Ex-Terrorist's Introspection
nkdat...@bigmailbox.net
DAWN, Karachi, Pakistan
Saturday, 24 October, 2009
Tackling extremism
By Maajid Nawaz
HARDLY a day now goes by without some new development linked to
terrorism in Pakistan. Thousands have lost their lives and millions
have had to flee their homes. Even the army GHQ, Pakistan’s most
heavily fortified institution, has not been spared attack and schools
and universities are no longer considered safe.
However, it is important to remember that the seeds of this current
malaise were sown much earlier than today — I know this because I am
living testimony to it. In 1999, when the Pakistan military was
preoccupied with Kargil and the cricket team had lost the World Cup
final to Australia, I was particularly interested in another
development the year before — the country’s newfound status as the
seventh nuclear-armed state in the world.
The news of this ‘Islamic bomb’ was what drew me from Britain to
Lahore in the summer of 1999, not yet 22 years old. Spurred on by
revolutionary zeal and dreams of erecting an Islamist caliphate, I
arrived as part of a vanguard to set up a Pakistani branch of the
global Islamist group Hizb ut Tahrir (HT). The plan was to radicalise
the country and foment a military coup against the democratically
elected ‘client’ ruler Nawaz Sharif, so that our future caliphate
could go nuclear. I was determined not to let anything get in my way,
and nothing really did.
During the following decade everything changed. Having spent four
years as an Amnesty International prisoner of conscience in Egypt I
had time to think, question and gain perspective on the extremist
cause I had dedicated my life to.
It led me to finally understand the crucial difference between the
faith of Islam and the political ideology of Islamism — a realisation
that necessitated my leaving HT as I no longer believed in their ideas
and the ‘Islamic’ justifications they used to support them. I thus
decided to return to Pakistan this year, this time to push back
against the insidious spread of Islamist extremism that I myself was
partly responsible for.
Pakistan’s university campuses were the natural choice for me to
start. Aided and supported by the local youth development NGO Bargad,
I embarked on a four-week, nationwide university tour to address
thousands of students on the bankruptcy of Islamist ideology. Along
the way I was asked several times, often by students themselves, why I
hadn’t chosen to go to madressahs first — after all, it seemed to be
what everyone was doing.
My response was always the same: while it is true that the madressah
system has supplied a steady stream of jihadists over the years, a
little-highlighted fact is that the leading ideologues of Islamist
movements have invariably been educated, are elite and socially
mobile. After all, Bin Laden is an engineer and his deputy, Ayman al-
Zawahiri, a doctor.
Many of the pseudo-intellectuals of HT are also highly educated,
including the nuclear scientist and computer and telecom engineers who
were recently arrested along with other HT activists during a police
raid in Islamabad. It came as no surprise to me that nuclear
scientists were among those accused of belonging to HT, considering
that this is exactly why I was sent to Pakistan as far back as 1999.
In the year 2000, I had also personally met Pakistani Army officers in
London, who had been training at Sandhurst. HT had recruited them to
its cause, and then sent them back to Pakistan.
Back to the future, travelling across Pakistan’s provinces, visiting
key campuses along the way, I had the valuable opportunity to engage
directly with students on such issues. I told them my life story, my
reasons for joining HT, my time in prison and why I eventually left.
In return, I heard from them about how they think and feel about
Pakistan’s problems, and their aspirations for the future of their
country. We discussed the need to tackle extremism on an ideological
level, and the steps Pakistan would have to take towards a more
democratic and pluralistic society and government. The reactions I
received were mixed, but they spoke volumes for those who populate
Pakistan’s universities.
Students from Sindh tended to be hugely receptive to my message,
whilst those in Mirpur, Azad Kashmir, from where the majority of
British Pakistanis hail, expressed much greater hostility towards the
West. In Quetta, the prevailing preoccupation was with ‘Punjabi
hegemony’; here I encountered popular revolutionaries with little time
for religious extremism but a hardened resolve to secede from
Pakistan, in some cases through violence.
I was accused by some of being a ‘foreign agent’, while others
wholeheartedly embraced my stance. I sometimes encountered a denial of
Pakistan’s role in allowing extremism to breed within its borders, but
also an acceptance that religion had been misused by various elements
within the country. Irrespective of their leanings, in every
university, people had something to say.
Ironically, the most violent opposition to my efforts didn’t come from
Pakistani students at all — it came from a British-Pakistani member of
HT who decided to punch me one evening in a cafe in Lahore. I later
learned that he, like several others, had left the UK to recruit
students in Pakistan, and to do this had started teaching at a private
university in Lahore.
It was sad evidence to the fact that British citizens continue to
export Islamism to Pakistan, along with playing a crucial role in
exporting the ideology to countries such as Malaysia, Indonesia,
Kenya, Mauritius, India, Egypt and Denmark. Only when the governments
of Britain and Pakistan wake up to take responsibility for the rot on
their doorsteps will we ever be able to reverse these trends.
As violence in Pakistan surges and ordinary Pakistanis feel
increasingly insecure in their own homes, we cannot afford to stop at
just a military response to this problem. Greater emphasis needs to be
given to winning the struggle for ideas; to foster an understanding
that taking a stance against Islamism does not equate to a rejection
of Islam.
This requires greater civil society engagement, popularising counter-
extremism narratives through the media, and the promotion of secular
spaces within society and the state.
While it is true that such measures rarely have quantifiable results
and require great resources in terms of time and effort, we can ill
afford not to implement them, for without this vision it is unlikely
that Pakistan can overcome the current moral dilemma and political
crisis it finds itself in.
The writer is director of the Quilliam Foundation, a counter-extremism
think tank based in the UK.
infor...@quilliamfoundation.org
Subarno Pande
> http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/pa...
short story on ourselves:
http://hindunationalismmuslimunity.blogspot.com/
Obama admits he is a Muslim - Video down, please watch:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCAffMSWSzY
Other important links - http://universalhindu.webs.com/
http://aryaindian.blogspot.com/
http://aryansameasdravidians.blogspot.com/
http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453913586888547641
http://khabar.josh18.com/videos/22861
Even USA Military now can't trust its largest minority 2.5% Muslims
above 2% Jews & below Christians -
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091112/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_fort_hood_shooting
Also, like others Philippines fighting these Jihadis -
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091112/ap_on_re_as/as_us_philippines_clinton
hab...@anony.net
persist
8.39 wage war till Islam is the only religion left on the planet
9.5 kill the idolworshippers wherever you find them
Islam is the only religion acceptable to non existent Allah etc.
harmony
<hab...@anony.net> wrote in message
news:4afef4d1....@news.giganews.com...
can you give us a total run down on this as you once had done?
i think it helps to periodically remind mommedans or educate and pre-empt
the budding victimisation by mohamadism in various mohamadistans of which i
understand there are 52.