Peshawar Mayhem: A Crime against Islam
By Abdel Aziz Aluwaisheg
22 December 2014
The massacre at a school in Peshawar, perpetrated by the Pakistani Taleban on Dec. 16, surpassed their previous attacks in its barbarity. This fact and the group’s pledge of allegiance to the “Islamic State” (Daesh), require a strong and swift action from Muslims everywhere and from the international community at large. But most of all they require national unity within Pakistan to confront the group’s evil.
According to official and media reports, nine armed men attacked the school. Although run by Pakistan’s military, the school is civilian and its students are children aged (5-17) years.
During an attack lasting eight hours, they killed around 150 people of whom over 130 were children; over 120 more were injured, some critically. The numbers are subject to change as authorities comb through the crime scene and finalize identification of remains.
According to those reports, the attack started at 10 in the morning, when the terrorists sneaked into the school wearing military uniforms. They did not attempt to take hostages for bargaining, but went from room to room targeting students. The children did not die of stray bullets or cross-fire, but were killed deliberately.
Attackers began by executing teachers in front of their students; one was burned alive, according to reports. Then they started shooting the students with live bullets, execution style. After the army had intervened, they blew up their explosive belts killing more students. Had the army not intervened, they would have probably annihilated the rest of the school’s 1,000 students. The Tehreek-e-Taleban Pakistan (TTP) was quick to take credit for the attack. Its spokesman Mohammed Khorasani said that they had targeted the school because children of Pakistani military personnel were enrolled in it. The group’s logic is quite bizarre, considering its claims of Islamic adherence. Here are some of its glaring contradictions:
First, as far back as the 7th Century, Islam emphasized the sanctity of civilians, especially children. In a very well-known tradition, the First Caliph Abu Bakr instructed the army he dispatched in 632 AD, as such: “You shall not engage in treachery; you shall not act unfaithfully; you shall not engage in deception; you shall not indulge in mutilation; you shall kill neither a young child nor an old man nor a woman; you shall not fell palm trees or burn them, you shall not cut down any fruit-bearing tree; you shall not slaughter a sheep or a cow or a camel except for food. You will pass people who occupy themselves in monks’ cells; leave them alone, and leave alone what they busy themselves with.”
Those instructions became well-established rules of war in Islamic jurisprudence. Today, they are largely codified in international covenants. Taleban appear to violate them one by one.
Second, Taleban claim that they committed this massacre in retaliation for attacks made by the army against Taleban families in North Waziristan. Spokesman Khorasani said that Taliban’s “Shura Council” had decided to target the school “in order to bring the battle into the homes of soldiers” who fought in Waziristan. In other words, the group is punishing the children for their fathers’ sins.
Even assuming that the accusation is accurate about the army attacking women and children in Waziristan, the group’s logic is again in violation of Islamic rules. The principle of personal criminal responsibility, forbidding the punishment of someone for the crime of another, has been affirmed at least five times in different chapters of the Qur’an. With this principle so clearly stated, how could a group that wraps itself in the flag of Islam kill so many innocent children for acts that they did not commit and probably had no idea that they had been committed?
During the attack on the Peshawar school, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif arrived in Peshawar and met with local leaders. He and other officials called for a national “consensus” to confront terrorist groups, perhaps in reference to the hesitation of some Pakistani leaders to do so. In particular, Imran Khan, whose party controls Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, including its capital Peshawar, where the attack took place, has been among the sceptics.
Political infighting has no doubt weakened the government’s ability, sometimes, to face extremists. Khan does not hide his competition with Premier Sharif or his misgivings about the fight against terrorism. Although he rarely criticizes Pakistani Taleban, he made an exception last week and condemned the school attack, saying that they had to “fight men, not innocent children.” Notice that he did not ask them to lay their arms altogether.
With Khan and others hopefully on board, perhaps we can see a national consensus in Pakistan for confronting terrorism, from whatever source. The confrontation should not be limited to the military and intelligence services, but works better when combined by political, intellectual and religious campaigns to debunk terrorists’ ideology. Economic measures are also needed to undermine terrorists’ ability to recruit fighters from among the unemployed and disenfranchised.
The consensus should not be limited to Pakistan, but should include other Muslim nations. As Pakistani Taleban cloak themselves in the garb of Islam, and claim to commit such heinous crimes in its name, Muslims the world over — political leaders, intellectuals and scholars — bear responsibility to come forth and debunk terrorists’ claims. They should be shown to be nothing more than criminal enterprises, which are not only ignorant of true Islam but also work against it by tarnishing its name. The international community should also join this fight. After all, Pakistani Taleban has openly declared its allegiance to “Daesh.” As such, the international coalition fighting Daesh in Syria and Iraq should perhaps consider widening its scope of operations to include Pakistan.
Source: http://www.arabnews.com/columns/news/678001
URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-terrorism-jihad/peshawar-mayhem-crime-islam/d/100634