RASC News Agency: A government-orchestrated demonstration intended to project Taliban solidarity with the Palestinian cause was unexpectedly overshadowed by a striking act of local defiance in Andarab, Baghlan Province a region long associated with anti-Taliban resistance. According to local sources who spoke on condition of anonymity due to fears of reprisal, what began as a carefully choreographed protest organized by the Taliban on Friday swiftly transformed into a scene of dissent. Amidst slogans against Israeli aggression in Gaza, several residents courageously raised the black, white, and green flag of the National Resistance Front (NRF), a direct challenge to Taliban authority. This bold and symbolic gesture, though brief, triggered an immediate and aggressive response from Taliban forces, who rushed into the crowd, tore down the resistance banners, and forcibly dispersed the gathering.
While the Taliban had promoted the rally as part of a nationwide campaign in support of the Palestinian people a cause widely embraced across the Muslim world their effort to position themselves as defenders of global justice was undercut by the eruption of internal protest. For many observers, the event laid bare the deep contradictions of a regime that claims to support oppressed peoples abroad while ruthlessly silencing its own population at home. Eyewitness accounts and circulating footage on social media confirmed the presence of NRF flags in the crowd symbols now synonymous with Afghanistan’s embattled yet persistent resistance movement. Their reappearance in Andarab, a district that has witnessed some of the fiercest clashes between Taliban forces and local resistance fighters since 2021, carried a weighty and unmistakable political message.
Andarab has long served as a bastion of defiance against Taliban rule. Despite repeated military operations, mass arrests, and targeted assassinations aimed at crushing opposition in the region, local resistance has refused to be extinguished. The brief unfurling of the NRF flag during a Taliban-led demonstration is not merely a symbolic act it is a public declaration that resistance continues to breathe even in the shadow of Taliban intimidation. Security analysts interpret this incident as evidence of the Taliban’s waning control over national narratives. Their attempt to mobilize public opinion on foreign issues like Palestine backfired, revealing that beneath the surface of their manufactured rallies lies a population deeply disillusioned with the regime’s domestic tyranny.
The fact that a protest organized by the Taliban intended to showcase unity was co-opted by anti-Taliban sentiments reflects the regime’s growing vulnerability. Far from being a show of strength, the event exposed the fractures within Taliban governance and the impossibility of suppressing dissent through force alone. In regions like Andarab, where the scars of Taliban brutality are fresh and resistance sentiment runs deep, even the most tightly controlled events are liable to unravel. The act of raising a flag even for mere seconds was enough to derail the Taliban’s narrative and remind the nation, and the world, that the fire of resistance has not been extinguished.
As the Taliban continues to tighten its grip on Afghanistani society through propaganda and coercion, it finds itself increasingly unable to control the spontaneous outbursts of dissent that challenge its claim to legitimacy. The Andarab incident stands as a stark reminder that authoritarian rule, no matter how brutal or orchestrated, remains fragile in the face of a people determined to reclaim their voice.
