Left in “To us Iran is terribly illiberal” (7)
I believe the answer is:
insular
'illiberal' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'left in to us iran is terribly' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'left' could be 'l' (common abbreviation) and 'l' is located in the answer.
'in' is within the answer.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for insular that I've seen before include "Parochial" , "withdrawn" , "Aloof - prejudiced" , "Narrowly restricted in outlook or scope" , "Provincial" .)