalism rather than dismantled it.

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Where were you on 9/11? Thomas and Aimen use this historic event as a starting point as they tease out how al-Qaeda went from being a small army of jihadists seeking a caliphate in the Middle East to main player, at the centre of the global stage.

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Coming soon: An ex-Al Qaeda jihadi turned MI6 spy and a former monk turned filmmaker, have been embedded at the heart of conflicts in the Middle East. Together Aimen Dean and Thomas Small unpack the realities of war, fundamentalism and their global implications through first-hand experience.

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