Page 2 of
2 The Taliban's brothers in
alms By Syed Saleem Shahzad
the library. "Actually, it was the
collective determination of all of us [circle of
admirers] which terrified the government, and it
just had to keep its hands off us," Rasheed said.
Security sources have confirmed to Asia
Times Online that when the trouble at the library
began, Musharraf ordered that the brothers be
arrested. But his security forces refused, saying
such a move would create havoc in Islamabad and
beyond.
Musharraf apparently even floated
the idea of having the Lal
Masjid bombed, but his air
force would have none of it. As a result, the
government had little alternative but to back off,
lift the siege and agree to dialogue.
"I
want to make it clear that protest on any issue is
the right of any citizen, whether he or she is
religious or not," said Rasheed. "The students of
the universities and the colleges carry out
processions and rampage on the streets. They set
public and private vehicles on fire, but are they
ever called terrorists?
"The girls of my
seminary did protest and they occupied a
children's library, but peacefully. They did not
break anything, not even television sets or CD
players, which they believe are evil, yet they
were declared terrorists, and stern action was
promised against us two brothers and against the
girls," Rasheed said.
Rasheed took his
mobile phone from his pocket and showed me
messages sent by a former ISI official who was
once a close friend of Osama bin Laden - retired
squadron leader Khalid Khawaja. The messages
warned the brothers that the government was
plotting to kill them.
"Our friend Khalid
Khawaja kept informing us of threats around us,
and as a result of such messages he was picked up
by the ISI and booked on a fictitious charge,"
Rasheed said.
"The government does indeed
have bad designs against us. Commandos were posted
all around for target killings. An environment of
terror was created, so much so that the Board of
Religious Schools pulled its support of us. They
were terrified that if we fell, they would be next
in line. The federal minister for religious
affairs, Ejaz ul-Haq [former president Zia's son],
came to see us," Rasheed said.
"It was a
strange environment. Ejaz was aware of the whole
situation and he candidly held the feet of Maulana
Abdul Aziz and said, 'I beg you, for God's sake,
please retreat from this issue, otherwise there
are strict instructions from Musharraf against you
people.'
"Maulana Abdul Aziz then held the
feet of Ejazul Haq and said, 'I beg you, too, for
God's sake, enforce Islam in this country. Until
then we will not retreat,'" Rasheed recalled.
"Most of our girls [more than 6,000] come
from North and South Waziristan. When their
relations learned about the situation [protest]
they came all the way from the two Waziristans and
gathered in the mosque. That was a real litmus
test against the government. In a way, Waziristan,
which the government has failed to pacify with
military operations, entered the federal capital.
The establishment had the shivers and it could see
[what], if any operations were taken [against us],
would happen to Islamabad," Rasheed said.
"The government had every intention to
crush us, but then it had to request us to remove
Waziristan's militants from the mosque. We
responded that first the government had to lift
the siege on the mosque. Only then would we ask
them to leave. Musharraf took a strict stand, but
all the agencies, including the Pakistan Rangers,
were not ready to clash with Waziristani
militants.
"Then Haji Omar [commander of
the Taliban in Waziristan] said in an interview
that if the government tried to attack Lal Masjid,
they would take revenge. That was the last thing
the government wanted and it lifted the siege and
we asked the militants to leave. But the Waziris
are still in Islamabad with their relatives, so if
the government makes any advances again, they will
immediately come to the rescue," Rasheed said.
During the siege, Islamabad witnessed an
unusually high number of suicide attacks, which
obviously spooked the government. Indeed, the
government reaffirmed its deals with the Pakistani
Taliban in the Waziristans whereby they have de
facto rule in the tribal belt along the border
with Afghanistan.
The brothers at Lal
Masjid remain as defiant as ever after their brush
with the government so close to the ISI's
headquarters. There is no doubt that their
influence is spreading across the country and that
their hardline teachings are filling a void left
by the absence of any real political opposition in
the country to Musharraf's rule.
This
plays into the Taliban's hands too, for when the
going starts to get tough in Afghanistan, they
will know where to look among their swelling ranks
of supporters in Pakistan.
Syed
Saleem Shahzad is Asia Times Online's Pakistan
Bureau Chief. He can be reached at
saleem_shahzad2002@yahoo.com.
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2007 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved.
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