Silence of the Lambs
By Samad Khurram
Back in 2002, I was returning from Friday prayers when I saw an unusual gathering of singing and quasi-dancing Mullahs. Unusual because I had always assumed Mullahs to be against all types of Kuffar (Art). The amused crowd were listening to chants of “Taliban aa gayay, Taliban aa gayay”. I smirked. As if! Pakistan is a nuclear country with the seventh largest army. We’re safe.
The Mullahs’ songs have been answered – the Taliban indeed are coming. And with them the cowards are bringing a lifestyle that destroys everything Pakistan and Islam.
Oh no. Wait! This guy is on the paycheck of those who are trying to break Pakistan. Taliban are heroes, its America which is wrong. Yes, this is the typical self defense mechanism coming to full force. Having nothing to lose, and having been already declared a CIA agent earlier in life I suppose I’ll continue. Continuing with a genuine fear, that these words are falling on either deaf or hostile ears. Mohammad Ali Jinnah’s Pakistan is over if all this chaos continues.
Jinnah’s Pakistan is a dream gone wrong. Perhaps if he knew that the dreamland for living in peace, harmony, religious tolerance and freedom was going to become arena for public flogging where laughs of sadist barbarians and the screams of minors will echo, he would not have decided on creating it. Had he known that there would be more suicide bombs in his country than any other place in the world, where fundos would go around the cities threatening women to become religious, where school children would have to undergo security protocols as if they were in a war zone, would he have even bothered to work for the green and white?
Still, Pakistan is not what we worry about. All our esteemed talk shows chatter on is whether there should be 17th Amendment or not and on the statements by America and India. Yes, American drones and Indian statements are a threat to our sovereignty. Yes, the balance of power is important. But even when the Taliban have killed more people than India, American Drones or our tyrant rulers, taken over more of our land and have made us feel more unsafe than anyone else in the past thirty years? What other definition of sovereignty is there than protection of lives and property of people, maintaining writ of the state across the territory and having people feel secured? Why can we have some programs discussing the atrocities of the Taliban, the acts of terror that they do and how they have destroyed Pakistan?
No, it’s the “Hindu Zionists” (notice the contradiction?) working on a CIA sponsored conspiracy to break Pakistan. There are the good Taliban who fought the Kuffar off and the real issue is the CIA. Arguably everyone has all the time in the world to devise every action we do, plan it to perfection and then make the evidence of their involvement disappear. Are we really that important for the rest of the world to worry about when they have their own countries and problems to tend to? Even if the Taliban are foreign funded should does that not mean we should double our efforts? Remember when India briefly occupied few territories near Lahore in 1965 how the whole country ran to defend it? My grandfather had stories of people going with sticks to support the army. I am afraid I will not have any such stories of patriotic resistance to tell anyone when another enemy has taken control of a fourth of NWFP and roughly one twentieth of Pakistan. Perhaps we should ban “Yeh watan tumhara hai, tum ho pasban is kay” for it seems no one really care about Pakistan, except the Zionist Hindus of course.
But no, remember the glorious days of the Caliphs? Remember the great Pakistani Fauj, who under the Ameer-ul-Momineen, Zia –ul – Haq, which crushed the Russians? This is only a plan to make America taste the same fate! Yes thank you Zaid Hamid. For a nation which already lives in denial, your conspiracy theories are all we need to turn us completely schizophrenic. Army is great and it will deal with any task assigned to it. More of the same comes from everyone turning patriotic everywhere. This automatic knee-jerk mechanism has seeped in our blood and shut off our brains.
For the love of God can anyone explain me why the great Army of Allah, whose laurels we sing from the day we are born, has still not been able to jam radio stations pouring terror in Swat? Have the core commanders not even tried asking the army engineers how radios work and how easy it is jam them without even having to be in the line of fire? Can they not even figure out if they only played “Who let the Dogs out” at the frequencies the Taliban use it would stop this vitriol? Why is it that these Taliban leaders can appear before journalists in broad daylight and roam freely without any trouble even when they claim responsibility of attacking Pakistanis across the country?
Perhaps the real question I should ask is why do I even care? When I took time off from Harvard to be part of the lawyers’ movement I had seen a ray of hope. There were concerned citizens and lawyers who stood for what was right no matter what the consequences. We fought for a principle and won with the hope that things will slowly improve. Today the very judges we had faith in released the cleric of Lal Mosque whose crimes everyone knows about. If the judiciary was going to release people whose crimes were recorded on TV perhaps it does explain why Taliban are spreading like an incurable cancer. Imagine who would be hanging in “khooni chowk” had Mullana Abdul Aziz kidnapped a few Taliban officials or fought against them and killed their men?
Yet when you think all’s over, somehow someone comes up. Someone whose name keeps your head from drowning. Perhaps this sick torture has to be long and painful where we chase mirages of oasis, never to really reach their. Perhaps for all the atrocities we have committed to our own people require us to be made an example of so no other nation follows our path. Why do ray of hopes like Afzal Khan, who has socked it up to Taliban and refused to be removed from Swat alive, appear every now and then? However he stands to die in the rain. Alone. Can anyone please name one Pakistani leader who has said the same? Forget that has anyone Pakistani leader said that he will go and get the Taliban to give up their arms? Will the real leader who can get rid of these monsters stand up? Imran Khan? Qazi? Nawaz Sharif? This silence is criminal!
What’s worse that these leaders of ours have unanimously approved a state within a state run, which is not accountable to anyone, absolves all crimes of the Taliban and gives a safe haven to those who are there to kill us? What sort of a Nizam-e-Nonsense is this when no one even tried to debate the issue properly and even consider for a second that giving blanket amnesty to the Taliban might not, even if it be infinitesimal, the right thing to do? No for the politicians this does not matter. All they are interesting in mudslinging at each other and more ministries. Our media and sheeple are busy devouring the latest gossip while Pakistan burns.
But unlike what people think it will not be because of Zardari’s corruption or Gilani’s incompetence or Salman Taseer’s whiskies. We have survived them in the past, and so we’ll do again. However any country that has fallen to the Taliban has never recovered. The Taliban are here to stay and unless we stand up against them in every possible way Pakistan will be lost – for good! It will be the silence of the lambs which destroys us. You will be responsible if Pakistan fails.
The writer is a student at Harvard University and turned down an award from the US ambassador as a mark of protest against killings of Pakistani soldiers by US drone attacks.
Shorter Version of this appeared in The News on Monday, April 20
Comments
67 responses to “Silence of the Lambs”
Comment by Hussain on April 22, 2009 @ 9:28 am Amir Mughal,
Please don’t make teeth maestro’s blog as your scratch pad. It would be a blessing on the people of Pakistan if you get a job or in other words get a life. You write books instead of comments. What do you do for living? if you are posting such long comments. I bet your dad was “wadera” from Shikarpur and you have nothing better to do in life than write pages after pages of worthless comments. Sorry to say, but its more than a regular person can take.
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Dear Hussain Sahab,
My hometown is Jacobabad not Shikarpur and sorry my Father is not a Wadera [Fedual]. If you have objection on my comment than you can reply me and or lodge protest with Mr Teeth Maestro to ban me from this forum.
By the way I am a Retired Police Officer and nowadays sell Samosa, Pakora and Paan outside Prince Cinema Karachi.
Regards
hahahahhahahahhahahahhaa
then you must be a reaserch analyst in samosa,pakora and paan.
i told you this copy/paste is annoying for every one even for those who agree with you.
For Mr Samad Khurram,
Ms Shireen M Mazari should apply for the POST OF LADY QAZI IN SWAT. Dear Sir Imran Khan keep it up.
Ignorance and intolerance confusing the issues Shireen M Mazari Wednesday, April 22, 2009
http://thenews.jang.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=17…
Hysteria, intolerance and ignorance are certainly not solely the hallmark of the Taliban, as I discovered last week when I defended the actual Nizam-e-Adl Regulation on television in terms of its content. Immediately, choice abuses – ranging from comments about by girth to the need for me to seek employment in Swat – were unleashed through the internet by the ignorant, hysterical and intolerant self-appointed "liberals". It was all these apologists for western "secularism" could do to stop themselves from actually telling my spouse that I was wajib-ul-qatl in their "liberal" eyes! But then I have a thick political skin, having survived the Left-JI alliance at Quaid-i-Azam University for 16 years!
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Ansar Abbasi & Jang Group's latest somersault on Islam, Shariah and Sufi Muhammad.
http://chagataikhan.blogspot.com/2009/04/ansar-ab…
hahahahhahahahhahahahhaa then you must be a reaserch analyst in samosa,pakora and paan. i told you this copy/paste is annoying for every one even for those who agree with you. [Dr Jawwad Khan]
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Dear Jawwad Sahab,
Use your deomocratic Right [but its Kufr for the Deobandi Taliban] and lodge protest with Dr Alvi and demand ban on me.
Regards.
I know very well that these are the vices which are disliked in Islam and I am indulged in these at my own risk and I am ready to be punished in the life hereafter.
(amir mughal)
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ready to be punished?
do you have any idea of punishment in hereafter?
every one is sinner no one is clean.but you should not preach some thing what you do not do because it make you a munafiq.
i don't see any reason for banning you.
aapke aaney se to teeth maestro men ronaq aagaee hey. 😉
ready to be punished? do you have any idea of punishment in hereafter?
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Dear Jawwad Sahab,
Yes I have complete faith on the punishment for sing in the life hereafter which starts just after your death from your grave till the judgement day and I also have a belief that on Judgement Day after further Interrogation i.e. Joint Interrogation Team more Punishments are awaiting me but despited all this I have a more firm belief on these:
On the authority of Abu Hurayrah (may Allah be pleased with him), who said that the Messenger of Allah (PBUH) said:
When Allah decreed the Creation He pledged Himself by writing in His book which is laid down with Him: My mercy prevails over my wrath. [Muslim, Bukhari,Nasa'i and Ibn Majah).
Therefore I would request you to enjoy the life and leave slavation and punishment to Allah.
Aamir Mughal, Sir, btw do have a blog on seculars/marxists , and Takfir wal hijrah ? if you don’t, could you right one ![Reflection]
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Dear Sir,
More precise and to the point:
Munawar Hassan, Sufi Muhammad, Jamat-e-Islami, Mullahs & Calamity of Takfir (Apostasy)
http://chagataikhan.blogspot.com/2009/04/munawar-…
Hey Samad Khurram,
The fight you wanted has already started in Karachi by MQM, they have started to kill pashto-speaking 'talibans' in karachi.
When are you joining this 'Mara-Maree'?
Hey Samad Khurram,
The fight you wanted has already started in Karachi by MQM, they have started to kill pashto-speaking 'talibans' in karachi.
When are you joining this 'Mara-Maree'? you can atleast write something to justify it.
I have found worst scum of earth in Jamat-e-Islami and IJT members e.g. back stabber [Mohsin Kush] of worst kind, deceivers, adulterers and sanctimonious pricks.
A Minor Glimpse of Mawdoodi's 'Pure Islamic Training' to Jamat-e-Islami Fascist Student Wing IJT as per daily news papers and then read detail history of Jamat-e-Islami's Terrorist Wing IJT.
Dawn Nov 2007
LAHORE, Nov 15: A large number of Punjab University students on Thursday held a protest demonstration against Islami Jamiat Tulaba (IJT) for its manhandling of Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaaf Chief Imran Khan.
Dawn Nov 2007
SWABI, Nov 15: The Awami National Party, Pakistan Muslim League (N) and Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf which are in the All Parties Democratic Movement (APDM) on Thursday asked Jamaat-i-Islami to stay away from their protest to be held here on Friday.
Dawn Nov 2007 by Ayaz Amir
This brings me to Imran Khan’s manhandling at the Punjab University, Lahore, by activists of the Islami Jamiat-i-Tulaba, the student wing of the Jamaat-i-Islami. Not only was he prevented from holding a demonstration and courting arrest, as he had intended, but he was seized and confined in one of the departments before being handed over to the police. Words fail me to describe this shameful incident. But Imran has not been diminished by it. He continues to stand tall. He is a brave man who has showed great courage during the post-martial law period. It is the Jamiat and its parent body, the Jamaat, which look small. Manhandling one of the few national heroes we have and then handing him over to the police: can anything be more despicable? But even in evil there can be some good. If May 12 exposed the true face of the MQM, Nov 14 has revealed the ugly face of the Jamiat and the Jamaat. Qazi Hussein Ahmed’s populist posturing had led many simpleminded souls to believe that the Jamaat had changed its spots. The incident with Imran dispels such illusions.
The Jamaat remains wedded to an ideology suspiciously close to fascism, (which makes one wonder about the uses to which Islam has been put in this country). From Gen Yahya onwards it has worked as a handmaiden of our spook agencies, the dark forces who have always undermined democracy. As a matter of policy its student wing has practiced unabashed violence to promote its political ends. Indeed, when the definitive history of the collapse of Pakistani education is written, the Jamiat’s ‘danda-bardar’ (baton-wielding) tactics will figure prominently in it.
Dawn Nov 2007
It is also important to take note of the IJT’s behaviour. The group has more or less terrorised the Punjab University for the last year or so, bullying the administration into taking certain decisions like shutting down the musicology department or disrupting cultural functions. The self-professed morality police seem to be upset that Mr Khan was invited to the PU campus without their knowledge, as if the university is their sole turf. This self-righteous attitude coupled with coercive force — similar to another fiery ethnic student group’s in Karachi — has never been taken to task by university administrations or the political leadership of the parties the student groups belong to. This time a JI leader has condemned the behaviour of IJT but it must be followed through by stern action against them. No student group should have a monopoly on campuses.
Dawn Nov 2007
Imran Khan came to the campus in the face of ‘stay-away’ warnings from Islami Jamiat-i-Talaba. He was pushed and shoved and insulted and thrown to the keepers not long after. Did the Jamaat-i-Islami leadership know what was about to happen or was it a personal initiative of their student wing to assail the idol? While the first possibility is highly unlikely in the case of ‘the most organised political force in the country’, in either case it is as dangerous an occurrence for the Jamaat as it is for Imran Khan and his Justice Party. For the Jamaat is nothing without its ‘likeminded’ allies.
BORN-again Muslims are not good enough for Islamists. The sorry drama enacted on the Punjab University campus in Lahore on Nov 14 should solve the mystery for those emerging from the sidelines to claim the command of a team of motivated students in whose selection and training they have played no part.
"I have found worst scum of earth in Jamat-e-Islami and IJT "members e.g. back stabber [Mohsin Kush] of worst kind, deceivers, adulterers and sanctimonious pricks"
man! that's new.
adulterers?????
sanctimonious pricks?????
i wonder where the bhashan about kind behaviour is gone?
"I have found worst scum of earth in Jamat-e-Islami and IJT "members e.g. back stabber [Mohsin Kush] of worst kind, deceivers, adulterers and sanctimonious pricks"
man! that's new.
adulterers?????
sanctimonious pricks?????
i wonder where the bhashan about kind behaviour is gone?
yeh ilzam to MQM waley bhee naheen lagatey.
Finally a sane article. No wonder u guys label a thinking man a CIA agent.
Looks like Pakistani Fauj is in action in Swat, repeating the Lal-Masjid story….
Good work, General Kiyani, Insha Allah people will remember you in the same honor as they remember Musharraf.
Zia Nawaz & Benazir had brought taliban into Pakistan & all you should thank them for this precious gift. They groomed falsely taliban to kill kafars in Afghanistan coz US was funding for jihad(architectured by the these THREE).
And then Mush(Zias gaddi-nasheen military dictator), Zardari (Benazirs gaddi-nasheen) & Nawaz are killing Taliban in Pakistan & Afghanistan coz now US is funding against jihad.
Check out the level of humanity of the these Pakistani rulers, how much low these rulers can go!!!
They kept taliban illiterate, provoked & groomed falsely taliban for jihad to get $$ & now killing them to get $$ again.
This is what these rulers do with human beings, first groom them falsely & then kill them, once your job is done.
And what Imran Khan is insisting that a bullet can't undo your false grooming but only by bringing them into political process & you can gradually de-groom(isolate) them.
http://thenews.jang.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=17…
Mr. Samad, this article will give you an insight to analyze the uprising of taliban & a support to them from the lower classes.
If have time go thru it. Thanks
Military operation, bullet proof cars & villas are a part of problem not solution.
One Education system, One socio-economic system & One Judicial system for all the Pakistanis is the only solution.