Adil Najam
For the fifth time in as many days, a bomb ravaged through Pakistan killing innocent Pakistanis. Muslims killing other Muslims they considered less Muslim than themselves. This time the target was the shrine of 13th century Sufi saint Sakhi Sarwar in District Dera Ghazi Khan. This time more than 40 were killed. That number is likely to rise.
This was, once again, a target killing of a Sufi shrine. As so many times before, this time the victims of this heinous murder were devotees at a Sufi Shrine. As so many times before, this time the murder was committed by a mere child (reportedly 15-16 year old and reportedly now in custody amongst the wounded). A child who is himself a victim in so many ways. A child who grew up in displacement and got the idea instilled and cemented into his mind that the short-cut to heaven was to blow other Muslims up!
The tragedy at Sakhi Sarwar was the logical culmination of another tragedy – the indoctrination of hate. Hate kills. Hate killed again today.
Murder was committed at Sakhi Sarwar today not merely by a boy-murderer dreaming of an easy ticket into heaven. Murder was committed at Sakhi Sarwar today by the purveyors of hate who have sanction from society – sanction given by our tacit silence. Hate kills. Yes. But so does silence. Silence killed again today.
Dear n honorable Mr. Rasheed,
Allow me to first n foremost clear one point off the bat: I dont hate no one. At the same time , I refuse to be a hypocrite.
If u carefully read my post, u wd realize that before u comeup with this done to death US/Zionist/Indian conspiracy verbage, all I said, was that we need to look inwards.
Muslims hv been killing Muslims from time immemorial. So thats no CNN Breaking news, but wats startling is that we lay every ill of ours at the doorstep of this foreign conspiracy BS.
Did Bush come down to open all these hate spewing Madressas?
Is Bush behind all the Shia doctors and academics being killed like dogs in cold blood, in this land of pure since umpteen number of years?
Is Bush responsible for all the bigotry n sectarianism, being spilled from the loudspeakers in Friday sermons?
Is Bush responsible for keeping our youth illiterate, brainwashing them n then turning them into walking bombs?
Is Bush responsible for publicly whipping women on their behinds ?
Is Bush responsible for slitting people’s throats and hanging their bodies by the trees, just bcoz of ideological differences?
Is Bush responsible for an obselete , extremist, radical, hate filled, distorted, untrue , skewed curriculum being drilled into our impressionable youths day in n day out?
Did Bush kill Salman Taseer ?
Did Bush shower rose petals on his smiling killer?
Did Bush silenced Shahbaz Bhatti?
Mr. Rasheed, nations that walk on the crutches of these lame excuses and face saving complaints, never stand up to the challenges confronting them.
Sadly, we top the list of such nations….solely on the account of absurdly n adamantly denying the writing on the wall.
And the writing delivrs a vry bleak message. Its NOW or NEVER.
U mentioned honorable Mr. Salman Taseer. I had the pleasure n the privilege of knowing him. In this country of hypocrites , double meaning n double talking ppl, practicing n preaching self defeating ideologies, he atleast had the heart n the conviction to say wat he meant & to mean wat he said.
Look wat we did to him n those like him ( Bhatti shb , another utmost & upright thorough gentleman, come to my mind)? And then compare wat we did to his abhorable n repulsive killer. V showerd him w rose petals. V offered him free legal counsel. V looked for ways to justify his atrocious n disgusting criminality. V were n still r looking for a hero in an animal like him.
All the time v r crying abt Kashmir / Iraq n Palestine, while our own house is on fire. Wats wrong w us ? I guess pretty much everything.
V r basically, a bunch of disillusioned, aimless , characterless and criminally lazy ppl, who can only chat n do nothing.
V never take lessons from our past. Infact we compound our probs, by going the extra mile in screwing up the very ext opportunity that comes our way.
For God’s sake, stop blaming others for our ills. V dont need enemies. Our enemies r too bz dvlping vaccines, exploring space , offering free health care to their populace and concentrating on nation building . V r our own biggest enemy. Period.
If v r not going to put pur house in order, nobody else will.
And Mr. Rasheed 65 years is heck of a time to atleast put our damn house in order. Shame on us.
All it takes for evil to succeed is for good men to remain silent.
Remember the Sailkot murder lynching of 2 children
it only succeeded because everyone stood around and watched
We are all guilty if we dont act NOW!!
Good citizenship cannot be delivered by government it is the role of ordinary people like you and I. Start by being polite, and courteous to other everything else will follow
I was surprised to see placards mentioning “Maloon Padri” in yesterday’s protests against these suicide attacks. There was no placard saying “Maloon Taliban..”, “Maloon Mullayiat..” or “Maloon Zia ul Haq..”. When will we recognize our true enemy?
Maloon padri committed a heinous crime by burning the Holy Quran but these so called majahids of Islam are committing far far larger crime by killing innocent people including women, children and elderly in the name of Islam and Quran.
Good to hear a few nice speaches above.
The fact is simple, a dog wont bite unless you throw stones at him. So stop torturing those people with drones and military action. They were hapily living in their tribal belt independently, so why disturbing them?
It will take a big effort and would take a long time to heal what we have disturbed. But who will do it? Do we see anyone progressing towards the solution to this problem?
Historically, pure Islam and shrine-worship don’t go together. In that the extremists have a point.
Our brand of Sufism was essentially developed in South Asia (Afghanistan, Pakistan, India…) by incorporating Islam into pre-islamic Indian norms of worship (Hinduism, Buddhism, etc) that were prevalent for millenia from Afghanistan to Baluchistan to Bangladesh. Largely, the worship didn’t change at all, though it acquired a Islamic veneer and context. The Sufi saints were no different than the rishis and sages in the Indian context. And, the worship was identical to that of Bhakti movement that originated in South India in the 2nd century AD and influenced all of the subcontinet. This suited the Indian mind more than a foreign mode of worship.
So, in this historical context, I see these terrorist acts as a struggle between the indigenous strain of liberal mystical Islam and the pure imported Arab variety. Lets hope that we retain our characteristically broad view of religion that has been the tradition of our land for millenia, from much before the advent of Islam.
Ahmed