After a decade, 9/11 is more controversial because of its internally changing partisans. Other processes, like the failure of the post-colonial state in the Islamic world, have supervened. Pakistain which had begun to be called a failing state in the mid-1990s is on the same page as Al Qaeda, hating America in tandem with the rest of the Islamic world and embracing a special kind of extremism by mixing its anti-Indian jihadi nationalism with its pan-Islamic hatred of Israel. At the end of the 9/11, when the late Osama bin Laden... who can now be reached at RFD Boneyard...
was killed in Pakistain, Paks are unhappy even though the man was responsible for killing more Paks than the people of any other state.
| As events unfolded in Pakistan after 9/11, Al Qaeda was embraced by Pakistanis even more firmly. The stage was set in Swat where the affiliates of Al Qaeda were successful in setting up the first mini-state for Osama bin Laden |
...the irrational fear that Moslems will act the way they usually do...
and a less sincere adherence to the values of Enlightenment. Defiance of assimilation and insistence on sharia that leans fundamentally on maltreatment of women as a cultural boundary are no longer met with amused tolerance. The expat Mohammedan is in for some rough handing in the West in the coming days.
First came the denial: 9/11 never happened and it was in fact an act of the Jews abetted by the Americans themselves in order to create an excuse to attack the Mohammedan world to grab its natural wealth and enhance the power of Israel. But Osama bin Laden sabotaged this elaborate scenario by boasting about his terrorist attacks in the US. When people in Pakistain still did not believe that 9/11 had happened, some honest observers had to tell the truth about the famous Jalalabad Tape.
Columnist Hamid Mir wrote in Jang (1 November 2004) that by announcing that he had carried out the 9/11 attacks, Osama bin Laden in his cassette on 29 October 2004 had revealed the falsehood of Mohammedan intellectuals and Learned Elders of Islam that the 9/11 acts of terrorism had been committed by the Jews. In the beginning Hamid Mir too thought that the Jews had done it but in November 2001 when he was in Jalalabad
| Jalalabad, Afghanistan is the largest city in eastern Afghanistan and the capital of Nangarhar province. The estimated population is 168,600 people. It is linked by highway with Kabul to the west and Peshawar, Pakistan to the east. |
| Al Qaeda may have lost the first phase of its war in America and Europe but it has won big in Pakistain. And that should worry the rest of the world |
...a valley and an administrative district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistain, located 99 mi from Islamabad. It is inhabited mostly by Pashto speakers. The place has gone steadily downhill since the days when Babe Ruth was the Sultan of Swat...
where the affiliates of Al Qaeda were successful in setting up the first mini-state for Osama bin Laden. In 2009, US special envoy late Mr Richard Holbrooke stated: the 'hard boyz involved in 9/11, the Mumbai attacks and unrest in Swat have common roots' and that 'the US was troubled and confused about the development in the Swat valley'. He was 'not sure if the Pakistain military and the ISI backed President Zardari's commitment to eradicate terrorist sanctuaries from the NWFP'.
In Pakistain, most TV channels expressed anger at the American reaction of scepticism over the accord reached between TNSM
...Tehreek-e-Nafaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi (Movement for the Enforcement of Islamic Law) is a Pak jihad boy group whose objective is to enforce their definition of Sharia law in Pakistain whether anybody wants it or not. It was founded by Sufi Muhammad in 1992, and was banned by President Musharraf in January, 2002 after Sufi dispatched several thousand yokels to Afghanistan to fight the infidel and ended up with most of them killed or captured and held for ransom. In 2007 TNSM took over Swat, which shows how well the
banningworked. TNSM is the Pony League of Islamic militancy..
's Sufi Muhammad and the ANP government in NWFP, accusing the western media of interfering in Pakistain's internal affairs. Reaction to Mr Holbrooke's observations was on the same lines. The truth of the matter was that the Swat accord had not satisfied many inside Pakistain even though the ANP had been generally supported in its effort to find a solution to the Swat situation in the face of the non-success of the military operations there.
What happened later in Swat after the Taliban whipped a young woman and Sufi Muhammad announced a rejectionist-khariji Islamic view of what had transpired is now being rapidly forgotten as an embarrassing episode. The army was reluctant to actually set up Al Qaeda as its enemy even after the early Musharraf decision to catch Al Qaeda operatives in Pakistain and hand them over to America. Musharraf's wisdom was superseded by the army's resolve to take on America rather than Al Qaeda.
Zahid Hussain in his book 'The Scorpion's Tail: The Relentless Rise of Islamic Militants in Pakistain and how it Threatens America' (Free Press 2010) wrote: 'By the spring of 2002, US intelligence and the Pak ISI reported that al Qaeda had regrouped in both South and North
Wazoo, and the United States pressed Musharraf to launch a major military offensive against them. But the military was opposed and Musharraf soft-peddled, attempting instead to bring the groups around by negotiating peace deals with them.'Gen Ali Muhammad Jan Orakzai, the commander of Pak forces in the area containing Waziristan, dismissed the reports of al Qaeda's resurgence. Although born in the tribal region, Orakzai had not served in the north-western region before, and he had little understanding of the developments there after September 11. The general considered the American and ISI warnings about Al Qaeda to be mere guesswork, saying that his soldiers had "found nothing." There was speculation that he deliberately ignored the large presence of foreigners because he feared that action against them would spark a tribal uprising' (p.32).
Other generals followed Orakzai's line. Was Al Qaeda, the killer of countless Paks through its affiliates, an enemy or someone who had to be assuaged and persuaded to condone Musharraf's early folly and regard Pakistain as a friend? The Pakistain Armed Forces were infiltrated by religious outfit and NGOs subscribing to the Al Qaeda worldview. The tragedy of 9/11 was reinterpreted and even rich women of Pakistain following the Al Huda movement of Farhat Hashmi heard from her that Osama was a 'soldier of Islam' and took it to heart. There was some English-Urdu divide but no one was willing to own the part Pakistain had played in providing Al Qaeda its launching pad of global terrorism in Pakistain.
Fasih Ahmed writing in Newsweek Pakistain (10 June 2011) told the story of journalist Saleem Shahzad who was killed mysteriously after reporting that Pakistain Navy had been penetrated by Al Qaeda: 'Saleem Shahzad posted a story on Asia Times Online about the deadly May 22 attack on Bloody Karachi's Mehran naval air station. Al Qaeda carried out the brazen attack on the PNS Mehran naval air station in Bloody Karachi on May 22 after talks failed between the Navy and Al Qaeda over the release of naval officials tossed in the clink on suspicion of Al Qaeda links, an Asia Times Online investigation reveals'.
The Americans finally killed Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad in May 2011. Al Qaeda lives and is embedded in Pakistain simply because Paks and Al Qaeda are on the same page on America. Islamabad is upset by delays in aid disbursement by America and the army wants the CIA to quit Pakistain. Most Paks think America is the enemy of Pakistain, Al Qaeda is not. All Paks think CIA is in Pakistain to steal Pakistain's nuclear weapons while Al Qaeda is not. America worries the Pak more than Hizbut Tahrir
...an al-Qaeda recruiting organization banned in most countries. It calls for the reestablishment of the Caliphate...
penetrating the army with its khariji ideology sharing objectives with Al Qaeda.
Pakistain is belly-up economically, gradually winding down till it can no longer look after its long-suffering people regularly targeted by Al Qaeda's henchmen. Al Qaeda may have lost the first phase of its war in America and Europe but it has won big in Pakistain. And that should worry the rest of the world.