The United States-Israeli war on Iran, now well into its fifth week, has become intolerable — to the region, to global energy markets and, increasingly, to the governments trying to contain the damage. When Pakistan’s deputy prime minister and foreign minister, Mohammad Ishaq Dar, stood up at the end of the day-long talks between foreign ministers of Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Egypt and said Islamabad was prepared to host “meaningful talks” between Washington and Tehran “in the coming days” for a “comprehensive and lasting settlement,” he was not indulging in hopeful language. He was stating the only realistic path still open.
Op-Ed
Pakistan Tries to Keep Diplomacy Alive
The bombs fell again on Friday, this time on two of Iran’s largest steel plants, a power station and civilian nuclear sites that Tehran insists have nothing to do with its military program. Israel also struck universities, according to Iranian officials. These were precisely the kinds of attacks on non-military targets that Pakistani diplomats had warned would kill any chance of talks. Yet even as the smoke rose over Iran’s industrial heartland, Islamabad was still trying to keep the door open. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif spoke for more than an hour with President Masoud Pezeshkian. Foreign ministers from Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are gathered in Islamabad on the Middle East crisis. And Pakistan’s de facto leader, Field Marshal Asim Munir, continues to shuttle messages between Washington and Tehran.
The Middle East War Has an Off-Ramp. It Won’t Stay Open Long
The United States and Iran are, by all credible accounts, about to sit down face to face for the first time since this war began. Germany’s foreign minister, Johann Wadephul said a direct meeting is expected “very soon” in Pakistan. Hours earlier, President Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff confirmed that Pakistan had delivered Washington’s 15-point peace plan to Tehran. These are not rumors; they are the first concrete signs that diplomacy may still have a chance to end a conflict that has already killed thousands, closed the Strait of Hormuz – the lifeline of global economy and pushed the Middle East to the brink of a wider conflagration.
India’s Problem With Peace
The news from Islamabad this week should have registered as standard middle-power diplomacy in a region on fire. Pakistan, citing its long border with Iran, its ties to both Washington and Tehran, and its newly burnished personal relationship between its army chief and President Donald J. Trump, has positioned itself as a potential host and facilitator for direct talks aimed at ending the fighting between the United States, Israel and Iran.
Trump’s Iran Reversal: Diplomacy, Delay or Market Calculus?
When President Trump took to Truth Social on Monday morning and announced that he was extending his 48-hour ultimatum to Iran by five full days, citing “very good and productive conversations” with Tehran, the global financial markets did exactly what they have learned to do under his leadership: they rallied.
Floggings, Executions, Legalised Abuse: The Taliban’s Vision of Justice
Four years after the Taliban seized power, Afghanistan is no longer sliding backward. It is hurtling into a deliberate abyss of codified cruelty, where the state’s highest authorities have decided that beating women, flogging citizens and executing dissenters in public stadiums constitutes governance.
Why Pakistan Can’t Afford Another Mideast Mess
Let’s not mince words: Pakistan is getting hammered by the US-Israel-Iran war, and the fallout could shove this perpetually precarious economy right back into the abyss. Oil at $100 a barrel? That’s not a blip—it’s a body blow. And if this mess drags on, as former Finance Minister Hafiz Pasha grimly predicts, Pakistan’s GDP could shrink by 1% to 1.5%, with the rot setting in deeper after six months. We’ve seen this movie before, and it doesn’t end well.
When Global Oil Surges, Pakistan’s Poor Pay First — and Keep Paying
Pakistanis are feeling the first raw edge of a conflict they did not choose. On Friday the government raised the price of petrol and high-speed diesel by 55 rupees a liter — the largest single-day increase in memory. Petrol now costs 321.17 rupees a liter, diesel 335.86 rupees. Kerosene, the lifeline of the poorest households, has nearly doubled.
Iran Can’t Win This War. It Can Make Everyone Else Lose.
The Islamic Republic is not trying to win this war. It is trying to survive it by making everyone else lose. That distinction explains why, even as American and Israeli strikes have shattered its nuclear sites, missile factories and the leadership circle around Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran keeps expanding the fight. Its missiles and drones are no longer aimed only at Israel or American bases; they are hitting oil terminals in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, probing the Strait of Hormuz and forcing Persian Gulf air defences to burn through interceptors at a rate Tehran knows its enemies cannot sustain forever. The strategy is brutally simple and brutally effective: raise the global price of oil, spike inflation, inflict American casualties and exhaust the patience of a president who has never liked long wars.
Why Pakistan Is Collateral Damage in the Hormuz Shock
The Strait of Hormuz never had to be formally blockaded. Risk aversion did the job anyway. In the 48 hours since US and Israeli attacks escalated against Iran, global oil markets have lurched higher by as much as 13%, Brent crude has traded near $78-$79 a barrel, and tanker traffic at the world’s most critical energy chokepoint has simply frozen in place.