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Malala Yusufzai: Victim of Barbaric Terror and Dirty Politics

"If you educate a man, you educate one person. If you educate a woman, you educate and liberate a whole nation." Malcolm X. Sabbiyah Pervez is a voice from Bradford on the shooting of a brave young woman

Education is a privilege that we take for granted here in the UK. We take for granted that it is compulsory and we take for granted that up until the age of 18 it is free. We take for granted the fact that we do not have to fight for our education, we do not have to struggle for it and most importantly we do not have to risk our lives for it. But there are many for whom such struggles are a constant reality. Many like Malala Yousafzai, who have that privilege stolen from them and for whom education is deemed unnecessary.

The issue regarding women being educated is one that has been prevalent throughout the ages, stemming largely from the belief that by educating a woman you are doing more harm then good, a view that still exists in fragments today within our own society. Many women will tell you that men feel intimidated by their knowledge or expertise in a certain field, indicating that the archaic view of the man being the dominant leader and omniscient, is still apparent within us.

I recall my grandmother narrating to us, that her eldest brother pulled her out of school when she hit puberty; she stated that he was concerned that if she continued to be educated she would not marry the man who was betrothed to her. My grandfather is significantly older then my grandmother and was a divorcee. When asked how she felt about her brothers decision, my grandmother replied she was furious but later saw the wisdom of his decision; she would definitely have not married my grandfather if she had continued her education.

As a young third generation British Asian girl growing up in Bradford, I encountered this backward mentality directed to my parents from some within my own community. Many stated that I did not need to be educated. Instead I should be educated to the bare minimum and be married off at an early age in order to remove myself as a burden from my parents. Others argued that if I was educated "too much" I would become difficult to control and education would grant me "too much" freedom, it would be hard then for me to conform to the expectations many had set for me. Fortunately I can tell you they were right. My education educated and liberated me, it allowed me to critically analyse the problems that i saw around me and to openly question and challenge them. My questions brought discomfort and I was regularly cautioned by elder members of my community for asking "too many questions." Unfortunately, I know of many girls here in the UK, who are pulled out of school because education is seen as a threat to what their elders expect of them.
So in a sense I can understand why the Taliban banned the education of girls when they took over the Swat Valley. They, like my great uncle and many others in Pakistan, felt threatened by the effect of educating a girl. You see Malcolm X pretty much has summed it up for us. When you educate a woman, you don't just educate her, you liberate her. You allow her to travel on a path of self-discovery and you enable her to question her position in society. You empower her by giving her knowledge of what she can become. And this is dangerous. It is dangerous to the Taliban because it means that they will not be able to impose their patriarchal laws upon liberated women, it means that if they do they will be presented with a challenge and a force greater then them. And their rule will be effectively be diminished. It was a threat and a risk they couldn't take.

So for those asking what Malala Yousafzai has done to the Taliban, this is exactly what she has done. At the tender age of 11, Malala started writing in order to articulate her hopes and fears under a false name. When her cover was blown and she was threatened by the Taliban and its sympathizers, she did not cease her writing. In contrast she went public, so that by the age of 14 she was a name and a force to be reckoned with. You see by educating Malala, her parents had given her her greatest gift. They had enabled her to understand her potential and to recognise that her writing was a tool, it was the sword of opposition to the men who had taken away her privilege of studying. It was her opportunity to stick her middle finger up in defiance and to seek vengeance and boy, did she strike fear in their hearts! Malala Yousafzai was a threat because her defiance was an inspiration to others, others who lacked her bravery and her strength of character and determination. It was an act of defiance that could ignite a movement of opposition, an opposition the Taliban desperately wanted to quash, threaten and intimidate.

Their motive behind shooting Malala is a simple one: shoot the leader and you scare the followers. To them it is a message of force, but in reality it is an act of cowardice. It is an act which demonstrates how pig-headed the Taliban really are. It demonstrates their weakness and fragility. So weak that a young girl armed with her writing can be seen as a great threat, a threat so damaging to them that even after shooting her they state that if she does not die they will strike once more. It is this latter thought that makes them real fools. By believing that they have eliminated a threat by shooting Malala, or even, God forbid ,by killing her, they are seriously deluded. This act will inspire many more like Malala, frustrated with the oppression of women that they encounter daily, frustrated with their lack of human rights and frustrated by their governments inability to protect them.

They will rise out of their slumber with a sense of empowerment and purpose to set a precedent for future generations, and I pray to God that when they do, Malala is there to lead them once again.


Sabbiyah Pervez is a politics and philosophy graduate and operations manager at the award-winning counter-extremist and gender empowerment consultancy Inspire. She co-ordinates projects to help the empowerment of young Muslim girls in Bradford and blogs on Sabbiyah.co.uk | Sabbiya Pervez Official Website

Malala Yousafzai - a product of education | UK news | guardian.co.uk
 
Protests in India against Taliban attack on Malala

Talking to the reporters, a protestor Afsha urged the Prime Ministers of Pakistan to send her to India for medical treatment.

“The reason why we have staged such a big rally is because, we want to appeal to the Prime Ministers of India and Pakistan to get Malala in Mumbai, so that we could give her medical treatment here, we are ready to meet the expenses of her family also since we want her speedy recovery. Malala initiated and took stand for the rights of the girls of her school, so we are with her and we pray to God that her health gets better soon,” said Afsha.


Protests in India against Taliban attack on Malala
 
Its based on facts..
Fazlulah being protected by ISAF and his people shot Malala.

Oh really?

Do you have any documented evidence to back up this ridiculous claim?

Any intercepted communications between ISAF and Fazlullah stating that is being sheltered by ISAF?

Any confessions by his henchmen stating that he is being protected over there?

What about evidence seized from dead bodies of Fazlullah foot soldiers?

Anything?

I would expect this kind of post from people like RazPak, not from people who are in JR. Think Tank club.

1. Fazlullah has publicly claimed responsibility as the mastermind for the attack.

2. He is in Afghanistan, and has been for quite some time.

3. After eleven years in Afghanistan, NATO should have the ability to hunt down terrorists in its territory.

This is not to say that NATO is actively protecting him but, if NATO can't deliver Fazlullah to face justice, it should shut its mouth for ever and NEVER, EVER claim that Pakistan is 'sheltering' the Afghan Taliban.
 
Protests in India against Taliban attack on Malala


Protests in India against Taliban attack on Malala

The ones in Thane were the typical denial mentality half witted idiots we see everywhere these days. They were holding banners blaming USA of carrying out the attack :lol::lol::lol:

M_Id_323824_Malala_Yousufzai.jpg


(see if you can read the big front banner LOL, the mullah at their starting point mosque clearly does not distinguish between right to education and right to indoctrination!)
 
Wait Y i didn't saw these Secular civil Society whhores out there in streets chanting against amerika NATO and when 20 soldiers were martyred in cowardly attack

Where were these whhores when on daily basis people are dying due drone attacks.

Where were these whhores when BLA killed innocent citizens and patriotic.

Where were these whhores when their thoku Mushi ran away like a bit(h in heat who dragged Pakistan in never ending war on terror when 40000+ people have died and economy gone to gutter.

It's people like you that give Pakistan a bad name. I doubt you'd use the same sexist terms if it was men out there protesting. The purpose of show casing women protectors is to show that Pakistani women are empowered and that society doesn't hold them down -- it is the greatest tribute to Malala.

If you want to talk about other issues with female protestors, I'm sure they've participated in all of the above, albiet with less media coverage. However, this case in particular, apart from being highly emotive (which has driven out droves of males too to protest) is hard-hitting for females -- it goes to their very right of an equal, enlightened life.

You need to calm down, take a step back, and think twice before you go around calling women activists "******"; because, I don't know how it is where you come from, and I'm not delivering a personal insult, but we all come from a woman.
 
God be with her and her family I hope she makes a full recovery.
 
What a bunch of barbarians, trying to kill a 14-year-old girl who wants to go to school and refused to bow down to their brutal ideology.

And we still have people who say we should negotiate with them, what is there to negotiate with them? Taliban's top leaders, just like the Nazis, will have to be eliminated, otherwise there will be no peace.


Six months ago I posted this video of brave Malala on another forum:

04-07-2012 04:28 AM

I take my hats off to this brave and highly intelligent young girl, I wish her all the best on her noble mission. Pakistan really needs more girls like her.

 
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And thats in Afghanisran?
So fazlullah is in Afghanistan?

Sure he is...But your claim that NATO and ISAF is protecting him is not only a fabrication but just opposite of truth.This TTP getting sheltered in kunar started only after NATO was forced to withdraw their forces from the province starting from early 2010 and afghan taliban started controlling the area-There used to be near daily attacks by afghan taliban and it became impossible to hold the posts due to the distance of area from NATO power centres and the ensuing difficulty to reinforce when taliban fighters swarm the area and attack..The ground is more or less under taliban control although there are frequent Arial attacks by NATO..


US begins withdrawing forces from Kunar's Pech Valley - Threat Matrix
PressTV - Taliban capture US base in Afghanistan
Northeastern Afghan district falls after Taliban assault - The Long War Journal

The point is:

*TTP is sheltered in kunar

*Kunar is under the control of afghan taliban after withdrawal of NATO posts,Taliban also
have considerable influence in population which is 98% pashtun..

*So afghan taliban must be the ones sheltering TTP in kunar.

*Since acknowledging this ground reality will shatter your conspiracy theories(Afghan taliban are true mujahids TTP is CIA/RAW agents bla bla bla),You guys need to turn the facts 180 degree and lie that TTP is sheltered by NATO and and conveniently forget the control afghan taliban posses in the areas in which TTP leaders are hiding..
 
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1. Fazlullah has publicly claimed responsibility as the mastermind for the attack.

2. He is in Afghanistan, and has been for quite some time.

3. After eleven years in Afghanistan, NATO should have the ability to hunt down terrorists in its territory.

This is not to say that NATO is actively protecting him but, if NATO can't deliver Fazlullah to face justice, it should shut its mouth for ever and NEVER, EVER claim that Pakistan is 'sheltering' the Afghan Taliban.
Developereo, I have no doubt it's just matter of time before the US will go after Fazlullah, but unfortunately I don't know when will we begin cleansings North Waziristan of terrorist sanctuaries.


Taliban’s Bajaur chief killed

Dawn
Anwarullah Khan | 26th August, 2012

KHAR, Aug 25: The proscribed Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has confirmed the killing of its Bajaur region chief Mullah Dadullah in a Nato air strike in Afghanistan on Friday.

Talking to reporters from an unidentified location on Saturday, a TTP spokesman said that Dadullah and his companions were returning to their hideout in Afghan province of Kunar after carrying out raids in a border area of Bajaur Agency when they came under attack.

He said Maulana Abu Bakr, a senior member of TTP, had been nominated new chief of the Bajaur region on the directives of TTP chief Hakimullah Mehsud. Afghan officials and TTP `commanders’ said the drone strike by Nato in a mountainous area of Shigal district killed 19 militants, including Dadullah and his deputy Abdur Rahman. At least eight Afghan-based Pakistani militants were injured in the attack and taken to a hospital in Asadabad, Afghanistan.

Mullah Dadullah, 44, whose real name was Jamal Said, belonged to the Mamond tribe in the village of Damadola. He was prayer leader of the village mosque and also ran a shop in Inayat Killi area before he joined the TTP.

According to sources, Dadullah had close association with some senior members of Al Qaeda from 2003 to 2007.

When he was appointed head of TTP’s Amar Bil Maroof Department he imposed a ban on CD and cassette shops and declared that shaving beard was un-Islamic.

He was later made director general of Darul Kafala (orphanage centre) run by the TTP in Inayat Killi. Dadullah had replaced Maulana Faqir Mohammad as TTP’s Bajaur chief in 2010. He along with hundreds of other militants had moved to Kunar after security forces launched an operation in Bajaur last year.

Agencies add: “There were two separate air strikes in Kunar yesterday (Friday). A total of 12 insurgents were killed, six in each air strike,” a Nato spokesman said in Afghanistan on Saturday.
 
1. Fazlullah has publicly claimed responsibility as the mastermind for the attack.

2. He is in Afghanistan, and has been for quite some time.

3. After eleven years in Afghanistan, NATO should have the ability to hunt down terrorists in its territory.

This is not to say that NATO is actively protecting him but, if NATO can't deliver Fazlullah to face justice, it should shut its mouth for ever and NEVER, EVER claim that Pakistan is 'sheltering' the Afghan Taliban.

In other words, you have no proof.

Thanks for admitting as such. :D
 
It's people like you that give Pakistan a bad name. I doubt you'd use the same sexist terms if it was men out there protesting. The purpose of show casing women protectors is to show that Pakistani women are empowered and that society doesn't hold them down -- it is the greatest tribute to Malala.

If you want to talk about other issues with female protestors, I'm sure they've participated in all of the above, albiet with less media coverage. However, this case in particular, apart from being highly emotive (which has driven out droves of males too to protest) is hard-hitting for females -- it goes to their very right of an equal, enlightened life.

You need to calm down, take a step back, and think twice before you go around calling women activists "******"; because, I don't know how it is where you come from, and I'm not delivering a personal insult, but we all come from a woman.

hunter_hunted is right, why there is so much noise over this attack when there are hundreds child and females suffered from such attacks? Where were these traitor NGO's and international leaders when many women and child died in terrorist acts?

Why don't these ill minded propaganda machines welfare organizations made symbol of bravery to those innocents died in blasts?

And everybody body starts commenting on Malala as they due for it?

Yes, we condemning it but it's also interesting what brought to some people magnifying this case when there are cases exists more critical?

Need to think from mind dude.
 
There is no doubt that there are hundreds of Malala who have suffered thru TTP terrorism or US drone attacks or thru Dark Age tribal customs such as 'vanni'. However there is only one Malala who stood up for her right to be educated and thus became an icon of female educationalists. She refused to buckle under Taliban and their supporter’s pressure. I feel pity for the narrow minded bigots such as JI Amir, Imran Khan and Hamid Gul who have declined to condemn Taliban outright.

Sad fact is that many in our society have been brain washed to the extent that they have lost capacity for introspection. As long as this mind-set persists, nothing is going to change.

The following article describes my feelings better than I ever could.


Denial, confusion and obfuscationFrom the Newspaper | Cyril Almeida


EVERYONE it seems has questions this week.

Some are of the stupid variety. What kind of human being would shoot a 14-year-old? Answer: a monstrous one. And there are a lot of monsters here.

How can anyone call themselves a Muslim and do this? Answer: Because they believe they are the true Muslims, not the weak-kneed moral relativists who pretend to be Muslims. A true Muslim does what needs to be done for the glory of Islam.

What kind of society teaches people to kill little girls trying to get an education? Answer: a sick and troubled society. A society that is in denial of the sickness in its midst.

Other questions are asked with a sly innocence. These are the more malign ones.

Why can’t we condemn all violence, by drones and by guns? Haven’t we had enough of killing? Can’t we now find a more humane way of ending the violence? Why don’t we try and understand this mindset instead of trying to destroy it?

These are malign questions because they are asked with a specific purpose.

The purpose is not to end jihad and violence, but to enable it, to perpetuate it, to make Pakistan the custodian of Islam, to create the perfect Islamist state in an imperfect world.

The trick the men with the malign questions have perfected is to sound reasonable.

See, we’re here on TV, talking things out, making our case, condemning all violence, trying to do our bit to make Pakistan peaceful and calm.

We all live here, we’re all the same. Let’s learn to understand why this is happening to us. It’s the Americans. It’s the Jews. It’s the Indians. Get rid of their influence and the wayward souls here will return to the fold.

They’re right about one thing: we all do live here. But we’re not the same, we don’t want the same things, and the men with the innocently asked but malign questions are not on the side of those asking in fear why this is happening to us.

Denial, confusion and obfuscation have meant that the difference isn’t as obvious as it should be.

Surely, both sides are well-meaning, people will ask. Surely, we can figure out a way to all live alongside in peace and happiness, people will say.

Yes, we could. But not if the rules are set by the other side.

Denial, confusion and obfuscation have meant that Pakistanis are not clear there is a continuum from the religious right to violent Islamism. It is not a difference of kind, only of degree.

The religious right creates an enabling environment for violent Islamism to recruit and prosper. And violent Islamism makes state and society cower and in doing so enhances the space for the religious right. One feeds off the other and together they grow in strength.

Denial, confusion and obfuscation have meant that the continuum from Jamaat-i-Islami to Al Qaeda, from Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam to the Taliban is barely recognised, let alone understood.

If there is outrage at that statement, at conflating the two, that is a testament to the success and deep-rootedness of the denial, confusion and obfuscation.

The mullah of today is the same as the mullah of yesterday. What’s changed is that the mullah of today has his goal in sight and the means to achieve it. The means is the continuum from the religious right to violent Islamism — one feeding off the other and together edging closer to their goal.

For years now, the problem of Pakistan has been seen as a problem of the state. But perhaps what it really is is a problem of society. A decrepit and broken society whose decrepitude and brokenness the denial, confusion and obfuscation have masked.

There is surely a problem of the state too. A certain poverty of imagination and moral bankruptcy have fashioned a state that can no longer do what is right and necessary.

It’s not always about complicity and sympathy. Often it’s just about fear. In Balochistan, I have wondered why the state doesn’t just take out the Lashkar-i-Jhangvi killers. After all, there can’t be more than a few dozen of them.

I asked and asked until someone finally offered, “They’ll never forget. You take them on and eventually they’ll get you. Maybe while you’re serving, maybe when you’re retired, but they will get you and probably your family too.”

The same question I’ve asked in KP and Fata. Why can’t they wipe this out? This isn’t a foreign army operating; these aren’t alien areas; yes, it was always going to be a slow grind, but why are the results so obviously patchy? Ask and ask and eventually — after theories and philosophies of missing holistic strategies and drivers internal and external — an answer comes. “Because they don’t know. They don’t know if that’s what’s really wanted. And because they don’t know, they’d rather live to see another day, to go back to their families.”

The state is a broken project. The foot soldiers are fearful because the high command is locked in denial and the certainty of old ways.

But perhaps it is society that is broken too. A society that laments its misfortune but can’t see the cause. A society that sees evil in its midst but never its facilitators. A society so manipulated by denial, confusion and obfuscation that the grotesque can masquerade as salvation.

Mercifully, the violent Islamists aren’t very bright. The shoot a little girl, they flog a teenager, they do terrible things that make Pakistanis recoil in horror.

But perhaps they can afford to not be very bright. Because they have the men with the innocently asked but malign questions.

They have the mullah to deny, confuse and obfuscate and lull society into believing the problem is without when it really is within.

The writer is a member of staff.

cyril.a@gmail.com

Twitter: @cyalm
Denial, confusion and obfuscation | DAWN.COM
 
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