The Quran

كَمَثَلِ الَّذينَ مِن قَبلِهِم قَريبًا ۖ ذاقوا وَبالَ أَمرِهِم وَلَهُم عَذابٌ أَليمٌ

Muhammad Asad

[To both kinds of your enemies,¹ O believers, is bound to happen] the like of [what happened to] those who, a short while before them, had to taste the evil that came from their own doings,² with [yet more] grievous suffering awaiting them [in the life to come]:

This interpolation - relating as it does to both the outright deniers of ihe truth and the hypocrites - is justified by the occurrence of the dual form in verse 17.
In the first instance, this is apparently an allusion to the fate of the pagan Quraysh at the battle of Badr (Zamakhshari) or, according to some authorities (quoted by Tabari), to the treachery and subsequent expulsion from Medina, in the month of Shawwal, 2 H., of the Jewish tribe of Banu Qaynuqa'. But in a wider perspective - strongly suggested by the next two verses - the meaning is general and not restricted to any particular time or historical occurrence.