A group of angry Afghan villagers have got the Taliban scrambling after they mounted an unlikely rebellion against the insurgents in eastern Afghanistan — and won.

Remarkably, the poorly-armed tribesmen, calling themselves the National Uprising Movement (NUM), have inflicted heavy casualties on the Taliban and succeeded in driving them out from scores of villages and several districts of Ghazni Province, a long-established militant stronghold.

The uprising, which has fed on the popular discontent with the Taliban’s brutal rule, has put the militants in an uncomfortable situation.

Initially, the Taliban responded with heavy-handed tactics, torching villagers’ homes and kidnapping tribal elders. …