Al-Qaeda fights for its mark in
Pakistan By Syed Saleem
Shahzad
KARACHI - The defeat of militants
led by Mullah Fazlullah in the Swat Valley in
Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province and
promotion of his detained father-in-law, Sufi
Muhammad, as the new leader in the area were the
essential recent targets of the Pakistani armed
forces to alienate extremists and promote
moderates.
The militants responded by
sending out feelers for a truce, which prompted
al-Qaeda to intervene by sending in fighters to
continue a guerrilla battle. Al-Qaeda's aim is not
so much to inflict
immediate damage on the
enemy. Rather, it is to prevent the flag-bearers
of the "war on terror" from lowering the level of
the struggle from that of a jihad for the
establishment of a caliphate to a local conflict
that could be settled through local government
handpicked jirgas (councils).
This
is precisely what the George W Bush administration
is trying to do across the region; to alienate
al-Qaeda by reducing its global struggles into
various stand-alone national resistance movements
that can be dealt with separately.
This
initiative includes contact between Iran and the
US on Iraq aimed at limited cooperation to further
reduce the level of the insurgency in that
country; the recent summit in Washington on the
creation of a Palestinian state; Saudi Arabia's
renewed efforts to reconcile Mehmoud Abbas' Fatah
and Hamas in Palestine, besides Washington's
efforts to speak to the Taliban directly about
peace.
To date, the most successful
outcome has been to alienate al-Qaeda from local
tribes in Iraq, apart from Washington's
cooperation with Iran. The latter could even lead
to Tehran guarding against al-Qaeda's movement
from Pakistan and Afghanistan into Iraq through
Iran, as well as blocking smuggling routes through
which arms and ammunition are smuggled for the
insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Over
the past few years, al-Qaeda has been alert to
efforts to dilute its global struggle. The Madrid
bombings of 2004 were aimed at jolting
international backing of the "war on terror",
while the London bombings in 2005 and other foiled
plots in 2006 were aimed at retaining al-Qaeda's
lead role in the Muslim resistance movements in
Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine.
Thus, at
a time when the Iraqi resistance has been largely
freed from al-Qaeda's influence, hardliners are
being sidelined in Palestine and liberal political
forces are rising to the fore in Pakistan to give
popular support to the "war on terror", it is
conceivable that plots similar to the Madrid and
London bombings will emerge to shatter the global
"Christmas truce" to alienate al-Qaeda.
Such incidents do serve al-Qaeda in the
long term by swelling its numbers. This helps
explain how, after losing thousands of fighters in
the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, the
group managed to take command of the Iraqi
resistance by pouring similar numbers into that
country.
At the same time, with
high-profile attacks al-Qaeda finds fertile ground
for its ideology. The hard core of al-Qaeda in the
Pakistan tribal areas is estimated at no more than
a few hundred, but it has managed to rear a
neo-Taliban to spread its views. In this regard,
the incident of the Lal Masjid (Red Mosque) is
instructive. The radical mosque in Islamabad,
which government security forces cleared of
militants in July, had become al-Qaeda's outpost
in the capital city.
Pakistan's Secretary
of the Interior Syed Kamal Shah had explained to
this correspondent before the operation that
intelligence agencies had tracked conversations
between Lal Masjid prayer leaders and top al-Qaeda
men in the Waziristan tribal areas. The agencies
were aware that the movement Lal Masjid had
started went far beyond a simple agenda of
Islamization. Kamal said events such as students
from Lal Masjid's seminaries forcing brothels to
close were a part of al-Qaeda's broader goal of
alienating mass support from the government's
operations against al-Qaeda in the tribal areas.
The Lal Masjid saga did distract the
government from its operations in the Waziristans,
but it also sowed deep seeds of anti-Americanism
and undermined the US plans to promote a secular
society in Pakistan. The foremost example of this
is President Pervez Musharraf's own Pakistan
Muslim League Quaid-i-Azam party, which has
announced an "Islam first, Pakistan second"
manifesto for the January general elections. This
is a noted departure from the post-September 11,
2001, Musharraf slogan of "Pakistan first".
Similarly, the sub-nationalist Pashtun
Awami National Party has always claimed to be the
true secular party of the country, but now it is
saying that "no rules against the Koran and the
Sunnah [religious actions instituted by the
Prophet Mohammed] will be acceptable".
Also, the Muttehada Quami Movement has
always openly supported the "war on terror" and
the need for a liberal and secular Pakistan. But
it surprised everybody recently when its leader,
Altaf Hussain, while in London, for the first time
delivered an anti-American speech, calling
Washington a supporter of feudals and capitalists.
Syed Saleem Shahzad is Asia
Times Online's Pakistan Bureau Chief. He can be
reached at saleem_shahzad2002@yahoo.com
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