Irony of ironies, all is irony was theme and motto of the peace THING held in Islamabad Pakistan last weekend.  The THING (given its brevity and other attributes discussed below we decline to call it a conference) came about after Trump cut and ran over the price of gasoline and said he would postpone for a fortnight his empty and disgusting threat that Iran’s “whole civilization will die tonight.”[1]

Shehbaz Sharif & Mojtaba Khamenei

Grandly ironic was Pakistan’s (“the world’s migraine”[2]) self-appointed roles as peacemaker and host of the THING.  Let’s count the ways, beginning with Pakistan’s ongoing war with neighboring Afghanistan – that began in February – and the continuation of its 79-year armed conflict with neighboring India.  Those hostilities constantly simmer and boil over each time Pakistani terrorists attack India, as in the 2008 “26/11” atrocities in Mumbai, perpetrated by Pakistan’s Lashkar–e–Taibi terrorist group and members of Pakistan’s army and government.  Last April, Pakistani Islamists killed 28 people in Pahalgam, Kashmir, leading India to bomb several cities in Pakistan, including Islamabad, the THING’s venue.

And who better to mediate a dispute between the U.S. and Iran, the Hertz of state sponsored terrorism than Pakistan, its’ Avis.

Elian Peltier

Then there was Pakistan’s strategy for dealing with the third combatant in the war.  Pakistan did not invite Israel to the THING but claimed contrary to American assertions that the truce leading up to the THING included Israel’s agreement to not only stop bombing Iran but stop its assault of Hezbollah in Lebanon, that began after Hezbollah bombed northern Israel in solidarity with their Iranian patrons.  I take most things Trump and Netanyahu say with a kilo of Kosher salt but given the context of this dispute over preconditions for the THING, Pakistan’s assertions are not only false but ludicrous.  That context includes the way Pakistan created an atmosphere most likely to result in an agreement to end the war.

As the three U.S. negotiators traveled to Islamabad,[3] Pakistan’s Defense Minister, Khawaja Muhammed Asif posted on X “I hope and pray people who created this cancerous state on Palestinian land to get rid of European jews burn in hell” [sic, sick].[4]

We do not know whether Minister Asif was ignorant or aware that two of the U.S. negotiators, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner are, like many founders of modern Israel, Jews of European ancestry.  Those Asif hopes will burn in hell.

Kin Jun Un

In addition to the contest over whether Iran or Pakistan is Number 1in state sponsored terrorism, the THING produced an even more compelling contest, for “Greatest Irony Permeating the THING.”  With an earnest invitation to counter with something more ironic, we provisionally give the award to Pakistan, which provided North Korea the technology to manufacture its nukes, appointing itself the role of mediating the cessation of a war whose only unequivocal and widely endorsed goal is preventing Iran from joining North Korea (and possibly Pakistan itself) as nuclear rogue states.

[1]   The night of April 8, 2026.

[2]   As per Madelaine Albright, late and former United States Secretary of State.

[3]   Vice-President Vance traveled after his trip to Hungary, designed to prop up the campaign of Viktor Orban, which at best did not move Hungarian voters and may well have assisted Orban’s victorious opponent Péter Magyar.

[4]   New York Times Bureau Chief (for Pakistan) Elian Peltier characterized this as “a statement on social media with antisemitic undertones” catch that, Arthur?