Source: Antiwar.com
by Ramzy Baroud
“The origins of chess are contested, but few dispute that while the game began in India, it was the Sassanian Persian Empire that refined it into a recognizable strategic system. It was Persia that codified its language, symbolism and intellectual framework: the shah (king), the rokh (rook), and shatranj, the modern chess game. This is not a trivial historical detail. It is, in many ways, a metaphor that has returned with force. Since the start of the US-Israeli war on Iran on February 28, 2026, political discourse – across Western, Israeli and alternative media – has repeatedly invoked the analogy of chess to describe Iran’s conduct. The comparison is seductive. But it is also incomplete.” (04/01/26)