The Original Sin

A policeman carries a wounded victim in Garhi Shahu Lahore (source: AFP)

I have to admit that all I really wanted to say or post today was vile swearing. At the pea-brained 'jihadis' with their pubic hair beards, at their bastard 'teachers' and Wahabbi funders, at the ass-wipe Pakistani establishment nee military that nurtured both of them, at the narrow-minded fat-assed bigoted mullahs who protect them and the moronic and blind politicians and bureaucrats that continue to mollycoddle them. There are really no civilized words to react to what has happened today in Lahore. 80+ innocent people, children included, gunned down while praying in their 'places of worship', places we are not even allowed to call mosques! And for what? Because 'they' don't fit in with 'our' puritannical idea of 'our' religion.

I keep coming back to the 'original sin' that did not begin this whole process of demonizing other sects and religions, but certainly sanctified it: the 1974 act of a democratic parliament, led by the secular and socialist Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, that declared Ahmadis as non-Muslims. Of course there had been anti-Ahmadi rabble rousing from much earlier - remember that the anti-Ahmadi Khatm-e-Nabuwat movement began in the early 1950s - but never before had the state officially sided with the mob. This act laid the basis, in my opinion, for the officially sanctified bigotry, persecution and oppression that followed under Mardood-e-Momin Ziaul Haq and continued under others, including the pointless declaration we must all append our names to, to get ID cards or passports. This original sin was not by the mullahs who had been braying for such a declaration for long and rioting in support of it, but by  Pakistan's democrats, secularists, intelligentsia, leftists, liberals and other minorities such as the Shia who acquiesced to it. Truly, if ever there was short-sightedness among Pakistan's establishment (and there are plenty of examples of it) this was it. Hereafter, a seed had been sown in the collective psyche, that not only was it okay to declare as heretics others who did not adhere to one's version of religion, but that violence and mob rule could be used to achieve your goals. The nurturing of extremist thought during Ziaul Haq's (mis)rule and its repercussions in the shape of today's barbaric attacks (and earlier targeting of Shias, Hindus and Christians) are a logical continuation of the original sin.

I know what the critical reaction to my statement is going to be. From the right, it will almost surely consist of theological arguments against the Ahmadis. From the left, some may argue about whether the original sin may, in fact, be the 1949 Objectives Resolution - which brought Islam into the constitution contrary to everything Jinnah stood for and would have thought proper - or even the concept of a state founded in the name of religion. I really have no desire to enter into a pointless theological debate with the right, other than to question whether they consider themselves bigger arbiters than Allah Himself. As far as I am concerned, heresy is between the Creator and the subject, who am I to make judgements about others' religious convictions? The argument on the left as far as the Objectives Resolution is concerned may have merit. (I don't subscribe to the negation of the idea of Pakistan as a whole simply because even states not founded on the basis of religion, such as India e.g. have seen horrific episodes of violence based on religion.) However, in my humble opinion, whereas the misguided Objectives Resolution did not actively profess prejudice and discrimination (in fact, believed it was standing against it), the anti-Ahmadi act of 1974 actively enshrined prejudice and discrimination.

Oh, but look at what some of our moronic opinion-makers say in response to today's carnage. There's Brigadier Imtiaz Billa on Business Plus suggesting an American conspiracy to force the Pakistan army to conduct an operation in North Waziristan and Southern Punjab and to malign Islam and Pakistan. Here's Lahore Commissioner Khusro Pervaiz immediately pointing to Indian involvement because "the operation was conducted on the anniversary of Pakistan's nuclear tests." There's some other maulvi on Geo's Pachas Minute claiming that Ahmadis have never been targeted "like this" before in Pakistan and that this shows that this is "not sectarian violence but just terrorism." And of course there is the usual chorus, of "these are not Muslims since Muslims could never do something so heinous." Will Pakistanis ever learn to look inward? Or understand cause and effect?

Thankfully, here's the moronic Punjab law minister Rana Sanaullah (half-heartedly) admitting the linkage between the attackers and some madrassahs and even the Tableeghi Jamaat at Raiwind. And here's a shaken Chief Minister of Punjab Shahbaz Sharif finally realizing that these extremists are not potential voters that deserve covert support, but barbarians who need to be eliminated. Ah, but isn't he saying the same thing as his arch-nemesis Musharraf now? And does he have the balls to do what really needs to be done: a repeal of all discriminatory laws and practices that promote the mentality he finds so abhorrent now?

Quote of the Day

Quote of the Day comes from PMLN MNA from Chakwal and columnist Ayaz Amir in the op-ed pages of The News:

"Punjab is the strategic depth of bigotry and extremism masquerading in the colours of Islam."

Actually, you should probably read the whole piece. Much of it re-encapsulates well-tread ground about the origins of our extremism problem. But the following concluding bit should also perhaps be translated and read out to his party members and leaders who probably find reading anything a bit bothersome (the clarifications in [square brackets] are of course my additions)...

"All the extremist outfits with whose names we are now familiar emerged at that time [under Zia whose protege Amir's leader Nawaz Sharif was]: the jaish this and that, the lashkar so and so. Most of them were Punjab-based and members from all these organisations acquired battle experience in Afghanistan. My friend Colonel Imam of Afghan 'jihad' fame -- and who, like most good people, is from Chakwal -- takes enormous pride in saying that the most fearless fighters of all were from Punjab. And he should know for he was in the thick of it.

When with the departure of the Soviet army and the victory of the Saudi and Charlie Wilson-funded 'mujahideen', the Afghan war wound down, the fighters who had gained battle experience in Afghanistan were shifted to an entirely different front: Kashmir, where in a protracted struggle they managed to tie down half a million Indian troops.

Their godfathers in the security establishment felt elated. Forgetting the role of hard-drinking Charlie Wilson and the Saudis, they wrote a self-glorifying narrative in which it was claimed that not only had the power of faith defeated the Soviets. It had also hastened the end and break-up of the Soviet empire. If a superpower could be thus defeated, zeal and the spirit of 'jihad' could work similar miracles in Kashmir.

This was the mood then pervading the top ranks of the army and the intelligence agencies. So it is scarcely to be wondered at that when after the fall of Kabul to the 'mujahideen', a Pakistani delegation was on its way to the Afghan capital, no sooner had the aircraft carrying it entered Afghan airspace when those on board, including some Americans, were startled by a loud cry: "Allah-o-Akbar". This from the then ISI chief [and a close confidante of then PM Nawaz Sharif who appointed him], the heavily-bearded Lt-Gen Javed Nasir.

Our rendezvous with our present extremist-flowing troubles did not come about from out of the blue. We had ploughed the land and watered it for a long time.

When the Americans attacked Afghanistan post-Sept 11, the theatre of 'jihad' shifted again: back to Afghanistan. The Bush administration of course screwed things up for itself by going on to attack Iraq before finishing the job in Afghanistan, a piece of folly sure to haunt the US for a long time to come. But Afghanistan was bad enough by itself. It reignited the fires of holy war and, given the iron dictates of geography, it was inevitable that Pakistan sooner or later would have its hands burned by another conflict raging in Afghanistan.

Once a change of course in our strategic course was forced upon us by the US -- Musharraf succumbing to American pressure without extracting the kind of bargain that would have better served Pakistan's interests -- logic and necessity demanded a clean break with the playing-with-fire policies of the past. In other words, a clean and definitive break with Zia-minded 'jihad'. But Musharraf played a double game. Even while dancing wildly to America's tune he was never serious, or he lacked the will and capacity, to seriously rethink the past.

But now that under a new sun and a new sky we are finally embarked upon a new course -- which marks a true break with the past -- we have to realise the extent and magnitude of the problem. The terrorism we are now fighting is not a provincial subject. It is not confined to any one province. It is a composite whole, organically tied together, growing not from any isolated virus but from a sickness of the mind and soul which had the whole of Pakistan, or at least its strategic quartermasters, in its grip.

If Pakistan is to become something, realising its dreams and potential, if it has to enter the real world and leave the world of dreams and fantasies behind, then there is no course open to it except to tackle this sickness, no matter what it takes and what sacrifices it entails, without ifs and buts, and without any misconceived appeals to the Taliban."

Amir's reference to General Musharraf reminded me of the time in the year 2000, when soon after taking power and vowing to restore Jinnah's vision, he had been asked a pointed question by a young journalist about the threat of Talibanization of Pakistan at a public gathering. If I recall correctly (I was witness to it), the question had raised the issue of blowback, long before it became fashionable to talk in such terms. I still recall the general's response: he claimed that people often tended to forget that the Taliban were evolving too and cited as an example the fact that when they met for dinner with Pakistani army delegations they would now use (or at least have on the table/ dastarkhwan) cutlery and crockery... whereas earlier they would simply eat with their hands out of a single thaal (dish). I'm not making this up. A few months later, the cutlery and crockery were publicly forgotten.

As for Ayaz Amir, if ever there was a misfit in a political party...

Wake Up, Stand Up, Stand Up For Your Fights

A hilarious post on "Sexy Islamism" by ex-DawnNews journalist Khawer Khan pointed me in the direction of this clip of designer Maria B. being interviewed on Samaa TV's Nai Rahain programme with host Nadia Jamil. You must watch too for a good time.





Here are some gems from Maria B.'s mouth:


On Why She Supports the lunatic Zaid Hamid (at 1:05):

"Because he doesn't stop you from anything!"

On Deciding Why She Won't Do Revealing Clothes Anymore (at 1:29):

"It's part of what my evolution is becoming [sic]."

On "Hate-Mongering" Critics of Zaid Hamid (at 2:19)

"He is a fakir, who teaches love"

(You can see some of that love on a previous post here btw)


On What 'Wake Up Pakistan' supremo Zaid Hamid's Ranting Is All About (at 2:52):

"This is a movement about tolerance, it's about love, about protectioning [sic] the minority."

Here's the sufi in his own words (do see the whole clip):





On How She Thinks Muslims Should Behave Towards Non-Muslims (at 6:32):

"Some people think that being religious and Islamic means ke you just going to... [treat non-Muslims with derision].. No! Those.. that Hindu can be a better person than you and higher in the scale of Allah [sic] than any one of those Muslims going around beating people up. So ye bilkul bhi mujhe koi na kahe (don't anyone say this to me).. just because you are Muslims you think you are superior, nobody is."

Aah, noble thoughts indeed. But then what do we make of this bit of humility from your mentor, wherein he claims 50 crore Indian Hindus are just itching to convert to Islam and that the next time Pakistan goes to war with India, Indian Hindus should be prepared to be massacred ("This time we will take no prisoners")?:





On How 'Wake Up Pakistan' Movement Is All About Diversity and Tolerance (at 7:45):

"Hum jab meeting kar rahe hotay hain, aik larki baithi hoti hai hijab mein, aik niqab mein, aik main baithi hoti hoon, aik Feeha Jamshed baithi hoti hai.. (When we have our meetings, there is one girl sitting in hijab, one in a niqab, I am sitting there and [TeeJays' designer] Feeha Jamshed is sitting there)... and we respect each other."

Like duh. So it is all about fashion statements, isn't it? By the way, what, no Ali Azmat at the meetings?



I don't know about you but I want to set up the "Wake Up Maria" movement.

Some Thoughts On Karachi's Bomb Attacks

Some people have asked us why he have not "covered" the bomb attacks in Karachi yesterday.

This is meant simply to be a brief explanation of why we did not blog about the carnage that engulfed Karachi yesterday or have not blogged about earlier such incidents. It's not that terrorist strikes do not affect us or that we live in some sort of cocoon far removed from the reality of present-day Pakistan. They certainly affect us very personally - emotionally if not physically - and, in fact, we know many people who have lost friends and relatives in the bloodshed or seen them injured. Many of our colleagues in the media have also suffered.

No. The reason for not blogging about it has more to do with seeing no need to replicate the wall to wall coverage that is already present in the media, and with a reluctance to speculate on something about which the facts are often still murky, at least to us. Yes, we know that there have been terrorist strikes in Karachi on Ashura and Chehlum, for example, but can we really say with 100% surety who was behind them? Can we add anything to the discussion that has not already been said? All too often people are willing to jump in with prescriptive opinions on the basis of silly assumptions, hearsay and wrong data.

Let's take the Ashura bombing and subsequent "rioting" that followed. The original claim of a suicide attack on the procession was eventually officially struck down (after a week!) and it was pretty apparent right at the beginning that the burning of Boulton Market et al was hardly an act of 'spontaneous rioting by enraged people in the targeted procession.' (Processionists at such religious congregations do not generally carry with them chain-cutters, gloves and inflammatory chemical material, all of which were used to break into shops and burn them, as we saw on the closed circuit camera footage.) Now, had there actually been a suicide bomber, the probability of jihadists being behind the bombing would have been quite high - if there's one thing paid mercenaries are unlikely to do, it is to sacrifice themselves for a 'cause'. But since there was apparently none, the possibilities of who could be behind the bombing multiply. This does not mean that jihadists (and I will come back to them later) could not be behind the attack (in fact, at least one spokesman for them claimed it). Just that the pool of possible perpetrators increase.

Depending on your point of view, it could be Al-Qaeda aligned jihadists (Pakistani Taliban or Lashkar-e-Jhangvi types), foreign agents (out to sow chaos in Pakistan and depending on your point of view, this could mean Indian, Afghani, American), local shadow government agents (out to derail the government), or even ruthless political players (out to score petty local gains). The only thing we know for certain, at this time, is that whoever it was, falls squarely into the definition of "terrorist", i.e. they want to achieve some political aim through an act of violence that is designed to create a scare among ordinary folk.

Let's look also at the allegations hurled about after the arson that followed the Ashura blast. The MQM immediately blamed the 'Taliban' (in their mind often a shorthand for Pashtuns from the north who have active support from the Pashtuns in Karachi), while others immediately blamed the MQM, ostensibly because the City Government (CDGK) it controls wanted to shift / demolish some shops in the area earlier and, sotto voce, because it allegedly wants to drive the Pashtuns out of the city by initiating a backlash. Neither side has been able to provide conclusive proof so far.

The problem with the MQM allegations is not that the jihadists could not be responsible, it is that its knee-jerk pinning the blame for every such act of violence on the Taliban / tribal Pashtuns reeks not a little bit of political opportunism and racism. Is it too much to ask to wait for an investigation to uncover some facts?

On the other hand, the Jamaat-e-Islami led allegations against the MQM, in this case at least, have not yet been backed up by real proof. Not only has the supposed CDGK plan to evict shopkeepers whose shops were actually burnt not been backed up by any concrete proof, it boggles the mind that, with such a dastardly plan in place, the MQM would go out of its way to capture footage of the arsonists and provide it to the police and the media.

What we do know is this: since the calculated act of arson could not have been carried out without the cover of the blast, it would be reasonable to connect the two. So, those who planned the arson would, in all probability, have had to know at least that there would be a situation created wherein their activity was possible. There is no point in speculating beyond that.

However, a final word about jihadists, a term I am using simply as a shorthand for a certain mindset. There is a section of opinion that has got so carried away with its anti-American and anti-establishment rhetoric that it paints the Taliban and its allies as some sort of romantic resistance movement against neocolonialism. And I don't mean just Imran Khan or our shadow warriors like Colonel Imam and Hameed Gul. I have heard even some otherwise reasonable leftists spout similar rhetoric. Let's get one thing straight: they may be anti-American (right now) but the Taliban are no resistance movement against neocolonialism. They and their allies are among the most ideologically regressive bunch of people to walk this earth who would be all too willing to be in bed with Unocal once again if they were in power.

But one of the other most irritating things to hear in the media is the claim that such acts of murder could never be committed by Muslims. That of course not only blithely ignores the whole history of internecine Muslim violence over 1400 years, but also deliberately ignores the commonality between the Taliban and their jihadist allies: their Wahhabist aversion to Shia Islam. Al Qaeda, The Taliban, the Mehsud-led Tehrik-e-Taliban, the Sipahe Sahaba, the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, the Jaish-e-Mohammad, the Lashkar-e-Taiba et al, they are all part of a continuum that sees Shias as innovators in religion (and thus worthy of condemnation) or outright heretics (and thus worthy of being killed). And this mindset has been tolerated at one point or another (or continues to be tolerated in the case of some) by not only their military handlers but also by the majority of Pakistanis sold on the idea of romantic resistance.

So let's not kid ourselves. The jihadists may not have been behind the bomb attacks in Karachi on Ashura and Chehlum. But not because they could not intrinsically do this sort of thing.