India-Pakistan | |||
Nuggets From The Urdu Press | |||
2012-04-22 | |||
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![]() ... served two non-consecutive terms as prime minister, heads the Pakistain Moslem League (Nawaz). Noted for his spectacular corruption, the 1998 Pak nuclear test, border war with India, and for being tossed by General Musharraf... . But he approached Zardari repeatedly for extensions in his job. He was the master of the Double Game. Pasha and his extensions Daily Jang had Hamid Mir writing that General Pasha as head of the ISI got items published implying that the PPP government would extend his tenure yet again, because General Kayani ... four star general, current Chief of Army Staff of the Mighty Pak Army. Kayani is the former Director General of ISI... and the Americans liked him. He had met CIA chief General David Petraeus in Thailand and Britannia assuring him that NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A single organization with differing goals, equipment, language, doctrine, and organization.... supplies would resumed but at the same time he was giving the impression in Pakistain that he was opposed to the US because America was Pakistain's biggest enemy. General Pasha and terrorists According to Hamid Mir column in Jang ISI chief General Pasha stated in November 2008, right after the Mumbai attack, that Fazlullah and Baitullah Mehsud were the assets of Pakistain but in March 2009 the same bully boyz attacked the Sri Lankan team in Lahore, giving the lie to Pasha. Once he told Hamid Mir that relations with India would mend soon but after attack on the GHQ in 2009 he said that attack had come from India. Pasha the jinxed ISI chief Columnist Hamid Mir wrote in Jang that ISI chief General Pasha's era in power was a nightmare for Pakistain: May 2011, Osama was killed by the US in Abbottabad ... A pleasant city located only 30 convenient miles from Islamabad. The city is noted for its nice weather and good schools. It is the site of Pakistain's military academy, which was within comfortable walking distance of the residence of the late Osama bin Laden.... ; May 2011 Mehran naval base was attacked in Bloody Karachi ...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It may be the largest city in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous... ; after attack at Salala, drone attacks were resumed on his watch. In the four years under him the Baloch were made to disappear and largest number of journalists were killed in the conflict zones of Pakistain. Pasha can't write Award-winning columnist Haroon Rasheed wrote in Jang that when he met General Pasha of the ISI he asked him to write a book about himself to defend against the untrue comment being written in the press. Pasha replied that that he had no experience of writing and therefore could not write a book. He said that he was good at speaking: if you invite me to a two hour lecture I can prepare it in ten minutes. General Zaheerul Islam will be the next Army Chief Daily Jinnah reported that General Zaheerul Islam newly selected as ISI chief was bound to become the next Army Chief after General Kayani. The other reason was that General Zaheer was very close to Kayani. In the past Kayani first ran ISI then became Army Chief. Zaid Zaman and murder of Maulana Jalalpuri Banned magazine of Sipah Sahaba monthly Paigham Khatme Nubawwat wrote that Zaid Zaman was the continuation of the mission of False Prophet Yusuf who hid after the death of Yusuf then appeared on TV talking in such a way that people took him to be a proxy of ISI and Army, When Bloody Karachi's Maulana Saeed Jalalpuri became critical of him as the follower of Yusuf the False Prophet he was killed. An FIR was registered against Zaid but little was done to get hold of him. But ISPR and ISI have declared that they were not supporting him. Fatwa against Zaid Hamid Banned monthly Paigham Khatme Nabuwwat reported that Jamia Banuria had published a fatwa against Zaid Hamid saying that Yusuf the False Prophet had nominated Zaid as next in line. Zaid Zaman was made responsible for making the False Prophet leave Pakistain safely. False Prophet Yusuf nominated Zaid Hamid (then Zaman) of Brinks Company as his khalifa. Roedad Khan will not appeal Quoted in Express ex-civil servant stated that if the Supreme Court convicted him in Asghar Case known as Mehrangate he will not appeal the sentence. The case has him working together with President Ghulam Ishaq in a cell put in charge of planning the defeat in elections of the PPP. ![]() Daily Jinnah stated that Insaf Party of Imran Khan ![]() ... aka Taliban Khan, who ain't the sharpest bulb on the national tree... was already a failing party because the opportunists (mausami pancchi) had either decamped or were fighting among themselves. This resulted in the party not being able to frame its constitution. People came late to the meeting in Islamabad and deputy chief Shah Mehmood WormtongueQureshi was absent. Osama was buried in America! Daily Jinnah reported that the dead body of the late Osama bin Laden ... who is now among the dear departed, though not among the dearest... after his murder in Abbottabad was not thrown in the Indian Ocean but was transported secretly to the state of Maryland in the US to a military hospital and the body was taken in a special plane of the CIA. Contest of apologies in Moslem League Quoted in Jinnah PMLN leaders invited each other to apologise for wrongdoing. Nawaz Sharif asked Chaudhry Shujaat to apologise to the people for siding with General Musharraf. Chaudhry Shujaat asked Nawaz Sharif to apologise for being supported by General Zia. Mubahila: discussion unto death Reported in Nawa-e-Waqt a mubahila was arranged in Lahore against the Ahmadis for which the latter did not turn up, thus yielding victory to the truthful Sunni opponents. Mubahila is a discussion which some describe as a competition of curses in the name of God in which the false party dies of its own accord. Ex-president Rafeeq Tarar also attended. The speakers said that Mansoor Ijaz can't get away by reciting the kalima. The challenge is a call to prove the truth or falsehood of the Qadiani religion. Regal Chowk should be Akbar Bugti Chowk Writing in Jang that Punjab University held a discussion on Balochistan ![]() ...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it... in which the speakers were Oria Maqbool Jan and Suhail Warraich among others. Warraich said that media in 1971 was not alive therefore East Pakistain was lost but now it was alive therefore Balochistan would not be lost.
Mumtaz Bhutto to join PMLN Reported in Nawa-e-Waqt Sindhi leader Mumtaz Bhutto stated that Tehrik-e-Insaf ...a political party in Pakistan. PTI was founded by former Pakistani cricket captain and philanthropist Imran Khan. The party's slogan is Justice, Humanity and Self Esteem, each of which is open to widely divergent interpretations.... had approached him but he had already decided to join the PMLN. He said that Imran Khan himself had made the approach and invited him to join his party but he excused himself because of prior commitment. Raza Rabbani talks about his political creed Quoted in Jinnah PPP leader Raza Rabbani stated that he found that Socialism was the only way of life for the states of the world. Socialism was the true revolution which the rightwing politicians wanted to destroy. He said third party employment (through contractors) was the worst form of employment and was exploitative. He said PPP would do its best to end this system.
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India-Pakistan | ||||||||||||
Nuggets from the Urdu press | ||||||||||||
2011-12-04 | ||||||||||||
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Reported in Mashriq the terrorism court judge who sentenced the self-confessed killer of Governor Taseer - Mumtaz Qadri - said that he was receiving death threats from many quarters. The judge Parvez Ali Shah fled to Saudi Arabia after that although the Registrar High Court clarified that he had gone on hajj.
Daily Jinnah reported that Council for Islamic Ideology (CII) had issued a statement saying that Blasphemy Law was an Islamic law and was in accordance with Quran and Sunna. The CII is headed by Maulana Sherani of JUI and that has changed the personality of the CII making it more orthodox and less intellectual.
Writing in Jang Hamid Mir stated that after Bhutto had been arrested he passed on the chairmanship of the PPP to leftist leader Sheikh Rashid but it was soon felt that the feudal aristocracy of the PPP was not willing to accept him as leader whereupon Sheikh Rashid asked Bhutto to name his wife Nusrat Bhutto as the party chairperson. In 1982, Nusrat Bhutto suffered an ailment of lungs and had to be sent abroad which led to Benazir being appointed in her place and in this she was supported by her brother Mir Murtaza Bhutto. MFN is salt on national wounds! Famous humanitarian leader of Jamaatud Dawa Hafiz Saeed told Jinnah that giving the MFN status to India will jeopardise national security and will be like sprinkling salt on the wounds suffered by the nation from India. It will now become difficult to resolve the issue of Kashmir. Khalil Ramday is judiciary's Hamid Gul! Daily Mashriq quoted head of the Supreme Court Bar Association Asma Jahangir as saying that Justice Khalil Ramday had become the judiciary's Hamid Gul meaning that he did not leave when he should have. ![]() The nutty former head of Pakistain's ISI, now Godfather to Mullah Omar's Talibs and good buddy and consultant to al-Qaeda's high command... was famous for retiring but yet keeping his finger in the pie of ISI intelligence. She said Ramday had retired and should have kept out of the bar politics. Maulana Rehman and Jemima Quoted in Daily Jinnah Maulana Fazlur Rehman has lashed out at what he thinks is an un-Islamic 'walking together' by Imran Khan ... aka Taliban Khan, who isn't your heaviest-duty thinker, maybe not even among the top five... with his divorced wife Jemima Khan who joined Imran in Islamabad in his campaign against drone attacks in the Tribal Areas. He said, 'Islam forbids mixing with one's divorcee wife; and it seems as if Imran Khan's future is still linked to Jemima Khan'. Allah will make Imran rule!
Hindu is our eternal enemy! Quoted in Nawa-e-Waqt chief editor and owner Majid Nizami stated that all students should be told that Hindu was the permanent (azli) enemy of Pakistan whose birth too should be explained in the same terms. He added that even brainwashing should be used to convince the children.
Reported in Mashriq the Karachi Hindu Panchayat complained that Hindu girls were being forcibly converted by the Muslim clergy and wedded to Muslim boys. Each month 20 to 22 cases of this conversion were coming to light. One Hindu complained that his daughter was now wedded to a Muslim and was not allowed to meet her parents. Jamia Banuria, the largest seminary in Karachi denied that 200 girls converted in the last two months were converted forcibly.
Daily Jang reported that PIA planes were falling victim to failing engines and smoke in the cabin but the latest menace was the presence of large sized rats in the planes. When the rats were sighted by the passengers the plane was delayed and attempts were made to remove them which delayed the hajj flights.
Reported in daily Pakistan nuclear scientist Dr Samar Mubarak Mand who is charged with producing gas from one of the world's largest coal deposits in Sindh said that his project will be completed in two months and that the production of electricity from it will be completed in 2013. Dr AQ Khan no 'fish of aquarium'! Quoted in Jinnah famous nuclear scientist and father of Pakistan Bomb Dr AQ Khan said that he was a fish of the river (daryai machchli) and would not be reduced to being a fish of the aquarium by taking part in politics. He said he did not want filth (gandh) thrown on him in politics. He told Nawa-e-Waqt that Imran Khan was ignorant about government and that Musharraf was the king of corruption. Wrong lawyers made judges! Quoted in daily Pakistan the new elected president of the Supreme Court Bar Council Yaseen Azad said that many lawyers who used to raise pro-restoration slogans in the lawyers' movement had been unfairly made judges. He said after March 2009 judges' appointments had not been done on merit. He disagreed with the yardstick of promoting senior-most judges as members of the Supreme Court. Privatise the Steel Mills! Reported in Express federal minister of production Anwar Ali Cheema stated that the Steel Mill was not possible to run by the government and should be privatised. He said 50 percent of the employees had to be fired, 2 billion rupees should be given as bailout, after which too there will be nothing certain. In the past the Musharraf government too tried to privatise the Mill but was foiled by a general running it, in tandem with the Supreme Court which declined to look into the economic theory of denationalisation. Elephants of Porus Writing in Jang famous columnist and friend of Imran Khan, Haroon Rasheed stated that one PMLN leader who hated the Sharifs was asked by him why he still sat on the PMLN stage if he hated them so much. The said leader replied that he would take revenge by destroying them from within the party. Such elephants of Porus - meaning leaders who would trample the party from within - as Ahsan Iqbal, Ch Nisar Ali Khan, Pervez Rasheed and Khwaja Asif, did not surprise him as they started speaking against Imran Khan. | ||||||||||||
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India-Pakistan | ||||
Nuggets from the Urdu press | ||||
2011-11-20 | ||||
![]() Reported in Mashriq deputy leader of prayers of Islamabad's famous Lal Masjid, Maulana Amir Siddiqi complained that after he had made a trip to Iran he was receiving death calls. He had gone to Iran in a group of ten religious scholars on the invitation of Iran's Shia Council but forgot that his mosque was aligned with a school of thought that adhered to Al Qaeda and was opposed to Iran. Another cricketer shows 'real' character According to Mashriq Pakistan's pace bowler Suhail Tanvir got married (nikah) to a doctor but immediately after the wedding his former wife Nosheen appeared on the scene saying he had secretly married her earlier and had a daughter with her and had not taken permission under law from her for his second marriage. There is one year's prison for violating the law. But the clergy in Pakistan does not accept the law, so he was safe. Musharraf wanted to hang Nawaz Former General Ziauddin told daily Pakistan that Musharraf wanted to hang Nawaz Sharif after overthrowing his government in 1999. He had set up the scaffold at Attock Fort and the hangman had also been appointed. He said Nawaz Sharif as prime minister had dismissed Musharraf as army chief and appointed Ziauddin in his place because he knew what Musharraf had planned against Nawaz. Nawaz Sharif was spared because of international pressure. Jinnah was unhappy with Bahawalpur Daily Pakistan reported that Jinnah was unhappy with Nawab of Bahawalpur because of his activities and this had resulted in two Hindus trying to kill Jinnah but the plot was foiled just two days before it was to happen. Jinnah was about to take action against the Nawab. Give women right to marry two men! Reported in Jinnah Justice (retd) Nasira Iqbal said that men could marry second wife only under certain conditions usually taken to mean that he treat all his wives equally which was not possible according to the Quran. Sharmila Farooqui of PPP said that women too should be given permission to marry a lot of men.
Famous columnist Hamid Mir wrote in Jang that America was on its last legs as the entire world was unhappy with the capitalist system imposed by it. He asserted that Allama Iqbal had warned the nation that it was not right to depend on London and Geneva because these places were in the clutch of the Jews (Panja-e-Yuhud). He also asserted that Western civilisation was on its death bed in its very youth. ![]() World famous intellectual Zulfiqar Ahmad Cheema
Reported in Jinnah that federal secretary petroleum became drunk on alcohol during a charity show in Islamabad, took off his shirt to bare his body after which he began to pursue the ladies present on the occasion. He caused a lot of disorder (ghul-ghapara) after which he specially turned his attention to foreigner ladies in hopes of attracting them to his bare body. On this he was overpowered by the guards and made to sit out the function.
Daily Jinnah reported that a senior journalist (hint-hint) and columnist of great fame in Lahore (name withheld) was found doing ghul-ghapara at Lahore's Gymkhana Club. The said journalist whose name could be easily guessed because of his well known inability to hold his drink was most abusive to club members in Chandni Lounge. The club administration was shocked at the fertility of the journalist's brain to produce long and very descriptive abuses. Aisha is still Hamza's wife! Daily Mashriq reported that Aisha Ahad Malik was still married to Nawaz Sharif's nephew and son of Punjab chief minister, Hamza Shahbaz Sharif. This was confirmed by the parents of Aisha - Ahad Malik of PMLQ and his wife. Hamza denied that he was married to her. Saudi Arab wanted Nawaz Sharif as premier Famous double-game president General Musharraf was quoted in Jinnah as saying that the Saudis wanted him as president of Pakistan provided he kept Nawaz Sharif as prime minister. Saudis got Nawaz to agree that he would stay out of Pakistan for a decade but later it was agreed that he would return but would not demand restoration of the judges nor want President Musharraf removed. Drone kills Umar Abdur Rehman's son Reported in Jinnah a drone killed three Arabs in Pakistan including two of them - a son and a grandson of - Umar Abdur Rehman the fiery blind orator-leader of Egypt's Gamaa Islamiyya serving a long sentence in America since 1995 for plotting to blow up the American Trade Centre through Ramzi Yusuf who is also serving a long sentence. Maulvi Faqir calls Pakistan 'ghulam' Quoted in Mashriq deputy chief of the Taliban Maulvi Faqir Muhammad said that it was no use talking to Pakistan because it was a slave (ghulam) of America. He said America was losing the war in Afghanistan and was therefore deceptively talking about peace with the Taliban. He denied that he had recently visited India; nor was he killing Pakistanis at the behest of India. India cannot be 'most favoured' Famous columnist Tanvir Qaiser Shahid wrote in Express that India could not be granted the title of Most Favoured Nation (pasandida tareen mulk) because it had inflicted so much cruelty on Pakistan. How could it be acceptable to the armed forces of Pakistan and how can it be acceptable that our army chief invites foreign guests to his meetings only to have them say in public that the army was in agreement with the award of MFN to India. Kick America out! World famous spy-master and intellectual Hamid Gul told Nawa-e-Waqt that if Afghanistan could beat up the US (maar-bhagaana) and throw it out of its territory, why couldn't Pakistan do it? He said Pakistan should stop the greatly expensive equipment of the US leaving Afghanistan through Pakistan, which Pakistan should confiscate. A new slant on 'halala' Daily Jinnah reported that chief of the world renowned madrassa of Karachi Jamia Banuria chief Mufti Naeem said that the contracting of second marriage by Suhail Tanvir without the permission of his first wife was a kind of halala (making permissible) which was allowed by Islam. He said Islam did not make second marriage or more conditional to taking permission from the first wife. Normally halala means remarrying first wife after first marrying her to another man, who is usually a cleric, complete with consummation of marriage through sleeping with the said cleric. | ||||
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India-Pakistan |
Nuggets from the Urdu press |
2010-07-16 |
Muhammad PBUH was the last Prophet![]() Daily Jinnah reported Director Supreme Council Jamaat Ahmadiya Mirza Ghulam Ahmad as saying in Lahore that Jamaat Ahmadiya believed that Muhammad PBUH was the last Prophet and that the Quran was the Last Book. He said that in 1974 the community was unfairly declared non-Muslim. Imran Khan doesnt condemn terrorists ![]() Quoted in Jang PMLN leader Pervaiz Rashid criticised Imran Khan for not condemning the terrorists who destroyed Data Darbar but instead demanded the dismissal of the PMLN government. Mr Rashid asked Imran Khan to ask his friends not to do terrorism. No mosque in Punjab Assembly! Daily Islam reported that while the Punjab politicians were languishing (gham main ghulnay walay) in grief for the Ahmadis, there was no mosque for them in the Punjab assembly where they could say namaz. More than 500 politicians and staff were without namaz. The nearest mosque had a door opening on to the Assembly but that had been closed. The mike that brought in the sound of namaz was also shut off in the House. Allama snubs Nehru ![]() Writing in Jang Hamid Mir wrote that once Congress leader Nehru came to Lahore to see Allama Iqbal. Nehru complained that Jinnah was too ziddi (stubborn) but both Hindu and Muslims love you as a great poet; had you been the leader of Muslim League everyone would have gathered behind you. On this Allama became furious and reprimanded Nehru and told him that Allama was a simple soldier (adna sipahi) of Jinnah. Chaudhry Shujaat defends Madrassa Haqqania ![]() Quoted in daily Islam Chaudhry Shujaat leader of Muslim League (Q) said that FIAs report accusing Madrassa Haqqania of Nowshehra of being involved in the plot to kill Benazir Bhutto was wrong. He said the madrassas were the castles of Islam and were serving Pakistan. He rang Maulana Samiul Haq the head of the madrassa at Akora Khattak and gave him his support. Chief Justices expensive car ![]() Reported in daily Jinnah secretary information of the PPP Fauzia Wahab said that the Chief Justice of Pakistan Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry had acquired a luxury car worth Rs 5.5 crore. Chief Editor of the paper wrote in his column that the name Fauzia had letters fau and zia and the latter in Urdu meant loss. Ahle Hadith want Ahmadis cleaned up ![]() The day the Ahmadis were massacred in Lahore by Punjabi Taliban, daily Ausaf reported that a province wide Ahle Hadith youth force was holding a mammoth gathering at Sargodha. Ahle Hadith leader Prof Sajid Mir condemned the killing of the Ahmadis but all the other speakers, in disagreement, demanded a cleaning up of the Ahmadis in Pakistan. Jamaat Ali Shah speaks Indias language Reported in Nawa-e-Waqt a seminar held by Nawa-e-Waqt Group of newspapers decided that Pakistans Indus Waters Commissioner Jamaat Ali Shah was no longer speaking for Pakistan but was defending the Indian position on the stealing of river waters by India through 62 dams. Speakers including such illustrious men as Ambassador Javed Hussain who said that India was stealing one crore forty acre feet of water and that the Indus Water Treaty was only good for the 1960s but today Indias water aggression could lead to an Indo-Pak war that would soon turn into a nuclear world war. Justice Sharif weeps at Data Darbar ![]() According to Jang Chief Justice of the Lahore High Court Khwaja Muhammad Sharif went to Data Darbar after the terrorists had destroyed it with two suicide-bombers and wept and prayed that Allah should keep Pakistan in His security. He said that terrorists could neither be Muslims nor Pakistani. Earlier Commissioner Lahore had stated that the terrorists had come from Afghanistan and had been trained by India. Jang reported on its front page that one 16-year old suicide-bomber Rafiq was from Barki near Lahore and that his brother was employed in an intelligence agency. Later the chief justice asked the police to investigate if Blackwater of America was involved in Data Darbar terrorism. The Ahmadi statement is a lie! ![]() Reported in Express ulema in Gujranwala reacted to the statement of the Ahmadi leader that the Prophet PBUH was the last prophet by saying that Mirza Ghulam Ahmad was lying and was a joke with the Quran and Sunnat. The government should understand the trick and abstain from abolishing the Blasphemy Law. The Qadianis were traitors and should be punished with death under Article 6 for treason. Pakistani mentality ![]() Writing in Jang Saleem Safi stated that Pakistanis had a split mentality because they tried to hide their filth (ghalazat) with new philosophies in order to make a fool of the world outside. In fact they were themselves idiots who deceived themselves and thus going towards destruction (zillat aur tabahi). Because of their talk the world thinks that Pakistan is the only castle of Islam where West-hating Muslims live. Bhutto and Ahmadis Columnist Abbas Athar wrote in Express that Bhutto got the Ahmadis declared non-Muslim after they had helped him organise his victory at the polls. Athar did not believe that Bhutto met his fate later because of some miracle but he did see a connection in the kind of fanatic men who got control of the state after him and hanged him. Bhutto was a liberal man but a hard Muslim was still hidden inside him. And the noose around his neck was tightened in the name of Islam. Two and half lakh new maulvis ![]() Reported in daily Islam just one federation of seminaries located in Multan, Wifaqul Madaris was host by the end of June 2010 to 2.5 lakh examinees trying to pass the exam kutub (books) and of hifz (learning by heart) of Quran. On passing they will be issued sanad of graduation. British women embrace Islam ![]() Daily Jinnah reported from the UK that while the West was thinking of banning hijab, British women were embracing Islam in great numbers. In the past decade 30,000 Christian women had become Muslim and just one mosque at Regent Park received women worshippers fully 60 percent of whom were converts. Ahmadis are to blame! ![]() Writing in Jinnah Hafiz Tahir Mehmood Ashrafi alias Sakht Jan stated it was wrong to say that South Punjab had become a safe haven for terrorists. And there was a federal minister who put on American spectacles before seeing Jaish and Lashkar in South Punjab. The question was why the government was allowing brandishing of weapons in Chenab Nagar these days. Wicked lady journalists ![]() Writing in Express Tanvir Qaisar Shahid stated that western lady journalists were given to breaking laws and going to places not allowed to them and in some cases of overstaying their visas in Pakistan. Among men, Daniel Pearl crossed the red line in Karachi and was beheaded by terrorists. He should have informed the intelligence agencies before going there. Christine Lamb and Emma Duncan were early examples of lady journalists getting out of hand, writing Waiting for Allah and Breaking the Curfew books respectively. These books were a blot (badnuma dhaba) on the governments of Pakistan. Fauzia Wahab regrets Daily Express reported that PPP information secretary Fauzia Wahab, faced with a trial for insulting the Companions of the Prophet PBUH, regretted that she said what she said about there being no Constitution for Hazrat Umar, and claimed that she herself belonged to the sacred family of Haji Imdadullah Muhajir Makki and that she wanted more madrassas like Jamia Banuria to be opened. A milestone decision Reported in monthly magazine Naya Zamana Chief Justice of the Lahore High Court granted bail to the leader of the terrorists who attacked the GHQ, Dr Usman. After the decision the Court resounded with slogans that went like this: Khwaja Sharif Zindabad, Nawaz Sharif Zindabad, Azad Adliya Zindabad, and Tehreek-e-Taliban Zindabad. The magazine also noted that the attackers of the Sri Lankan team in Lahore had also been let off for lack of proof. |
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Terror Networks |
The strategy of suicide-bombing |
2008-05-06 |
Book Review by Khaled Ahmed Suicide bombing was initially embraced by only a couple of Islamist groups: al Dawa, an Iraqi Shia group, and the Lebanese Shia organisation, Hezbollah. Later, it was copied by others moved by nationalism and, more frighteningly, ethnic sub-nationalism. Toward the end of the 1980s, suicide terrorism began to spread beyond Lebanon and Kuwait in the Middle East: first to Sri Lanka but then, as the 1990s unfolded, to India, Argentina, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Kenya, and Tanzania. Apart from the Eelam Tigers of Sri Lanka, most of the stuff has been motivated by religion. From 2001 to 2005, 78 percent of all the suicide terrorist incidents were religion-driven. Indeed, of thirty-five terrorist organisations employing suicide tactics in 2005, 86 percent were Islamic. These movements have been responsible for 81 percent of all suicide attacks since 9/11. By 2005, more than 350 suicide attacks took place in at least twenty-four countries including the United Kingdom, Israel, Sri Lanka Russia, Lebanon, Turkey, Italy, Indonesia, Pakistan, Colombia, Argentina, Kenya, Tanzania, Croatia, Morocco, Singapore, the Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Iraq. But the mechanics of suicide-bombing is not religious at all. It is adopted because it makes terrorism so easy. If you dont use martyrdom based on religion you have to arrange for the getaway of the terrorist you have sent out to do the job. The terrorist must know that he would definitely make his escape after the act of terrorism or he will not do the job. In the case of suicide-bombing, the terrorist knows he is going to his death and therefore seeks to do the utmost level of damage possible. The organisation that uses him benefits from the fact that no trace of the perpetrator is left for the victim state to make out who has done the job. In the case of Al Qaeda, each bomber was handpicked by bin Laden himself but also was then asked to swear an oath of loyalty, pledging to carry out a suicide operation. Each was filmed for a martyrdom video to be released after the attack. According to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the man who thought up the 9/11 attack, all but one of the nineteen hijackers made such a tape. The lone exception was the terrorist who thought his oath could be hypocritical and therefore Allah might not accept his sacrifice! The suicide-bomber is indoctrinated/brainwashed into believing that he would go to heaven as a martyr. The martyr not dying physically and enjoying the pleasures of paradise is recorded in the Quran in relation to historical events which occasion the Revelation. But the pivot of the suicide bomber phenomenon is religious extremism prevalent in the society from where the bomber is chosen. Extremism is not a specialisation. It is flowing from the pulpit and TV screen in most Muslim states, including Pakistan. Research in Pakistan by an Islamabad doctor after interviewing the TNSM returnees from jihad against America in Afghanistan has found that the warriors were picked up from the mosque rather than the madrassa. In Pakistan, extremism of faith leads to another result. Al Qaeda bombers function in a Muslim milieu and rely on society to oppose the state and embrace the act of suicide-bombing. This has not worked when the bombers have operated in non-Muslim societies, as in the case of Chechen terrorists in Russia. Despite the fact that Muslim bombers kill innocent Muslims, it is the state which is isolated and condemned and not Al Qaeda. The more Al Qaeda kills Muslims in Pakistan the more the population will become alienated from the state. And that will happen not because the state has failed to resist and eliminate Al Qaeda but because Al Qaeda is right and the state is wrong. The Muslim-kill-Muslim function of Al Qaeda suicide-bombing has escalated into sectarian killings. When this happens, the Muslim population instead of becoming united before opposing the state now divides before condemning the state. This new version is more lethal in the degree to which the state is rejected, and therefore Al Qaeda has supported the sectarian brand of suicide-bombing more than the other brand in recent times. On May 31, 2005, a suicide-bomber attack in Karachi during evening prayers inside Ali Raza Imambargah, killed as many as 19 and wounded 38. The force of the blast was so severe that it cracked the buildings dome. This attack came just weeks after May 7 at another Shia mosque, which killed 23 and injured almost 100 people during the Friday prayers. The Ali Raza imambargah attack was most probably in retaliation for the assassination of the Sunni Muslim head of Jamia Banuria in Karachi, Nizamuddin Shamzai, the previous day. Suicide bombing appeals through martyrdom and is more successful if the victims are Muslims. For instance, it has not succeeded as a tool of persuasion in Europe the same as it has in Pakistan which leads the world in being the victim of this warfare. Therefore, the natural inclination on the part of Al Qaeda to kill Muslims in Pakistan rather than Christians in Europe and America is understandable. Al Qaeda doesnt appear to be original if you compare it with the 19th century European anarchists and their rationale for killing innocent fellow-Christians. The central idea of Al Qaeda is to create anarchy after which it might set about creating the global khilafa its website promises. The khilafa will of course be in one state first before it spreads and controls the rest of the Islamic world. What will be the technique to spread out from, say, the mini-state of South Waziristan to the rest of the Islamic world? The answer is easy: suicide bombing. It inverts some of the most important concepts to achieve this. Killing Muslims becomes more useful in terms of influence and persuasion; and Islamophobia becomes a positive intra-Muslim value if Muslims fear Islam as the beginning of their becoming good Muslims. Today, Al Qaedas suicide-bombers affect the Pakistani mind by staging suicide-bombing; but it forms the Pakistani mind more effectively in its favour by switching off suicide-bombing for a period of time. If we kill Americans through suicide-bombing, America will not become Muslim. If we kill Pakistanis through suicide-bombing, Pakistan will become a more strict adherent of Islam. In that is the first building block of the khilafa. Dying to Kill: the Allure of Suicide Terror; By Mia Bloom; Columbia University Press New York 2007 |
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India-Pakistan |
Lal Masjid as logic of Islamic rejectionism |
2007-07-12 |
By Khaled Ahmed Muslims all over the world withhold legitimacy from the Muslim nation-state. Muslim states respond by using the mithridatism of sharia take a bit of poison every day for immunity from actual poisoning only to discover that the clergy continually posits a more stringent sharia whose enforcement is not possible without theocratic rule. The Islamic state describes a familiar trajectory of rejectionism till it becomes internally secure under direct clerical rule, as in the case of Mullah Umars Sunni caliphate of Afghanistan and Imam Khomeinis Shia imamate of Iran. Isolation, indoctrination, rejectionism: The madrassa and the mosque act as nurseries of Islamic rejectionism. The mosque is the place of employment of the graduate of a seminary. The seminary socially insulates its acolytes through its dars nizami syllabus, ensuring that its graduates can only be employed in a mosque. (This is at the root of the proliferation of mosques in Pakistan.) The residential madrassa is the locus of three functions: isolation, indoctrination and rejection. The burden of its message to society is an exhortation to vigilantism based on the Quranic concept of amr (encourage good) and nahi (oppose wrong). In a Muslim state, a majority of the population possesses a rejectionist mind rejection of the incompletely Islamic state. This is not a negative trait; it is an honest expression of allegiance to the utopia of the sharia. The clerical message about the backsliding of the state targets internal non-enforcement of literalist edicts. It also attacks foreign policy whose avoidance of international isolation is interpreted as compromise of national honour. Honour-based societies such as Pakistan focus on foreign policy as a device of repossession of lost honour. In this sense, Islam becomes an instrument of re-tribalisation. Madrassa as centre of cult following: Lal Masjid encapsulates the Muslim mind. The TV channels in Pakistan have woken up to the parallels Lal Masjid has in other parts of the world, but they still deliberately ignore the cultic aspects of these comparisons. Not all the comparisons have been correctly defined. For instance, comparisons with the Chechen attacks on a school in Beslan in Russia (2004) and a Moscow theatre (2005) do not take into account the charisma of Abdul Aziz. However the reference to 1979 Makka revolt by a rebel preacher Juhaima was more to the point because of the central figure in it of Imam Mehdi pretender. Reference to the siege of Golden Temple after the Bhindranwale revolt (1984) in India is also an acceptable analogy. Why did the TV channels avoid reference to the fact that Juhaima had put up his nephew Qahtani as the promised Mehdi? One can only say that there is a reluctance to compare cultism with the Lal Masjid phenomenon. Reference was indeed made to the 300 prophetic dream visions of Maulana Abdul Aziz in the Urdu press, but the theme was not pursued further. Was this non-reference meant to avoid comparison with religious cults in the West that manifested the same syndrome of isolation-indoctrination-rejection as the Islamabad seminary? Divine inspiration and cult figures: If Maulana Abdul Aziz had received his orders directly from Allah, and had a cult following he himself described as ready to commit suicide for him, David Koresh and his suicide squad of devotees at Waco, Texas (1993) also clashed with state troops because messages from God did not allow surrender. His cult followers accepted suicide the same way as the cult followers of Californias Jim Jones in British Guiana (1978). The Swiss group suicide (1994) was also ordained by a divine message. The fanaticism of the male and female acolytes of Maulana Abdul Aziz would have resulted in mass suicide had he not himself abandoned them by fleeing. The Lal Masjid founder Maulana Abdullah was killed in 1998 at the height of the sectarian war unleashed by Deobandi madrassas in 1986 after the issuance of apostatisation fatwas. Abdullah was a graduate of Jamia Banuria like Maulana Masood Azhar of Jaish Muhammad whose trained terrorists are now found entrenched within Lal Masjid together with Maulana Abdur Rashid Ghazi. Ghazi echoed his fathers sectarian worldview when he told a TV channel that the government might have brought out Shia warriors against his besieged acolytes. The Aziz-Rashid duo began with a clear anti-Shia intent when they abducted a Shia lady in Islamabad after accusing her of running a brothel. Only the BBC website recorded the charge made by the lady that, while they were dragging her family out, the Lal Masjid vigilantes had referred to the Shia sect as a sect of prostitutes. The duo had climbed to the top of the already dominant position of the Deobandi seminaries in Islamabad by establishing contacts with the Taliban and Al Qaeda. Musharraf and proliferation of madrassas: The madrassas in Pakistan have proliferated after 9/11 and under Musharraf. This makes clear the intent of the new religious seminary in Pakistan. In the old radical madrassas ready to face America and its allies, induction of acolytes has doubled, as was shown by admissions at Jamia Banuria in 2002. In Islamabad too, the proliferation of madrassas has taken place under Musharraf after 2001, not under General Zia after 1979. Today, there are 88 seminaries in Islamabad imparting religious education to more than 16,000 students. It is not for nothing that every second male in Islamabad keeps a jihadi beard and looks scary to foreigners. Research has revealed that the number of students of the Deobandi seminaries, including Jamia Hafsa and Jamia Faridia, doubled during the last one year. The students to these seminaries many of them residential have flocked from all parts of the NWFP and the tribal areas. Madrassa dominance of Islamabad: The breakdown of madrassas in Islamabad is as follows: Deobandi (5,400 students); Barelvi (3,000 students in 46 seminaries), Ahle-Hadith (200 students in two seminaries); Shia (700 students in eight seminaries) and Jamaat-e-Islami-led Rabita al-Madaris (1,500 students in 18 seminaries). According to a newspaper investigative report, the present number of 10,700 seminarians in the federal capital is almost equal to the combined strength of the seminary students from Balochistan (6,374 students) and Azad Jammu and Kashmir (2,835 students). Who has tried to change the character of Islamabad through a proliferation of extremist seminaries? One could quickly claim that President Musharraf could not have been involved in this proliferation because of his exhortations against extremism. But that would be incorrect: During the rule of General Zia (from July 1977 to August 1988), 7 new seminaries were established in the federal capital; under President Musharraf, the number went up to 14! Mithridatism will not work. The commander of the Rangers besieging the Lal Masjid madrassa had a flowing beard just like the ones sported by Maulana Abdul Aziz and Abdur Rashid. Almost all the troops brought out to confront the terrorists inside Jamia Hafsa were bearded and looked more like the Taliban than Pakistan army soldiers. Pakistan is firmly set on the trajectory beyond all dreams of democracy as the panacea for collective derailments. Utopias of rejectionism: At the end of the parabola of Islamic reform is the theocratic state, ruled and secured against de-legitimisation by the clergy through punishment of dissent with death on the basis of the doctrine of fasad fil ard (turmoil on earth). But after the establishment of theocracy as the acme of state evolution, comes the international assault. The Sunni caliphate of Afghanistan was invaded under a chapter-seven UN Security Council resolution number 1373. It was found that the caliphate had endangered its Muslim neighbours before endangering the world. The same kind of international movement is developing against the imamate of Iran which also endangers its Muslim neighbours equally as it endangers the world. The seminary is the symbol of Islamic rejectionism. This rejectionism is achieved through isolation which international investigators often condone as dars nizami, thinking that insulation of the acolyte has nothing to do with violent rejection of society and state. At the subconscious level, we are all waiting for the Sunni caliphate in Pakistan. We all know what will happen after that. |
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India-Pakistan | |
Editorial: Nemesis of Jaish | |
2007-07-03 | |
Eight terrorists belonging to the much-metamorphosed jihadi militia Jaish-e Muhammad have been arrested in Lahore. The police have confined their list of offences which range from the killing of Christians in Pakistan to carrying out terrorist acts in Afghanistan for the Taliban against the international NATO-ISAF forces. The group was located in Quetta and one can speculate that the lead on the terrorists with half a decade old Pakistani charges against them must have come from Afghanistan. The eight men are believed to have been behind an attack on a missionary school near Murree in 2002, killing six; and a grenade attack on a church in Taxila four days later, in which four nurses were killed a poor mans answer to the invasion of Afghanistan. One of the terrorists had a bounty on his head of one million rupees. The group had in their possession material for making bombs and large quantities of arms and ammunition. The group confessed to being members of Khudam al-Furqan, the name a splinter from Jaish assumed after Jaish was banned in 2002. Pakistan is now in the process of dismantling and eliminating at times under duress the proxies it had launched in the name of freedom wars. The jihadi underworld developed under several names, the most well known being Jamiatul Ansar which emerged as the most blood-thirsty terrorist group in Indian-occupied Kashmir in the 1990s. When the world woke up to its indiscriminate savagery targeting people not directly connected with the freedom struggle, it splintered and assumed different identities, one of them being Harkatul Mujahideen, led from the Deobandi seminaries in Pakistan. Harkat came to be a close associate of Osama bin Laden and accompanied him to Sudan when he took his Al Qaeda out of Afghanistan because of mujahideen infighting. One leader of Jaish, Maulana Masood Azhar, rose as an agent of Al Qaeda with the ability to raise funds all over the world. In 1993, Al Qaeda was involved in the killing of 24 Pakistani soldiers in Somalia while performing duties under UN auspices, about which Osama bin Laden was to boast later. While in disguise in India, Masood was captured and imprisoned. Another operative of Al Qaeda, Umar Sheikh, was also captured in New Delhi. In 1999, an Indian civilian aircraft was hijacked after take-off from Nepal by a group of terrorists led by Masoods brother, Ibrahim. The plane was taken to Afghanistan where the Taliban, recognised by Pakistan as a regime, arranged for a swap of Indian passengers with the two Al Qaeda terrorists, Umar and Masood. After their release, both came to Pakistan and began operating freely. Umar came to Lahore and Masood went to the most powerful seminary in Pakistan, Jamia Banuria, from where he later started issuing threatening statements against President Pervez Musharraf when the jihad was bottled up after 2003. In the pre-9/11 days the Pakistani establishment was still upbeat about its proxy wars and did nothing to catch the terrorists, which aroused suspicion in many quarters about the 1999 hijack. Both the terrorists then struck targets that hurt Pakistans national interests in the post-9/11 period. Umar Sheikh arranged to kill an American journalist Daniel Pearl and is today in prison in Pakistan appealing against his death sentence.
Masood damaged General Musharraf more effectively in 2001 when he attacked the Indian parliament and caused a military standoff between Pakistan and India that lasted almost a year. He was put under house arrest in his hometown Bahawalpur from where he has a way of vanishing from time to time. No one knows where he is today. The Harkat leader Fazlur Rehman Khalil is also at large, probably living in Islamabad, and has only recently stopped giving interviews to foreigners which have proved embarrassing to Islamabad. Another actor in this lethal dramatis personae of terror was Qari Saifullah Akhtar, let off from the 1995 abortive military coup and then sent off to Dubai in 2001 to escape being killed by the invasion of Afghanistan, only to be recalled when his boys nearly succeeded in killing President Musharraf and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz. No one knows where he is now. Pakistan is revisiting the nightmare of its past. Its posturings will remain dubious till it decides to purge its conscience and starts with a clean slate. | |
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The Great Banuri Town Seminary |
2004-02-23 |
A look at the center of radical Deobandi Islam. It is said that Allama Yusuf Banuri set up the Banuri madrassa in Karachi just after 1947 after coming down from the NWFP. Another account says that the large Banuri Town complex of seminaries was established by him much later. The headquarters of what is certainly the largest Deobandi madrassa in the country is in Site Area spread over more than six acres. Jamia Banuria can accommodate 2,000 pupils, while all its 12 branches in the city accommodate 3,000 pupils. The amount spent on its upkeep comes to Rs 3.7 crore annually. The seminary has secular subjects in addition to religious courses, but its graduates have figured prominently in jihad. Its most well known pupil was Maulana Masood Azhar who also taught here before becoming a jihadi hero and leader of the banned Jaish-e-Muhammad. Mufti Nizamuddin Shamzai: The most well known living head of the Banuri complex is Mufti Nizamuddin Shamzai who was counted as the most powerful man in Pakistan during the rule of Mullah Umar in Afghanistan. An American author has written that Mullah Umar and Osama bin Laden met for the first time in Banuri mosque under the tutelage of Shamzai. Among his 2,000 fatwas the most well known is the one he gave against America in October 2001 declaring jihad after the Americans decided to attack Afghanistan. He had earlier in 1999 already deemed it within the rights of the Muslims to kill Americans on sight. (The fatwa was later modified in explanation.) He was the patron of the foremost Deobandi jihadi outfit Harkatul Mujahideen and was seen as an elder by the two leaders of Harkat: Fazlur Rehman Khalil and Masood Azhar. In 1999, after his release from an Indian jail, Masood Azhar quarrelled with Khalil and formed his own Jaish-e-Muhammad. Shamzai was clearly inclined to favour Masood Azhar and became a member of the Jaish shura (governing council). He was already a member of the shura of Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Islam (JUI) of Maulana Fazlur Rehman. "The spilling of American blood is permissible" is how his â99 Fatwa went. Shamzai is one of a group of highly respected Deobandi scholars in Pakistan who give religous legitimacy to the Jihadi outfits. The Shuras of these different groups have an overlapping membership, which ensures that they remain under the control of the radical, but pro-Army, Mullahs. The Rise of Maulana Masood Azhar: The most famous alumnus of the Banuria seminary was Maulana Masood Azhar, leader of the banned Jaish-e-Muhammad. He is the son of Allah Baksh Shabbir, a teacher of Islam, of Bahawalpur. He has five brothers and six sisters. Masood was born in 1968 and completed his religious training at Banuri Mosque of Karachi and then taught there for two years till 1989. He was inspired to do jihad while at Banuri Mosque. Masood is the author of 29 jihadi tracts and was the organisational genius behind Harkatul Mujahideen, for which he toured abroad and collected funds. He was caught carrying fake dollars at Jedda airport during one of these trips. He was instrumental in getting Harkatul Mujahideen and Harkat al-Jihad al-Islami to merge for some time and was also the man behind creating a collective organisation named Harkatul Ansar. He was in Somalia in 1993 while Osama bin Laden was based in Sudan. Masood was caught in Anantnag in Held Kashmir in 1994 while trying to coordinate Harkatul Ansar. Masood is said to have met Osama bin Laden in Medina in 1994 when both were disguised. Masoodâs mission was to bring his jihadi organisation under the aegis of Al Qaeda. Masood Azhar was devoted to Maulana Haq Nawaz Jhangvi, the fanatically anti-Shia and anti-Iran founder of Sipah e-Sahaba who was murdered in 1990, which in turn led to the murder of an Iranian diplomat in Lahore, thus starting the great sectarian war of the decade of the 1990s, attracting Arab funds to Deobandi warriors. It is said that his separation from Harkatul Mujahideen forced his co-leader Fazlur Rehman Khalil to move close to Osama bin Laden, but the truth is that Masood Azharâs trail in Somalia in 1993 links him with the adventure the Harkat recruits participated in from Sudan which resulted in 24 Pakistani troops (as part of a UN peace force) killed in ambush by warlord Aidid that Osama bin Laden was supporting. Later in 1999, the kidnapper of Daniel Pearl in Karachi, Umar Sheikh, joined him and confirmed the strong bond between Al Qaeda and Jamia Banuria. Binori has also served as one of the headquaters of the global jihad movement. While Afghanistan was the training area, this and some other madrassas provided the religous indoctrination for the future leaders of jihadi movements. Qari Saifullah Akhtar: The next renowned graduate of Banuri Mosque is Qari Saifullah Akhtar, born in 1958 in South Waziristan. The leader of Harkat al-Jahad al-Islami, Qari Saifullah Akhtar first came to public view when he was caught in the 1995 unsuccessful army coup by major-general Zaheerul Islam Abbasi, but saved his skin by turning state witness. (Some say he was defiant but was still let off.) After that he surfaced in Kandahar and from 1996 was an adviser to Mullah Umar in the Taliban government. His fighters were called âPunjabiâ Taliban and were offered employment, something that other outfits could not get out of Mullah Umar. The outfit had membership among the Taliban too. Three Taliban ministers and 22 judges belonged to the Harkat. In difficult times, the Harkat fighters stood together with Mullah Umar. Approximately 300 of them were killed fighting the Northern Alliance, after which Mullah Umar was pleased to give Harkat the permission to build six more training camps in Kandahar, Kabul and Khost, where the Taliban army and police also received military training. From its base in Afghanistan, Harkat launched its campaigns inside Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Chechnya. Because of their common origin in the Banuri seminary, Harkat al-Jihad al-Islami and Harkatul Mujahideen were merged in 1993 for better performance in Kashmir. The new outfit was called Harkatul Ansar, the first to be declared terrorist by the United States after one of its commanders, Sikandar, formed an ancillary organisation Al Faran and kidnapped Western tourists from Kashmir in 1995. Qari Saifullah Akhtar fled from Kandahar after the fall of the Taliban and hid in South Waziristan for some time before being reportedly whisked away to some safe place in the Gulf by one of his Arab friends. |
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