Islam,Terrorism and Jihad
"Sometimes I imagine I'm going along and the Taliban stop me. I take my sandal and hit them on the face and say what you're doing is wrong. Education is our right, don't take it from us. There is this quality in me – I'm ready for all situations. So even if (God let this not happen) they kill me, I'll first say to them, what you're doing is wrong."...
Unless the Pakistan military does a mea culpa and completely severs its links and support to terror groups across the board, and the Pakistani political establishment -- with the sincere support of the clergy -- distances itself from the ideology of the TTP, Malala Yousufzai’s struggle both for her life and the cause she embodies would be in vain....
Maulana Ata-ur-Rehman, brother to his holiness Maulana Fazlur Rehman, put up much the same performance in the National Assembly. We condemn this outrage, he said, but we will have to go to the root causes of why such events happen...then a string of equivocations about drone strikes and the infidel war in Afghanistan. Root causes...the last refuge of those trying to take cover....
...even before the attempt on her life made her an international headline and lit up a flame in many a heart to emulate her enough to say “I am Malala”, the fact is that there are number of Malalas across the country; even in the tribal lands along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border – areas which have been billed as the most dangerous place in the world in the Western narrative....
The late Pakistani journalist Syed Saleem Shahzad talks about this in his insightful book, Inside Al-Qaeda and the Taliban: Beyond Bin Laden and 9/11. Referring to the waves of foreign Jihadi volunteers fighting against the Soviets in Afghanistan, Shahzad says, “The first arrivals were Egyptian youths from the Muslim Brotherhood, and they were later joined by others from a number of underground organizations opposed to various Arab governments.”…
Here’s an example of what it means: Salman Taseer was killed by Mumtaz Qadri. One man killed another. According to the raw forensics, a crime occurred. However, because of the perceptions around what happened, the victim was labelled a criminal and the murderer a hero. If you fit the profile of the average reader of my columns, you most likely disagree with this description. But reality is dictated by consensus....
“The very idea of Indian Muslims living peacefully and marching towards prosperity strikes at the very root of Pakistan’s existential philosophy. The very existence of a prosperous Muslim community in India destroys the Two-Nation Theory on which the state of Pakistan is based. The very fact that Muslims in India not only live peacefully among themselves but also in harmony with a variety of other religious, linguistic, ethnic communities while Muslims in Pakistan are deeply divided among themselves and constantly at each others’ throats is a profoundly destabilising factor for the very existence of Pakistan.
“That Pakistan’s Muslim Sindhis, Baluchis, Pathans, Saraikis, and indeed Mohajirs would love to join the Indian mainstream, given half a chance, cannot possibly be lost on the Pakistani establishment that has spawned these terrorist organisations to further its dubious strategic imperatives. We the Muslims of India, by our very existence, more so on account of our peaceful and prosperous existence, are an existential threat to Pakistan. And not just to its terrorists, which are in any case a part of the establishment. We can’t help it. There is nothing we can do about it. That is why it is in our particular interest, in the interest of Muslims of India, that these terrorist camps are destroyed and the criminals who have wreaked so much havoc on our land are brought to justice.”
In a wreath-laying ceremony at the bomb site in Oslo on July 22nd, 20012, Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said Breivik had not succeeded in his declared goal of destroying Norway's commitment to being an inclusive, multicultural society. Stoltenberg said: "The bomb and the gun shots were meant to change Norway. The Norwegian people answered by embracing our values. The perpetrator lost. The people won."
Very proudly, we Indians too can say on our commemoration of 26/11 that Pakistani terrorists and their handlers in Pakistan have failed to even so much as create a dent in the multicultural harmony of our society. And if we can say that nowhere in the world is the prevailing state of peace and group harmony being disturbed as a result of terrorist strikes, this is perhaps the best tribute we can pay to the International Victims of Terrorism on the Day of Remembrance. They have been victims of a hydra-headed barbarian ideology that wants to divide us all in exclusive groups. We have not allowed them to succeed and let us resolve that we will not let them succeed anywhere in the world.....Sultan Shahin, Editor, New Age Islam speaking at a parallel meeting in Palais des Nations, Geneva on September 20, 2012, paying tribute to the International Victims of Terrorism on the Day of Remembrance.
Conspiracy theories abound. Just about anyone with a stake in national politics is liable to be blamed. Some northerners claim that the south may be looking for an excuse to break away and lay sole claim to Nigeria’s offshore oil. By contrast, some members of the federal government in Abuja suggest that the northern political elite is masterminding the violence to make President Goodluck Jonathan, a southerner, look bad at the next election....
Most Muslims I met are as petrified of the Islamist rise as are mainstream Europeans. But they appear powerless in face of the challenge by oil-funded jihadis. Muslim Europeans worry about race relations getting worse, while Islamists see such a prospect with glee. Unfortunately, Muslims who oppose Islamism and defend free speech are lost in the din of the jihad....
Death threats, acid attacks and bombings by Taliban militants and other extremists lead many parents who support female education to keep their daughters at home. Sometimes, it's the families themselves who stand in the way. School officials in conservative communities say relatives are often more interested in marrying off their daughters or sisters than in helping them get an education….
Killing and molestation, loot and plunder are the order of the day. People are increasingly taking the law into their own hands. The entire society is swept by emotionally charged, high-sounding words of demagogues in different garbs here and there. They pass some nasty remark and scores of lives are lost in no time. The very next day they retract their statement but the damage can’t be undone.
Muslims, who predominate in many neighborhoods of Kenya's second largest city, blame the authorities for the cleric's killing, and say it is part of a campaign against their community and faith. They say the spontaneous outpouring of fury was a natural response, both to the assassination and to decades of political and economic marginalization in an area where shanty towns cluster in squalor alongside luxurious white sand beach resorts.
Professionals are the new face of terror as they swell the ranks of outfits such as IM
A JOURNALIST, a doctor, a researcher at the Defence Research and Development Organisation, an employee of a major computer MNC and an engineer — all professionals, many excelling in their chosen fields. But they have also become the face of modern violent Islamic extremism. In contrast to the image of the jihadi being a madrasa- educated, semi- literate individual, today’s terrorist, going by the profile of the various groups who come under the rubric of the “ Indian Mujahideen”, can be from any segment of society.
Intelligence agencies and counter- terror experts believe the Internet is a major factor that has helped in giving an image makeover to terrorists. “There is a lot of terror- related activity in cyber space. Educated people are needed for this. There is also a lot of provocative literature which is being read by the educated class making them vulnerable to terror recruits,” former Intelligence Bureau chief Ajit Doval said.
After the Kamra attack, highly placed government officials spared no efforts to explain that there was no security lapse, a line which ironically had also been parroted during Mehran incident. As reported in the press, at least four out of nine terrorists striking Kamra received logistic assistance from the adjacent village. In its simplest meaning, there is a security lapse the moment an unauthorised person leaps over the compound wall of a restricted area with mala-fide intent. So, what else was it if it was not a security lapse?
"Al Qaeda plans to move from their conventional base in the Afghanistan and Pakistan region to more vulnerable African countries" Al Qaeda chief Dr Ayman Al Zawahiri announced the merger of Somali terrorist group Al Shabab with his organization on February 10 this year, to create Al Qaeda in East Africa, or AQEA.....