As Iran is increasingly viewed through the lens of war, nuclear tensions, and geopolitical rivalry, the Japanese anime Jaadugar: A Witch in Mongolia offers a strikingly different encounter with Persian-Islamic history. The series reveals the reach of Japanese cultural influence while highlighting the limits of Tokyo’s diplomatic role towards Iran.
Popular culture can sometimes cross political frontiers that diplomacy approaches only with caution. Resonating with this reality, the Japanese anime series “Jaadugar: A Witch in Mongolia” has arrived at a remarkable moment, as the United States and Israel wage war against Iran and Islamophobia continue to shape public discourse worldwide. An adaptation of a manga penned by the artist using the pseudonym Tomato Soup, the story is set in 13th-century Persia. In the town of Tus, an enslaved girl named Sitara is taken in by a family of scholars, where her mistress’s son, Muhammad, teaches her that knowledge can provide a way forward even when everything else is taken away. Knowledge and reason eventually serve as weapons she carries into the Mongol court in her quest for revenge, as the Mongol conquest has destroyed the world she came to love.
For much of the world today, Iran appears mainly as an oil producer, a nuclear problem, or a permanent security headline, even though the Persian world in which Tus flourished was once a major centre of medicine, philosophy, mathematics, astronomy, and religious learning. This anime series throws the viewer directly into the midst of this intellectual tradition; it frames Islam not only as ritual but also as a set of moral values regarding knowledge, and it demonstrates how a slave girl could utilise theology, literacy, and reason to change her life. Such depictions are important given the recurring portrayal of Muslims in some popular culture as ‘threats’ or as ‘backward’. Muslim women, in particular, have consistently been portrayed as passive beings with no agency in their own lives; with common tropes such as, the veiled victim awaiting rescue, women trapped in forced marriages, or silent figures defined largely by male authority. The anime series shows a different Muslim woman in the portrayal of Sitara, who actively utilises her education, intellect, and political acumen even when bound by the limitations of slavery and invasion.
This portrayal carries even greater weight given the growing prevalence of Islamophobia in public and political discourses. The United Nations has warned of a “disturbing rise” in anti-Muslim bigotry, including racial profiling, discriminatory policies, online harassment, and violence. In Japan, the hostility has also become more direct, mosques have reportedly received repeated abusive phone calls and emails, while some Muslims have said they are afraid to leave their homes. An anime cannot change the course of a war, nor mainstream discourses; however, through showing the Islamic and Persian worlds through the lens of scholarship, intellectualism, and a Muslim woman’s political and intellectual agency, Jaadugar opens a richer space for a different kind of public imagination of the Islamic world and of Iran within the minds of Japanese viewers, and beyond.
Curiosity and Interest are a Two-Way Street
Anime is not an insignificant medium for making such an introduction. Japanese anime enjoys an enormous following across the Arab and Muslim world, with many anime stories circulating beyond the reach of formal cultural programmes. Pakistan offered a striking reversal of that influence through “The Glassworker,” hailed as Pakistan’s first hand-drawn animated film and garnering international recognition at animation festivals in Annecy and Hiroshima. The shift from Japanese anime inspiring Pakistani filmmakers to a Japanese series that encourages interest in Persian and Islamic history shows that cultural influence does not always travel in one direction.
There are already signs that the author’s unfamiliar historical world has generated curiosity. The manga ranked first among female readers in the 2023 edition of Kono Manga ga Sugoi!, received nominations for the Manga Taishō in 2024, and won the grand prize in the Comic Division at the 55th Japan Cartoonists Association Awards in 2026. These accolades do not mean that Japanese readers have suddenly developed a sophisticated understanding of Islamicate history. Still, persuading an audience to become interested in Tus, Persian scholarship, and Muslim figures of the Mongol period is an achievement in itself.
Yet, the interest surrounding “Jaadugar” should not be mistaken for a wider change in Japanese attitudes toward Muslims or immigrants. Some viewers have shown curiosity about Persian names, Islamic customs, and the historical figures behind the story. However, outside the anime, Muslims and other foreigners are still often discussed through fears of crime, cultural incompatibility, and national decline. Social media platforms have accelerated the move of such rhetoric into the mainstream political consciousness, with parties such as Sanseitō drawing support from slogans about a “silent invasion” and putting “Japanese First.”
This hostility is not just confined to the world of social media. A Japanese national of Pakistani descent has launched a lawsuit against alleged racial profiling by Japanese authorities, Muslim communities have received resistance in their search for Islamic cemeteries, and foreign residents regularly experience police questioning, with anecdotal reports suggesting immigrants being associated with crimes based on faulty logic not substantiated by data. Therefore, Jaadugar does not mean that Japan is more receptive to Islam; it demonstrates that another side of Japanese society (represented here by an author and production team who have spent years developing a nuanced, multidimensional character who is a Muslim woman, alongside studying Persian intellectuals and the multilingual world of the Mongol Empire) also exists, even if this second side of Japan mostly appears unseen in mainstream political rhetoric.
Persian History and Japan’s Current Iran Dilemma
Master Muhammad, a pivotal character in Jaadugar, adds another layer of historical detail to the anime. Muhammad’s life story, travelling from Tus toward Nishapur, strikingly echoes the early life of the Persian polymath Muhammad ibn Muhammad al-Tusi, best known as Nasir al-Din al-Tusi, one of the most influential scholars of the medieval Islamic world. A mathematician, astronomer, philosopher and theologian, al-Tusi later served under the Mongol ruler Hulagu Khan and played a central role in establishing the Maragha Observatory, becoming an important conduit through which Persian and Islamic scholarship continued under Mongol rule. Though, the author has not confirmed that Muhammad is based on al-Tusi, but their shared name, birthplace, scholarly path, and historical setting make the connection hard to ignore. His life demonstrates how the roles of conqueror and conquered may have blurred into those of victims, subjects, collaborators, and beneficiaries, and how empires come to depend on the knowledge of the scholars of the very people they conquered.
Such a civilisational portrait stands in contrast to Japan’s public stance on the present Iran-US war. Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s government has characterised the conflict primarily through the lens of energy security, evacuation, and alliance management. She called on Iran to refrain from nuclear weapon production, and expressed criticism of the war, while failing to criticise the American and Israeli initial assaults. During a meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump, she cited the pacifist nature of the Japanese Constitution to rule out direct military intervention, yet failed to challenge Washington’s position. This deference is striking given Japan’s longstanding ties with Iran and its claim to speak to both sides. Yet Tokyo has not emerged as a visible mediator, appearing more concerned with avoiding friction with Trump than with drawing on its own diplomatic considerations.
Against this diplomatic absence, “Jaadugar” becomes more significant. Rather than focusing on alliance calculations, nuclear power, and security concerns, the anime approaches Iran from civilisational, historical, and personal perspectives. Certainly, this anime will not alter Japan’s ties with the United States or completely erase hostility toward Muslims. Still, it may leave viewers curious about Sitara, Muhammad, Tus, and the Muslim lives behind the history of Mongol conquest, in a year when Iran is discussed mainly in terms of targets, tankers, and nuclear facilities; that quieter cultural impact still matters.
Sarmad Naeem holds BS and MPhil degrees in International Relations from the National Defense University, Islamabad. His research focuses on Japanese and Chinese foreign policy and major-power competition. LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarmad-naeem-5686b9102/
Muhammad Rauhan Rasheed is an Erasmus Mundus Master’s Scholar in the Religious Diversity in a Globalized World program. He studied at the University of Groningen, the University of Córdoba, and the University of Bern. He is a frequent contributor to publications including The Diplomat, E-International Relations, and Modern Diplomacy. LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/muhammad-rauhan-rasheed-2k2000/
This article is published under a Creative Commons License and may be republished with attribution.
