Main reason for the continued violence is that the whole society is confused. Society has lost the distinction between right and wrong, halaal and haram, and between barbarism and civilised behaviour. The poison of sectarianism & extremism that spread during Zia’s time has eaten away the normal human values & replaced it with savagery. Some mullahs have twisted the peaceful religion of Islam so much that ‘Suicide’ something clearly forbidden by Allah in the holy Quran; is being preached as the direct route to heaven. The reason of terrorist success being that thinking it is Allah’s work, some naïve Pakistanis facilitate the suicide bombers.
I have posted so often on this subject that now I am bereft of words to describe my feeling of despondence and anguish at the hell that followers of the imported Wahhabi/ Salafi teaching from Saudi Arabia & Egypt has turned by beloved Pakistan into. As I was writing this I heard the news that a Shia aalim from AJK who was targeted by the sectarians has died.
In any other nation, whenever there is a terrorist attack, whole nation gets united against the terrorists. No one asked Bush to resign after the 9/11, instead all across the political divide united to revenge the attack on the United States. Not so in Pakistan, here leaders try to make a political capital out of it and start a blame game.
Despite the fact extremists and the sectarians have been killing innocent Pakistanis since the 1980s; until recently, JI & JUI were saying that Taliban are our mistaken brothers and we should talk to them. Imran Khan invited Taliban to open an office in the KPK for discussions? What is there to discuss, Taliban want to takeover Pakistan, did Imran Khan want to discuss that?
I say we are a confused nation because some Pakistanis consider only Sunni Deobandis as real Muslims and Sufi followers heretic Muslims. Shias & Ismailis are kafirs and no place in Pakistan at all for Qadianis, Christians and other non-Muslims.
Another section considers only the Punjabis real Pakistanis; MQM supporters, Sindhi Nationalists, Baluch nationalists and ANP as suspect Pakistanis. Even the Army differentiates between good Taliban & bad Taliban. Rana Sana Ullah brazenly defended his narrative that sectarian killers should be treated differently from other terrorists.
My dear compatriots, Zarbe Azb alone is not enough. No one can say for sure that a person is a terrorist until he is about to commit the act but by then it is too late. Hence no matter what, occasionally a terrorist will find a soft target. If we are serious to root out terrorism from our midst, we need to change the heart & minds of ordinary public and for that there has to be a paradigm shift in the national thinking.
We must understand Pakistan was not made by the mullahs, most were against it. Majority of us are Muslims but all Pakistanis have equal right to live in Pakistan. As outlined in Quaid’s’ August 11, 1947 speech; all Pakistani citizens are equal, regardless of colour, ethnicity or religion. State and all political parties must agree that life & property of a Christian, Hindu, Qadiani, Shia, Sunni, Parsi, Ismaili, Punjabi, Pathan, Baluch or Sindhi or Mohajir should be equally respected.
There should be zero tolerance by the State & the society of anyone not accepting Writ of the State. Thus all private laskhars, sipahs or militant organization banned & ruthlessly crushed. Any political/religious leader who openly praises Pakistan’ enemies such as Lal Masjid Mulla, Munawwar Hassan of JI and Altaf Hussein of MQM should be put behind bars. Any TV or Radio which allows pro- terrorist opinions to be aired should be shut down.
Zero tolerance for any jihadi organization. Any mullahs guilty of issuing Fatwa of kufr and / or jihad to be sent to prison for minimum of 5 years.
We are correctly accusing Afghanistan gov’t for sheltering anti-Pakistani elements; have we forgotten that Afghan Gov’t & USA has been accusing Pakistan of sheltering anti- Afghan Taliban for the last 15 years? Therefore the State must stop nurseries of the extremists from spreading intolerance in Pakistan or in any other country.
Text books of all the Madrassas thoroughly vetted; any mullah, preaching or publishing hate material, regardless of whether Shia or Sunni should be put behind bar. All crimes by the individuals must be treated as crimes even if it is in the name of religion. Anyone who supports cold blooded killers such as Mumtaz Qadri should be ostracised.
Pakistan state must make all out efforts to stop foreign funding to the madrassas and terrorist organizations be it Saudi Arabia or Iran.
You tell me that it can't be done. I agree that it is not easy and needs a strong will, but unless we are prepared to do it, Pakistan will continue to suffer and innocent Pakistanis will continue losing their lives.
