Conflict and contemplation

In war-like diplomacy, shows of strength and submission are being used either to pacify domestic audiences or intimidate enemies and allies alike.

“YOUNGER children were quite shaken as we heard and felt the explosions. Our glass doors shook.”

This was an excerpt of the report on Tuesday from my cousin living in Doha, similar to a multitude of accounts from Malaysians who observed Iran’s missiles the evening before (23 June 2025) targeting Al Udeid Air Base base in Qatar which hosts the US Air Force, among others.

Qatar has become increasingly familiar to Malaysians over the years: I was offered a job there in 2007 (after my stint in Washington DC) but I didn’t take it up because I was already committed to be home – and Doha did not yet have the glitz and glamour it’s now famous for.

Hundreds of Malaysians visited Qatar for the football World Cup in 2022, and today many of us fly Qatar Airways to connect around the world (two daily flights), the National University of Malaysia (UKM) has a branch there, and the frequency of official bilateral visits have been steadily rising.

Thus, we associate Qatar with opulent luxury amid energetic development and geopolitical deftness, and that’s why a single barrage of missiles becomes a significant talking point, even though it’s absolutely minuscule in impact compared to what people in Gaza experience every minute of every day.

Many games are being played, of course, in war just as in diplomacy, with shows of strength and submission being used either to pacify domestic audiences or intimidate enemies and allies alike.

US President Donald Trump swore on live television in expressing anger with both Israel and Iran for violating the ceasefire he claimed he brokered, having ordered the use of sophisticated bunker-busting bombs to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities, even though his presidential campaign stressed that he would not get America involved in more foreign wars.

This, of course, after Israel began those attacks, its prime minister insisting (as he has been for decades) that Iran was imminently close to developing a nuclear bomb.

Iran, for its part, showed restraint in warning Qatar of its counter-attack beforehand, indicating a desire to respond but also to not escalate things further.

Domestically, there is no sign of an uprising against Iran’s leaders (as the attackers had hoped), on the contrary as I write there is a reportedly a crackdown on internal dissent.

Meanwhile, the leaders of Arab countries – many of whom have long regarded Iran as a major threat to their stability – continue walking the tightrope between dissatisfaction among their populations (for not doing enough to help Palestine, chiefly) and maintaining good relations with the West.

It was just a month ago that Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates feted Trump amid ostentatious scenes of camel and horse-lined motorcades and traditional dances, with billions of dollars’ worth of business deals and investments announced – and sanctions on the transitional government of Syria lifted.

Certainly, many Malaysians online and over teh tarik are blunt in expressing admiration for Iran for appearing to support Palestine and confront Israel more robustly.

Arab friends – who almost always characterise the tension as an ethnic (Arab/Persian) rather than a theological (Sunni/Shia) one – are quick to point out that they tried to confront Israel militarily before but failed, and now living standards are higher for millions around the region as a result of peace: “you guys are far away, you don’t understand.”

Reactions elsewhere were keenly watched: China and Russia condemned the attack but did not offer Iran any material support, while Europe meekly called for a return to diplomacy.

But there is some interesting news from US politics, or rather New York politics in particular. Zohran Mamdani emerged victorious in the Democratic Party primary for New York mayor, meaning that he will be the party’s official candidate for the election in November.

If successful, he would become the Big Apple’s first Muslim mayor, and the first to describe himself as a democratic socialist, who has been endorsed by Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Running on a platform of freezing housing rents, free buses and free childcare, he has the opportunity to energise the Democratic Party by offering a new kind of leadership that isn’t reliant on billionaire donors that made it increasingly difficult to distinguish against the Republican Party.

The reinvigoration of political parties is vitally important in a mature democracy, and perhaps his story will trigger bold thinking across Muslim democrats the world over.

Tunku Zain Al-‘Abidin is founding president of Ideas. The views expressed here are the writer’s own.