Muslim countries will ultimately have to influence domestic opinion and legislation in every country individually, which also is an enormous task. They could focus more immediately on Western countries since most blasphemous speech originates there given their lenient free speech provisions. Since free speech exceptions exist even in Western countries, Muslims could first review whether current exceptions could outlaw blasphemous speech....

The Malala incident could well have been a turning point in Pakistan’s battle against violent extremism and militancy. The despicable attack on the young girl had reinforced the threat that terrorism poses to society. But unfortunately our political and military leadership have failed the people yet again. The paralysis of the state has given space and more time to those who want to impose their ways through the barrel of the gun….

It’s official now. When it comes to nabbing terror suspects, long-time Pakistani ally Saudi Arabia is India’s new best friend. Against this backdrop, Pakistan’s inability to rein in Lashkar militants and others of their ilk has not gone down well in Saudi Arabia. Therefore, it is now clearly scoping out new friends in this region even as Pakistan tries to come to terms with the fact that it may no longer have a monopoly over the ‘Saudi relationship’....

As it is obvious it is an extremely weak defence of attack on her. Firstly, if Taliban know Islam, a child cannot be punished unless he/she attains adulthood. Only those who can understand the consequences of what they are doing are liable to punishment in Islam Even prayers, fasting or hajj are not obligatory on children. Secondly, niyyah (intention) is necessary for performance of an act in Islam. Even prayer or fasting without niyyah will not be acceptable....

Over the past decades, an elaborate web of Islamist extremist terrorism, backed by Pakistan, has thrived under the benign neglect of the state on Saudi Arabian soil. The absolute impunity with which Pakistan-backed Islamist terrorists operated against India from Saudi Arabia has now been diluted by the arrest and deportation to India, of a number of prominent terrorists, albeit under sustained pressure and with a number of hiccups....

Much as I hate to be the bearer of bad news, al Qaeda did not make up Shariah law. Islam did. And in the West, it is a key tenet of due process that law is imposed literally — ambiguous laws violate the principle that people of ordinary intelligence must be on fair notice of what is prohibited. There’s nothing “gratuitous” about applying as it is written. We can keep our heads tucked snug in the sand, or we can recognize the source of the problem....

Even as die-hard optimists cried themselves hoarse in the hope that this would be the turning point, Malala’s shooting just ended up raising Pakistan’s ability to absorb brutality by a notch or two. No doubt the ranks of those anguished by the state of affairs in Pakistan swelled at the sight of the teen being wheeled in and out of hospitals, but it also brought up close the warped thinking that has come to dominate the nation’s mindscape....

However, far from their KP homeland, the ANP is coming under sustained attack in another stronghold, Karachi, the provincial capital of Sindh. On August 28, 2012, Amanullah (36), the ANP's Ward president for the MPR Colony in Karachi, was shot dead in a targeted attack by unidentified militants in the Orangi Town area of Karachi....

An obstacle that seems to define US-Pakistan relations is the lack of a common enemy recognised by both parties. There is a mutual threat within the military ranks of both nations in the form of infiltrators, using their military training to assist extremist groups. Pakistan’s Army has maintained a double-policy of fostering and punishing extremists within its ranks while the American military is witnessing a rise of white extremists....

... why we’re so willing to devote blood and tears in an attempt to safeguard the political rights of the people of Kashmir, but are willing to mutely acquiesce to oppression of fellow Pakistanis on our own soil. If as a nation we stand boldly on principle for freedom and justice for the oppressed people of Kashmir, why are we so willing to turn a blind eye to the murder, torture and terror committed on the people of north-western Pakistan by militants there?...

It took them by surprise. Comfortable in the belief that the nation has well and truly been converted to a narrative that explains the violence of Islamic militants in Pakistan as an expression of defiance against everything from ‘US imperialism’ to the ‘invasion of Hindu and Western culture’. The advocates of this narrative were taken aback with the way the majority of Pakistanis and the mainstream media responded to young Malala Yousufzai’s shooting by the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP)....

While in engineering college in Bhatkal, he met Lashkar members Bhatkal brothers and they all decided to form Indian Mujahideen to avenge Gujarat riots and carry blasts in the country. Bhatkal brothers, who were already in close touch with Amir Reza Khan of Lashkar-e-Toiba. He is also suspected to have also gone to Pakistan for training, said sources. Apart from doing his job, he was reportedly meeting

I had a terrible dream yesterday with military helicopters and the Taliban. I have had such dreams since the launch of the military operation in Swat. My mother made me breakfast and I went off to school. I was afraid of going to school because the Taliban had issued an edict banning all girls from attending schools. Only 11 students attended the class out of 27. The number decreased because of the Taliban's edict. My three friends have shifted to Peshawar, Lahore and Rawalpindi with their families after this edict....

The ISI-Bangladesh linkages run deep, and, before the Sheikh Hasina Government cracked down of terrorist groupings operating against India from Bangladeshi soil, and fundamentally altered the relationship between the ISI and Bangladesh's Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI), intelligence and terrorist collaboration between the two countries was at the heart of a number of terrorist attacks executed across India....

Or have we eaten on the insane root that takes the reason prisoner?”— Shakespeare, Macbeth Attempts are being made to prevent the people from identifying the malignancy of which the attack on Malala is merely the latest manifestation. The kind of mental acrobatics being performed by normal-looking gentlemen is a measure of the corruption of the mind that the lust for power can breed....