Top 100 Quotes About The Taliban
#1. Thousands of civilians have lost their lives to terrorist attacks inside Pakistan, and thousands more will - because, unlike the Pakistani government, which has no coherent policy to deal with the radicals, the Taliban have one to deal with Pakistan and its citizens.
Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy
#2. The existence of the Taliban, in my view, is a tragedy for Afghanistan. We as Americans need to understand our role in helping bring that tragedy about. So I think it's important to look at the stories about why these people are fighting.
Anand Gopal
#3. But in Afghanistan, the general rule was that since you were fighting the Taliban, which was not a lawful government force, the Geneva Conventions did not apply. And that led to a lot of excesses in Afghanistan, excesses like Abu Ghraib that were already well-publicized.
Yaroslav Trofimov
#4. Al Qaeda, the Taliban, a whole host of networks that are bent on attacking America, who have a distorted ideology, who have perverted the faith of Islam, and so we have to go after them.
Barack Obama
#5. Take the example of my daughter. A lot of people were speaking out about education when the Taliban were bombing schools in Swat Valley, but Malala's voice was like a crescendo. It spread all around the world. She was the smallest but her voice was the biggest, because she was speaking for herself.
Ziauddin Yousafzai
#6. I recommended to the president [George Bush] that our focus had to be on al-Qaida, the Taliban and Afghanistan. Those were the ones who attacked the United States of America on 9/11.
Colin Powell
#7. While Taliban fighters had an initial claim to protection under the conventions, they lost POW status by failing to obey the standards of conduct for legal combatants: wearing uniforms, a responsible command structure, and obeying the laws of war.
John Yoo
#8. The Taliban has a huge leadership problem at a critical political moment, another caliph has announced himself to the world, and the Taliban has been silent. And that is getting noticed by militants across South Asia.
Graeme Smith
#9. French troops arrived in Afghanistan last week, and not a minute too soon. The French are acting as advisers to the Taliban, to teach them how to surrender properly.
Jay Leno
#10. The Taliban has asked Osama bin Laden to voluntarily leave the country.They said they delivered him a note asking him to leave, which is a pretty goodtrick considering they claim they don't even know where he is.
Jay Leno
#11. Never short of guns and guerrillas, Afghanistan has proven fertile ground for a host of insurgent groups in addition to the Taliban.
Anand Gopal
#12. When the Taliban took over in 1996, the news of their crimes hit the Toronto papers. As a feminist and as an anti-war activist, I heard about what was happening to women, and I wanted to do something to support those folks.
Deborah Ellis
#13. The Buddhas had to be destroyed by the Taliban to get the world thinking about Afghanistan.
Mohsen Makhmalbaf
#14. Mr. Speaker, we are a blessed Nation. We have not suffered another attack on our soil since September 11, and we are grateful. We have killed or captured dozens of members of al Qaeda and the Taliban. Our military and intelligence forces are working both hard and smart.
Marsha Blackburn
#15. There was expectations that the fights there, the operation there might be extended for several months, even for several years. But within a few weeks it ended, because obviously the Taliban wasn't a real force.
Bulent Ecevit
#16. When we started after Osama bin Laden, we really decided to go after the Taliban. And we seemed to be content to kick the Taliban out of Kandahar. And then we let Osama bin Laden escape from Tora Bora.
Wesley Clark
#17. Our aim is always to minimise casualties and to separate a hardline Taliban from those who have been caught up in the insurgency.
Bob Ainsworth
#18. Suppose something would happen to the president, who would be in charge? The Vice President. Joe Biden? You have got to be kidding today when you say the Taliban's not our enemy.
Douglas Wilder
#19. I would have to make an evaluation based on the circumstances at the time I took office as to how much help they continue to need. Because it's not just the Taliban. We now are seeing outposts of, you know, fighters claiming to be affiliated with ISIS.
Hillary Clinton
#20. The Taliban may pine for a pre-industrial society, but most Afghans do not.
Richard Engel
#21. As far as Iraq, the important thing is that the Taliban is gone in Afghanistan, three-quarters of the al-Qaida leadership is either dead or in jail, and we now have Saudi Arabia working with us, Pakistan working with us.
Peter T. King
#22. Negotiating with the Taliban must be done from a position of strength. Negotiating from a position of weakness would be a disaster.
Philip Hammond
#23. The big question now is who will take power in Afghanistan once the Taliban is defeated. I was thinking, how about Al Gore? He's not doing anything, he needs a job, and he's already got the beard.
Jay Leno
#24. Some of the generals are saying, 'We're making progress. We are clearing an area.' But you really don't defeat the Taliban by clearing an area. They move.
Colin Powell
#25. When you say things like, 'We have to wipe out the Taliban,' what does that mean? The Taliban is not a fixed number of people. The Taliban is an ideology that has sprung out of a history that, you know, America created anyway.
Arundhati Roy
#26. One thing that I noticed is having met some former Taliban is even they, as children, grew up being indoctrinated. They grew up in violence. They grew up in war. They were taught to hate. They were, they grew up in very ignorant cultures where they didn't learn about the outside world.
Greg Mortenson
#27. When US-led forces toppled the Taliban government in November 2001, Afghans celebrated the downfall of a reviled and discredited regime.
Anand Gopal
#28. It is very clear that the people in Afghanistan do not want the Taliban back.
Hillary Clinton
#29. Pakistan's ruler Pervez Musharraf predicted the Taliban will fall for hiding Osama bin Laden. Ex-king Zahir Shah is standing by to replace Mullah Mohammed Omar. And the most ominous sign of all, President Bush has learned all their names.
Argus Hamilton
#30. The Taliban travesty, a noxious combination of Deobandi rigidity, tribal chauvinism, and the aggression of the traumatized war orphan.
Karen Armstrong
#32. It is no secret that many Islamic movements in the Middle East tend to be authoritarian, and some of the so-called 'Islamic regimes' such as Saudi Arabia, Iran - and the worst case was the Taliban in Afghanistan - they are pretty authoritarian. No doubt about that.
Mustafa Akyol
#33. Johnny Walker, the American that fought for the Taliban, is now talking with an Arabic accent. Have you heard him? It's ridiculous. I know how we should handle him. Let's bring him back here and take him to Cleveland Browns stadium and dress him up as a referee. They'll know how to take care of him!
Jay Leno
#34. Speculation is a fool's game, but I've seen many political projections that look like the Taliban could hold most of the country, and possibly Kabul, within perhaps a short time.
Eliza Griswold
#35. We don't want the Taliban to put down roots, or the al Qaeda to put down roots in Afghanistan that can facilitate Afghanistan becoming - once again - a launching pad for international terrorism.
John R. Allen
#36. While the Taliban connives with foreign terrorists, the Afghan people suffer from poverty, drought and hunger
Jack Straw
#37. I am not against anyone, neither am I here to speak in terms of personal revenge against the Taliban or any other terrorist group. I'm here to speak up for the right of education for every child. I want education for the sons and daughters of the Taliban and all terrorists and extremists.
Malala Yousafzai
#38. I think every religious person should have a deep sense of respect for other people's religious documents and religious symbols just as we were deeply opposed to the Taliban destroying the two historic buddhas which they blew up. So I think we ought to all oppose burning the Koran.
Newt Gingrich
#39. The United States finds itself with forces of reaction. Do I have to demonstrate this? The Taliban's annihilation of music and culture? The enslavement of women?
Christopher Hitchens
#40. Living with a teenage daughter is like living with the Taliban a mum is not allowed to laugh, sing, dance or wear short skirts
Kathy Lette
#41. Did we not aid the grisly Taliban to achieve and hold power? Yes indeed 'we' did. Well, does that not double or triple our responsibility to remove them from power?
Christopher Hitchens
#42. We don't see that the Taliban ultimately can succeed, and it's a combination both of what the international community can do to support Afghanistan, not just in the short term, but over the long term.
John R. Allen
#43. Photography of any living being, according to Taliban rule, was illegal. So when I went to Afghanistan, immediately I was worried about photographing people. But it was what I wanted: to show what life was like under the Taliban, specifically for women.
Lynsey Addario
#44. If American forces leave Afghanistan, the Taliban is going to do what to America? Don't say you're worried about what they will do to the Afghan people. If that was America's concern, America's operational presence there would be much different.
Henry Rollins
#45. Know what the Taliban leaders like to do for fun? Just sit around and get bombed.
Jay Leno
#46. The fact is that Iran doesn't want to see the Taliban come back any more than do most Afghan citizens.
David Petraeus
#47. And the narrative for the Taliban that they can wait us out is a flawed narrative. I think that the unambiguous international support for Afghanistan has been a very powerful message. You know, that was the message that came out of the NATO summit. We will not abandon Afghanistan.
John R. Allen
#48. An information operations team was sent to Afghanistan to conduct various psychological operations on the Afghans and Taliban. The team was then asked not to focus on the Taliban but on manipulating senators into giving more funds and troops [to the war].
Michael Hastings
#49. Rockets fired by the Taliban generally aren't guided.
Richard Engel
#50. Unlike other Taliban groups, the Haqqanis' approach to mayhem was worldly and sophisticated: they recruited Arabs, Pakistanis, even Europeans, and they were influenced by the latest in radical Islamist thought.
Anand Gopal
#51. Any conception of human well-being you could plausibly have, the Taliban patently fails to maximize it.
Sam Harris
#52. Believe me, having a teenage daughter is like living with the Taliban.
Kathy Lette
#53. No possible future government in Kabul can be worse than the Taliban, and no thinkable future government would allow the level of Al Qaeda gangsterism to recur. So the outcome is proportionate and congruent with international principles of self-defense.
Christopher Hitchens
#54. In Afghanistan this week, outnumbered Northern Alliance rebels on horseback defeated Taliban forces armed with tanks. Experts say the victory is just like the story of David and Goliath and David's friend, the Stealth Bomber.
Tina Fey
#55. I want education for the sons and the daughters of all the extremists, especially the Taliban.
Malala Yousafzai
#56. I don't want to be thought of as the "girl who was shot by the Taliban" but the "girl who fought for education." This is the cause to which I want to devote my life.
Malala Yousafzai
#57. We're told to go on living our lives as usual, because to do otherwise is to let the terrorists win, and really, what would upset the Taliban more than a gay woman wearing a suit in front of a room full of Jews?
Ellen DeGeneres
#58. Moscow has been helping the Northern Alliance because the Taliban was openly supported by Pakistan, .. until last week, Pakistani servicemen had taken part in war operations on the Taliban side.
Sergei Ivanov
#59. I was kidnapped by Sunni insurgents near Fallujah, in Iraq, ambushed by the Taliban in the Korengal Valley in Afghanistan, and injured in a car accident that killed my driver while covering the Taliban occupation of the Swat Valley in Pakistan.
Lynsey Addario
#60. I don't want revenge on the Taliban, I want education for sons and daughters of the Taliban.
Malala Yousafzai
#61. In light of the strong correlation between female education and demographic decline, a purely empirical perspective on Malala Yousafzai, the poster girl for global female education, may indicate that the Taliban's attempt to silence her was perfectly rational and scientifically justifiable.
Theodore Beale
#62. We Pashtuns love shoes but don't love the cobbler; we love our scarves and blankets but do not respect the weaver. Manual workers made a great contribution to our society but received no recognition, and this is the reason so many of them joined the Taliban - to finally achieve status and power.
Malala Yousafzai
#63. Where land mines are indiscriminate, cheap, and brutal, drones are discriminate, expensive, and brutal. And yet they are insufficiently discriminate: the assassination of the Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud in Pakistan in 2009 succeeded only on the seventeenth attempt.
Teju Cole
#64. And as a result of the United States military, Taliban no longer is in existence.
George W. Bush
#65. After September 11, when the United States took action to overthrow the Taliban, our interests and Iran's aligned, and we were able to coordinate quietly but effectively.
Earl Blumenauer
#66. Barack Obama said he may negotiate with the Taliban. A lot of people are saying okay, but be careful. But I said this guy has experience negotiating with the enemy. For gosh sake, he lives with his mother-in-law, you know.
David Letterman
#67. We felt like the Taliban saw us as like little dolls to control, telling us what to do and how to dress. I thought if God wanted us to be like that He would not have made us all different.
Malala Yousafzai
#68. More bad news for the Taliban. Remember how they are promised 72 virgins when they die? Turns out that it's only one 72-year-old virgin.
Jay Leno
#69. The Taliban, broadly speaking, are Afghans - farmers, subsistence farmers. As I say, most of those people can't find the United States on the map. Al Qaeda, traditionally, are much more educated, middle-class people, often from Egypt, from Saudi Arabia, North Africa.
Rory Stewart
#70. [I]f you think that American imperialism and its globalised, capitalist form is the most dangerous thing in the world, that means you don't think the Islamic Republic of Iran or North Korea or the Taliban is as bad.
Christopher Hitchens
#71. Military surge in Afghanistan to eliminate the Taliban.
Barack Obama
#72. Laila sees something behind this young girl's eyes, something deep in her core, that neither Rasheed nor the Taliban will be able to break. something as hard and unyielding as a block of limestone. Something that, in the end, will be her undoing and Laila's salvation.
Khaled Hosseini
#73. Cults, or related social movements such as the Taliban in Afghanistan, result in massive military expenses.
Keith Henson
#74. The Taliban could take our pens and books, but they couldn't stop our minds from thinking.
Malala Yousafzai
#75. What would bug the Taliban more than seeing a gay woman in a suit surrounded by Jews?
Ellen DeGeneres
#76. The dangers of an Afghan collapse are many: Afghan deaths, a loss of American prestige, a loss of NATO prestige, a moral blow to U.S. troops and veterans, a Taliban resurgence, huge setbacks for women, and greater power for Pakistan and Pakistani extremists.
Richard Engel
#77. We need to put in proper safeguards. How are we going to feel if somebody leases to the Taliban?
William Shawn
#78. I think within a year or so, perhaps, if 9/11 had not happened, in Afghanistan would have been a very broad-based general uprising against the Taliban.
Ahmed Rashid
#79. This body, the United States Congress, was united, Republicans and Democrats alike, in taking that action, toppling the Taliban government, and working to try and root out al Qaeda and find Osama bin Laden.
Chris Van Hollen
#80. The Taliban and its backers bear the responsibility for the consequences of this outrageous act.
Amanullah Khan
#81. There has not yet been a major ground offensive battle ... There are, we know, negotiations going on between the opposition forces and the Taliban leadership for surrender.
Peter Pace
#82. The people suffering most from the Taliban were Afghans.
Salman Rushdie
#83. In much of the world, there is a sense of an ultra-powerful CIA manipulating everything that happens, such as running the Arab Spring, running the Pakistani Taliban, etc. That is just nonsense.
Noam Chomsky
#84. Announcing a withdrawal date, that was wrong. The Taliban may not have watches, but they do have calendars.
Mitt Romney
#85. I don't think the ongoing negotiations with the Taliban will yield a positive result
Aitzaz Ahsan
#86. I say to the Taliban: surrender the terrorists; or surrender power. It's your choice.
Tony Blair
#87. The first time I visited Afghanistan in May 2000, I was 26 years old, and the country was under Taliban rule. I went there to document Afghan women and landmine victims.
Lynsey Addario
#88. In the occupation in Afghanistan, there are tragedies as well. It's not as bad as in Iraq because there are fewer American troops. But, as I describe in the book, going out on patrol and coming into a village, the soldiers found a stash of documents and decided this was Taliban propaganda.
Yaroslav Trofimov
#89. What's interesting about the Taliban, is they're more afraid of educating girls than they are of drones. One educated girl is more scary to the Taliban than a drone.
Tina Brown
#90. When I read about women living under the Taliban, I really wanted to travel there and see for myself: Is it that bad? What is the situation? I remember the night before I left for my trip, I called my mom and said, "I'm going to Afghanistan tomorrow."
Lynsey Addario
#91. Did you hear about this 20-year-old kid named John Walker from Northern California who was apparently fighting for the Taliban? ... It didn't take long for the TV networks to jump on this Walker thing. CBS has a new show: 'Walker: Taliban Ranger.'
Jay Leno
#92. I am not here to speak against the Taliban. I'm here to speak up for the right of every child.
Malala Yousafzai
#94. But here too it should be noted that the President's approach was to first ask the repressive and brutal Taliban to surrender Osama bin Laden to us, and only after that government refused to do that did we invade.
Barney Frank
#95. Last night the Taliban offered to release eight Westerners if the U.S. promised not to attack. The State Department declined but thanked the Taliban for the offer, saying it really felt good to laugh again.
Tina Fey
#96. Winning in Afghanistan is having a country that is stable enough to ensure that there is no safe haven for Al Qaida or for a militant Taliban that welcomes Al Qaida. That's really the measure of success for the United States.
Leon Panetta
#97. There was a rumor that Jesse Jackson was going to go over there to talk with the Taliban, apparently they were having trouble rhyming the word Jihad.
Jay Leno
#98. TALIBAN-ESQUE Any behavior that imposes the beliefs of one person on everyone else. Conversations with the Taliban-esque are impossible. They aren't even conversations. WIth them, it's my way or no way.
Whoopi Goldberg
#99. We can't afford to leave Afghanistan to the Taliban and the terrorists.
Condoleezza Rice
#100. Women and children were slaughtered by the Taliban. You are going to sit down and negotiate with these folks? They never lived up to an agreement. The Pakistanis tried in '08, the Russians tried it when they were there. George Bush tried it in '05. It has never worked.
Mike Rogers
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