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Pakistan has carried out fresh air strikes on targets inside Afghanistan, adding another chapter to a conflict that has grown from a uneasy border standoff into a recurring cycle of mutual violence. The latest escalation drew an Al Jazeera Inside Story discussion titled "Why is violence between Pakistan and Afghanistan recurring?", which aired on 26 September 2026 and ran for just over 27 minutes.
The episode arrives at a moment of acute tension. Within the space of a single week, three separate reports illustrated the pattern: Afghanistan said three people were killed in Pakistani air attacks on 21 September; Pakistani forces said they killed Afghan Taliban fighters in a border escalation on 25 September; and on 26 September, a suicide bombing in Pakistan's Dera Ismail Khan killed at least 12 people. Each incident feeds the justification for the next, and each is used by both governments to argue that the other is the party responsible for the bloodshed.
The relationship between the two countries was once described as an alliance. In 2021, when the Taliban returned to power in Kabul, Islamabad publicly hailed it as a victory — a moment that briefly suggested a new era of cooperation between the government of Pakistan and the Afghan Taliban. Instead, relations have deteriorated steadily since, and the two sides now describe each other less as partners than as enemies.
Much of the collapse in relations traces to a single unresolved accusation. Islamabad says the Afghan government is harbouring the Pakistan Taliban, known as the TTP, along with other armed groups that have claimed responsibility for attacks inside Pakistan. These attacks, including the kind of mass-casualty suicide bombing seen in Dera Ismail Khan, are presented by Pakistani officials as evidence that militant networks retain a safe base across the border, from which they can plan and launch operations.
Kabul has consistently denied sheltering or backing those fighters. The denial is central to the impasse: without credible movement on the question of whether militant sanctuaries exist in Afghanistan, Pakistani leaders say, the strikes and border operations will continue. The Afghan government, in turn, treats such strikes and incursions as acts of aggression against its sovereignty and its citizens.
The programme asks a question that goes beyond the immediate news cycle: why does the violence keep recurring, and what will be the fallout this time? The answer explored by the panel is not simply about any single incident, but about a structural loop in which each side's countermeasures deepen the grievances of the other. Attempts to stop the fighting — through diplomacy, back-channel talks and pressure from outside powers — have so far failed to break the pattern, and the failure of those efforts is itself a central part of the story.
The discussion is presented by Al Jazeera's Adrian Finighan, who frames the episode as a question of escalation and consequence rather than a straight news bulletin. The format brings together three guests with sharply different vantage points on the conflict, spanning Pakistani policing, Afghan politics and international diplomacy.
Syed Akhtar Ali Shah, a former inspector general of police in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, brings the perspective of the province that bears the brunt of the violence. Khyber Pakhtunkhwa shares a long, porous frontier with Afghanistan, and has absorbed the human cost of cross-border militancy in the form of attacks on civilians, security forces and public infrastructure. His background gives him a direct view of how insurgent networks move, hide and recover, and of the operational pressures facing local security forces.
Faiz Zaland, a professor of political science at Kabul University, speaks from inside Afghanistan's capital and offers the Afghan perspective on sovereignty, state-building and the difficulties Kabul faces in governing a country that remains a declared safe haven for a range of militant organisations. His presence underscores a central asymmetry in the dispute: each government insists it is the victim of the other's aggression, while each denies responsibility for the violence that provokes the response.
Michael Semple, a former EU representative in Afghanistan, brings the international and diplomatic dimension, having worked in the European Union's engagement with Afghan actors. His role in the panel points to the wider question of external involvement: what leverage outside actors retain, why previous efforts to mediate have stalled, and whether the international community is capable of pressing both Islamabad and Kabul toward de-escalation.
The fallout of the current cycle is potentially severe. Continued air strikes and border fighting risk civilian casualties on both sides, further damage trust between the two governments, and an expansion of the armed groups that are, in the first instance, the stated object of the operation. Each round of violence also hands ammunition to those who argue for a harder line, narrowing the space for compromise.
For ordinary Pakistanis and Afghans, the consequences are measured in lives lost and in communities that live under the shadow of retaliation. The suicide bombing in Dera Ismail Khan, which killed at least 12, and the reported deaths in the 21 September air attacks are not abstract disputes between states; they are the visible price of a confrontation that shows no sign of resolution.
For regional observers, the instability also carries wider implications. A permanently militarised border draws in concerns about refugee movements, cross-border trade, and the resilience of counter-terrorism efforts that have already proved fragile. The repeated failure of mediation suggests that existing mechanisms for managing the dispute are inadequate to the task.
As Inside Story presents it, the story of Pakistan and Afghanistan is no longer the story of two governments that once saw themselves as allies. It is the story of a conflict that feeds on its own logic, in which retaliation is met with retaliation, denials are met with strikes, and each month produces fresh reasons to continue. Whether that cycle can finally be broken is the question left on the table — and the question the panel was set to examine.
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