Adil Najam
Pakistan is in tears today. Yet again.
70+ people are dead in Wah today, as yet another cursed suicide bomber targets Pakistan and Pakistanis. The Tehrik-i-Taliban has taken responsibility for them. Only two days ago, 32 people were killed in a suicide attack on a hospital in the northern town of Dera Ismail Khan. Meanwhile incursions and attacks into Pakistani territory by American forces continue and fighting between militants and Pakistani forces rages in Bajur and other areas, killing even more.
In what continues to be war on and in Pakistan, Pakistanis continue to die. Pakistan continues to cry.
Some will call it the largest legacy of the Musharraf years. Some will read unstated messages within this murder and mayhem by these killers. Others will see it as the price in dead bodies that Pakistan pays in the War on Terror. Yet others will remind us that this is reaping what Gen. Zia-ul-haq sowed. There will be, I am sure, plenty more pontifications too – ranging from the absurd to the absurdly profound.
All I know is that today, yet again, Pakistanis die. Pakistan continues to cry.
Why must this murder and mayhem continue? I ask. When will it end? These, of course, are absurd questions themselves. Because we all know the answers. It will continue for as long as we let the killers kill and support their murders with our silence. Silence, of course, also kills. And some are condemned to cry silently.
Thank you Adil Najam for this moving post. But it is really lost on most of your readers who seem to enjoy fighting over faith. This violence is not going to stop easily.
The comments here show exactly why we are in this problem. People are at it here too. Fighting over whose interpretation of religion is right and whose is wrong. D_a_n or Usman, please leave us alone, both of you fanatics. Just let us be and whatever your views on religion , practice them yourself and leave us alone. Please. It is arguments exactly like your that end up in self-righteous killing.
” Go parse their statistics and you will find that more than 50% of them are Chinese, Indians and Pakistanis.”
That’s exactly what my point was that you missed completely, that the selection there is based on merit, and not on whether they are Christians or Non-Christians. That is the reason NASA is the best mankind has to offer.
Your ideology that only muslims should hold exclusivity in the society is an inferior one and I just gave you one example of it.
@ Ibrahim…
you smugly pronounced that many of us stand ‘ex-communicated’ as it were from Islam…but last time i checked Allah SWT had not given this power to any living man or woman..it’s funny how the Mullah has always pined and begged to be given a role which is a copy of the christian clergy….again…the Mullah trying to outsource ..what lies in Allah SWT’s domain..
You DO NOT have the right to declare anyone outside the fold of MY deen…please try to reconcile to that fact
secondly…you keep going on and on about shariat…
yet you never ONCE mention WHICH shariat do you want to see implemented…is it the demented one proposed by the evil Khwaraji Taliban …or is it the heartless tribal and politically expedient one of the sad Kingdom of Saudi Arabia…
and what If of all those who would advocate a different form of shariat than you? what of them Ibrahim? would you declare them excommunicated from Islam too? or would you just do what the Taliban khwaraji’s do…ie, execute them like the Taliban Khawarji’s execute shia POWs?
your intolerance is repugnant…
i feel like hanging my head in shame thinking that I spent years risking my life …so that people such as yourself could sleep safely in bed..
@Mazhar:
What makes you think that I support Talibani values?
I am against all violence whether it is committed by Talibans or Americans. However I do believe in “innocent until proven guilty” maxim.
BTW, I do not understand what you want to prove by referring to Stanford and MIT educated NASA engineers. Go parse their statistics and you will find that more than 50% of them are Chinese, Indians and Pakistanis.