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.
Well, one benefit of Musharraf’s departure is that those of us on what can be termed the liberal/left end of the political spectrum in Pakistan have been rid of the massive Musharraf millstone hanging around our necks… say one word against the Mullahs and you are immediately accused of being pro-Musharraf/US/Israel/India… the flip side is that saying anything anti-Musharraf used to make one pro-mullah… some people see the world in black and white…
While it needs to be said that these Taliban are the results of what the army and the ISI have been doing for decades now, it shouldn’t stop at that… now that these Taliban exist, (and they do exist because of the army creating, arming, funding and encouraging them, to this day), they will not go away simply by commenting on why they are there… Pakistan (more specifically the army) created this Frankenstein’s monster which is killing people the world over, and the onus lies with us in finishing it…
No peace deals will work with these barbarians… instead, as they did over the last year, they will simply kill off all pro-government tribal Maliks… today, they have also killed a senior ANP leader in Swat, and accepted responsibility for it… when they sign peace deals, they expect the government to stop doing anything, while they themselves can carry on in their merry ways…
Given their association with the army and the ISI in the past (and one would think, the present), it is hypocritical of them to go around claiming they are taking the army on… even if one were to accept that for the sake of argument, one has to wonder what lies next… those who support these barbarians should ask themselves if they are willing to live in a Pakistan where girls can’t go to school because the Taliban have burnt them, where women have acid thrown on their faces, where all forms of entertainment is banned, and all the other “benefits” that the people currently living under the Taliban yoke are enjoying…
As for innocents dying in air force attacks on FATA, it is because these Taliban are using those innocents as human shields… such bravery!
Innocent people lost their lives, they did not commit any crimes, niether involve in any conspiracy just going to make their rizk (bread), they were killed by Taliban and Taliban admitted that.
So now what Taliban’s are , merciless, bloodthirsty killers no muslim will ever link them to the teachings of Holy Prophet, no matter whatever the circumstances are……
Taliban should be declared kafirs by all muslim scholars if they have a shred of islamic spirit.
Like others have said, this is extremely sad news. I check Dawn.com every morning, and believe me, I have developed the habit of saying a silent “no bombs” prayer during the few seconds it takes for the page to load. How did we get into the current state of affairs where even a single week without suicide bombings is considered a victory?
Musharraf is definitely not my favorite person, but I don’t think we can put the blame on him, entirely. We, as a country, have been damned with this “strategic” location since the beginning. Unless something drastic happens, I don’t see how we’re going to come out of this mess anytime soon. All we can hope for at the moment, is for Osama to be found, so the U.S. administration can have an excuse to scale back its operations in Afghanistan.
But if that doesn’t happen, I think the government should just withdraw the military. We may lose billions in aid, but heck, at least our people will still be alive.
@as said earlier these are not Talibans,
they are BATILANS supported by USA & Indians
they have nothing to do with Islam and muslims,
therefore, liable of severe punishment, they must
be crushed these Batilans which contains every
anti-Islam element. We must demand united action
against these agents.
Wah is my hometown… I left two years ago to come study here in the US… I still can’t get through to my mother on the phone, but another relative got through and told us she and other relatives were fine… but its a very disconcerting feeling when they strike this close to home…
What is worrying and disheartening is that so many of us (going by the comments on BBCUrdu for instance) are unwilling to place the blame on the Taliban… instead, they whine about the government not doing enough to provide security… yet, when the government tries to take the Taliban on (however half-heartedly), the same people cry out about the government killing their “apnay log”… such people should ask what sort of “apnay log” go around slaughtering innocents in this manner (being from Wah, I can testify to the fact that the people who walk or use bicycles to go work at the POF are poor, hardworking folk)… it is time for pro-Taliban ignorant fools to stop blaming conspiracies, foreign hands, agencies and the like, and say it out loud: all these acts are being perpetrated by the Taliban… they’ve admitted these attacks and the one on our Shia brethren in D.I. Khan… these Taliban will not just disappear if the operations against them stop in FATA… instead, stopping the operations will further embolden them… the only solution for the Taliban mayhem lies with the bullet… one bullet for each Talib…