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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Taiz: The Yemeni City That Refuses to Surrender
15 oktober 2026 · 59 min
We welcome back friend of the show Baraa Shiban, who was recently on the front lines in Yemen. The Houthis have surrounded Taiz once again. Can the city that has defied Yemen's tyrants for generations hold out against another devastating siege? Lees meer
For mind-expanding Q&A's with Aimen, join the CONFLICTED COMMUNITY here: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm/
Baraa and Thomas discuss:
Baraa's eyewitness journey into besieged Taiz along its treacherous mountain supply route.
Life under siege: ruined streets, sniper fire, shelling and hospitals running short of supplies.
Displaced families, makeshift schools and the children dreaming of justice.
Taiz's defiant celebration of Yemen's 1962 republican revolution.
From Rasulid capital to republican stronghold: Taiz's turbulent history.
Taiz's political traditions: Nasserists, Socialists, Islamists and resistance to the Imamate.
Outgunned defenders confronting Houthi artillery, drones and Iranian support.
The fall of Al-Turbah and the battle for Mocha, Bab al-Mandab and Taiz's supply routes.
The Saudi-backed counteroffensive and whether Taiz can survive without outside help.
Find Baraa on X: https://x.com/BShtwtr
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Conflicted is a Message Heard production.
Executive Producers: Jake Warren & Max Warren.
Produced and edited by Thomas Small.
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We’re Addicted to Security, and It’s Destroying Us
13 oktober 2026 · 1 uur 14 min
In this latest Conflicted Conversation, Ruben Andersson, professor of social anthropology at Oxford University's Department of International Development, discusses his new book Age of Security: The Rise of a Global Obsession. Lees meer
For deeper dives and world-class Q&As with Aimen Dean, join the CONFLICTED COMMUNITY here: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm
Ruben and Thomas explore:
How security replaced politics
Why failed security breeds more security
The border crackdown that fuels illegal migration
How neoliberalism hollowed out social order
Sweden’s slide into gang violence
When Big Tech became Big Security
China and the rise of the Paranopticon
How surveillance blurred civilian and military life
Why Covid made us surrender freedom so easily
Can we escape the politics of fear?
Find us on X: https://x.com/MHconflicted
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Conflicted is a Message Heard production.
Executive Producers: Jake Warren & Max Warren.
Produced and edited by Thomas Small.
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Adrian Wooldridge: Can Liberalism Save Itself?
8 oktober 2026 · 1 uur 23 min
In this latest Conflicted Conversation, journalist Adrian Wooldridge discusses his latest book Centrists of the World Unite: The Lost Genius of Liberalism. Lees meer
For deeper dives and world-class Q&As with Aimen Dean, join the CONFLICTED COMMUNITY here: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm
Adrian and Thomas explore:
Why liberalism is in crisis — and whether it can reinvent itself
Modernity, permanent change and the birth of the liberal world
Erasmus, tolerance and the case for a “chastened liberalism”
Hobbes, individualism and whether liberalism misunderstands human nature
John Stuart Mill, moral formation and the need for cultural elites
Power, authority and how liberal distrust became a “democracy of disdain”
Meritocracy, elite failure and the rise of the examination class
Identity politics, minority rights and the limits of anti-majoritarian liberalism
America, China and the unraveling of the liberal international order
Can liberalism recover its moral foundations without Christianity?
Find us on X: https://x.com/MHconflicted
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And Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/conflictedpod
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Conflicted is a Message Heard production.
Executive Producers: Jake Warren & Max Warren.
Produced and edited by Thomas Small .
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The Real Geopolitics of Sudan’s Civil War
6 oktober 2026 · 53 min
Sudan’s civil war has become a regional proxy struggle, with the UAE, Egypt, Iran, Turkey and other powers backing rival armed camps as the country fragments under the pressure of war. But while the RSF’s foreign support has drawn intense scrutiny, the forces sustaining Sudan’s army — from Islamist networks to drones, money and weapons supplied from abroad — have received far less attention. Lees meer
For mind-expanding Q&A's with Aimen, join the CONFLICTED COMMUNITY here: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm/
Aimen and Thomas discuss:
Why Sudan has become everyone’s proxy war
The UAE, the RSF — and the case against the usual narrative
Who is really backing Burhan’s army?
How the Muslim Brotherhood returned through Sudan’s war
Iran, Turkey and the drone war changing the battlefield
The hidden regional contest between Egypt and Ethiopia
Did Sudan’s army use chemical weapons?
Can the outside powers stop the war they helped sustain?
Find us on X: https://x.com/MHconflicted
And Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MHconflicted
And Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/conflictedpod
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Conflicted is a Message Heard production.
Executive Producers: Jake Warren & Max Warren.
Produced and edited by Thomas Small.
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The Middle East Braces for Escalation
2 oktober 2026 · 57 min
The war is widening, diplomacy has stalled, and the Middle East is once again sliding towards escalation as the relationship between Israel and the Gulf states grows closer while pressure on Iran is mounting at sea, in the air, and across its network of regional allies. Lees meer
For mind-expanding Q&A's with Aimen, join the CONFLICTED COMMUNITY here: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm/
Aimen and Thomas discuss:
The failure of the latest US-Iran diplomacy at the UN and the growing risk of renewed escalation.
Israeli claims of renewed Iranian nuclear activity at Pickaxe Mountain and the wider nuclear question.
The secret Abu Dhabi meeting and the emerging Saudi-UAE-Israeli security alignment.
The war in Yemen, the Houthi advance, and Saudi plans for a major counter-offensive.
Pakistan’s growing military role in Saudi Arabia and the significance of the Mecca Pact.
The widening regional front: Somaliland, al-Shabaab, Eritrea, Europe, and security around the Bab al-Mandab.
Iraq after the US troop withdrawal and the future of Iran-backed militias across the region.
The Strait of Hormuz, pressure on Iran’s economy and aviation, and the attempted FlyDubai terrorist attack.
Find us on X: https://x.com/MHconflicted
And Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MHconflicted
And Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/conflictedpod
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Conflicted is a Message Heard production.
Executive Producers: Jake Warren & Max Warren.
Produced and edited by Thomas Small.
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Carlos the Jackal: The World’s First Super-Terrorist
29 september 2026 · 1 uur 4 min
In this latest Conflicted Conversation, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Joby Warrick tells Thomas all about his latest book The Jackal: The Rise and Fall of Carlos, the World's First Super-Terrorist. Lees meer
For deeper dives and world-class Q&As with Aimen Dean, join the CONFLICTED COMMUNITY here: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm
Joby explains:
Carlos the Jackal: From Venezuelan Marxist to Global Terror Icon
Wadi Haddad, the KGB and the Birth of International Terrorism
Dawson’s Field and the Rise of Made-for-TV Terror
How the Media Created the Myth of “Carlos the Jackal”
OPEC 1975: Gaddafi, Ransom Millions and Carlos’s Biggest Coup
Carlos Inc: How Dictators Turned Terrorism Into a Hired Service
From Carlos to Bin Laden: The Shift From Marxism to Jihadism
Joby Warrick Meets Carlos: Unrepentant After 30 Years in Prison
Find Joby on X: https://x.com/JobyWarrick
Find us on X: https://x.com/MHconflicted
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And Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/conflictedpod
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Conflicted is a Message Heard production.
Executive Producers: Jake Warren & Max Warren.
Produced and edited by Thomas Small .
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The Houthis Are Winning — Here’s Why
24 september 2026 · 1 uur 10 min
Aimen's away this week. But not to worry! Sitting in his seat is Mohammed al-Basha: a Yemeni-American analyst with over twenty years of experience. Basha is the perfect person to help us understand better the larger forces at work in the Yemen Civil War — with consequences for the entire world. Lees meer
For world-class Q&A's with Aimen, join the CONFLICTED COMMUNITY here: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm/
Basha and Thomas discuss:
How the Houthis Smashed Yemen’s Western Front in Just Seven Days
Inside the Houthi Machine: From Mountain Rebels to a Revolutionary State
Abdul-Malik al-Houthi: The Hidden Leader His Followers Treat Like a Sacred Authority
How Gaza Supercharged Houthi Recruitment, Weapons and Global Ambition
Why Yemen’s Anti-Houthi Forces Keep Falling Apart
Tareq Saleh: The Warlord Who Embodies Yemen’s “Game of Thrones”
Saleh Co-Opted the Tribes — the Houthis Are Trying to Crush Them
Could the Houthis Take All of Yemen — and Would Yemen Survive It?
Find Basha on X: https://x.com/BashaReport
And on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bashareport
Find us on X: https://x.com/MHconflicted
And Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MHconflicted
And Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/conflictedpod
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Conflicted is a Message Heard production.
Executive Producers: Jake Warren & Max Warren.
Produced and edited by Thomas Small.
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1453: The Catastrophe That Ended Rome
22 september 2026 · 1 uur 24 min
In this latest Conflicted Conversation, historian Anthony Kaldellis of the University of Chicago discusses his new book 1453: The Conquest and Tragedy of Constantinople. Lees meer
For deeper dives and world-class Q&As with Aimen Dean, join the CONFLICTED COMMUNITY here: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm
Anthony explains:
Why the ‘Byzantines’ were really Romans
The Roman state’s extraordinary longevity
Constantinople’s strategic importance
The rise of the Ottoman state
Ottoman slavery, the devşirme, and the janissaries
Romans, Italians and Turks living side by side
Venice and Genoa’s role in the East
Ottoman cannon and the myth of Orban
Why the siege was not inevitable
The enslavement and dispersal of the Romans
How ‘Byzantium’ was reinvented after its fall
Find us on X: https://x.com/MHconflicted
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And Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/conflictedpod
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Conflicted is a Message Heard production.
Executive Producers: Jake Warren & Max Warren.
Produced and edited by Thomas Small .
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Globalisation Made Global Jihad Possible
17 september 2026 · 1 uur
In this week’s Conflicted Conversation, UCL associate professor Philip Cunliffe makes a provocative case: far from being polar opposites, global Islamism and American unipolarity were born of the same globalised order. But what happens when that order starts to fall apart? And is today’s rising New Left inadvertently fighting to save the liberal-imperial system it says it wants to destroy? Lees meer
For deeper dives and world-class Q&As with Aimen Dean, join the CONFLICTED COMMUNITY here: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm
Philip and Thomas discuss:
How U.S. unipolarity and globalisation reshaped the world after the Cold War
Why Cunliffe thinks ‘global Islam’ is a distinctly modern political phenomenon
How early state-seeking Islamism gave way to transnational Islamism and jihadism
Why neoliberal globalisation weakened state sovereignty and boosted Islamist networks
The strange overlap between liberal humanitarianism and jihadist causes
How the CIA, Afghanistan and Syria blurred the line between ally and enemy
Why the new American Left could revive the logic of liberal interventionism over Israel
What comes after the decline of American empire: sovereign nation-states or rival new blocs?
Find Philip on X: https://x.com/thephilippics
Find us on X: https://x.com/MHconflicted
And Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MHconflicted
And Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/conflictedpod
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Conflicted is a Message Heard production.
Executive Producers: Jake Warren & Max Warren.
Produced and edited by Thomas Small .
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Saudi Arabia’s Yemen Disaster
16 september 2026 · 1 uur 3 min
Every region-watcher was stunned over past week as the anti-Houthi forces in Yemen suffered an extremely brutal reversal—with global consequences. Aimen lifts up the curtain of inter-Gulf politics to help Thomas understand better what went wrong, and why Saudi Arabia's confused foreign policy may deserve the lion's share of the blame. Lees meer
For mind-expanding Q&A's with Aimen, join the CONFLICTED COMMUNITY here: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm/
Aimen and Thomas discuss:
Did Iran dupe Saudi Arabia?
How the Houthis humiliated their rivals
Mocha falls: Bab al-Mandab exposed
Saudi Arabia’s oil lifeline gets hit
Why Yemen’s anti-Houthi coalition imploded
The bitter Saudi-UAE divorce
Has Qatar reshaped Saudi foreign policy?
Why Trump refused MBS’s rescue call
Find us on X: https://x.com/MHconflicted
And Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MHconflicted
And Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/conflictedpod
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Conflicted is a Message Heard production.
Executive Producers: Jake Warren & Max Warren.
Produced and edited by Thomas Small.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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The Rest Is History
Goalhanger
- Categorieën
- Religie , Spiritualiteit , Geschiedenis
- Verschijnt
- Een paar keer per week
- Lengte
- Meestal 1 uur 5 min
- Afleveringen
- 242
- Eerste aflevering
- 16 november 2018
- Taal
- Engels