Preventing More Lal Masjids Re: # 173 Freethinker

``...Pakistan was created for the Indian Muslims so that they could practice their religion freely...``

Really? Then why are Shias, Ahmedis and other Muslim minority sects more secure in India? Why are there fewer Muharram deaths in India than in Pakistan? Then why did Bangladesh part ways? Why are Bangladeshis thronging to India illegally?

Mull over this some.

Preventing More Lal Masjids Re: # 165 Anil

``Why has no one heard of progressive reformers of Islamic society?``

Anil, if you are serious about the answer to the above questions, then I suggest that you take a look at the following books:





and






and

Preventing More Lal Masjids Re: # 163 Tahmed

Afterthought:

If your stated reason for not `discussing with twits from India like you` is because of national origin, then I suggest that you go to a Paki-only forum, since Chowk is for `Ideas & Identities of ,b>India Pakistan`

Re: 166: Why beat around the bush? If you know what will and what won`t work, just get straight to the point like Hamidm2 suggests?

CIAO

Preventing More Lal Masjids Re: # 163 Tahmed

You are hilarious with your childish immaturity! See ya!

Preventing More Lal Masjids Re: # 160 Tahmed

``...If mullah rashid had agreed, those who surrendered would have been tried through due legal process...``

Only a naive fool believes that Rashid would have `agreed and surrendered`.

Preventing More Lal Masjids Re: # 148 Manto

Dearest Manto (I like you, you know?:)):

The point is that El Presidente has successfully suckered you by changing the topic of the debate from the Supreme Court Judge to the masjid.

Further, to your point on fundamentalism and the tottering Musharraf regime (hey, time for another Kargil, right?) here is an insightful article that claims a linkage between the recent US Government leak about massive, planned operations in FATA in 2005 (and the related NY Times leaked story) to the near certainty that should Musharraf`s government fall, the US will have no option but to step in FATA. Time to Iraqize FATA! Long Live Musharraf!

Here is a juicy excerpt from the first link:

``If the threat of a (Pakistani) government fall was the only thing holding Washington back in 2005, and now that the fall is imminent through no action of the United States, what does Washington have to gain from restraining itself any further (in Pakistan)?``

Chew on this a bit and take the time to time to read the links before responding! You may soon need to re-write your resume to make yourself useful to a Western NGO tasked with writing a new Paki constitution! Not that I seriously expect you to draw the correct conclusions from the facts.

Take a hike to Monal Restaurant today for me and have a beer! I`ll be toasting to you over paani puris at the Mahatma Gandhi Mall in Edison, NJ (your old haunts at Rutgers).

Have a nice day!

CIAO

Preventing More Lal Masjids Re: # 153 Manto

``Pervez Musharraf has completely legitimised his presidency under the constitution``

So, being the `constitutionalist` that you are, you have to respect his decisions. You guys are screwed!

Preventing More Lal Masjids Re: # 152 khairbakhsh

``Is that not all signaling that Maulana Ghazi was right ...?``

He probably was. And to the finer point of constitutional law (and to address Manto`s obsession with Constitutional Law and the writ of the state), may I remind all Pakis that the Pakistani Constitution (current version in effect) begins with its preamble asserting:

``Whereas sovereignty over the entire Universe belongs to Almighty Allah alone, and the authority to be exercised by the people of Pakistan within the limits prescribed by Him is a sacred trust;``

Ghazi, as he claimed to operate within the ``limits prescribed by Him`` was not really challenging, but rather supporting, the writ of the state. It was Musharraf, by unconstitutionally seizing power (and forsaking the oath that he took to defend the Constitution when he was originally commissioned as a military officer and later as El Presidente) who used the Paki Constitution as toilet paper.

Preventing More Lal Masjids Re: # 148 Manto

``Anyone who challenges the writ of the state must be made an example out of. ``

Dearest Manto:
Will that (example) begin with el Presidente Musharraf? He is the primo uno challenger of the `writ of the state`. Otherwise, it is just hot air.
CIAO

Preventing More Lal Masjids Soul stirring words from a brave man facing certain death on his last stand, ```I know my martyrdom is certain and I tell you that the government was never sincere in talking to us. After every sentence [while negotiating] they threatened us. They don`t want talks. They just want to break us and humiliate us, so we prefer death.``

Romair, Bulleya - where are you now with your oft-repeated sermons on human rights violations? Are you still a member of Amnesty International?

And here is more `encouraging` news that, `The Pakistani media interviewed a number of the girls who were released from the mosque and the neighboring seminary, and many of them said that they regretted not having been able to become martyrs alongside their teacher, Ghazi. `

We have a number of suicide bombresses in the making!

But wait, Musharraf has successfully taken the spotlight away from the Supreme Court Judge Chowdhry and the London conference of opposition parties. According to journalist Hamid Mir, `Hamid Mir, senior political analyst at the same TV channel. ``Musharraf wanted to diffuse the multi-parties conference in London [a meeting of dozens of Pakistani politicians]. Before that he was using Lal Mosque to distract [from] the judicial crisis.``

Pakis, you have been had again!

What Lies Beneath: Dispatch from the Frontlines of the Burqa Brigades Re: # 565 Zeemax

``...Whatever girls remain now, will carry on the movement. ...``
Lovely. So, we can expect many more examples of the Lal Masjid episode?

What Lies Beneath: Dispatch from the Frontlines of the Burqa Brigades Re: # 554 Manto
``...workers double paning the windows of my house... ``
Are the new windows bullet proof or impact resistant? You may want to upgrade if you have not.
CIAO

What Lies Beneath: Dispatch from the Frontlines of the Burqa Brigades Re: # 535 Ahmed Madani

Madani Sahib:
You are right. Friedman is a Jew! That completely explains the narrative! Not only that, The New York Times is owned by a Jewish family. Here is what it published today (excerpts):

QALAI SAYEDAN, Afghanistan, July 9 — With their teacher absent, 10 students were allowed to leave school early. These were the girls the gunmen saw first, 10 easy targets walking hand-in-hand through the blue metal gate and on to the winding dirt road.

The staccato of machine-gun fire pelted through the stillness. A 13-year-old named Shukria was hit in the arm and the back, and then teetered into the soft brown of an adjacent wheat field. Zarmina, her 12-year-old sister, ran to her side, listening to the wounded girl’s precious breath and trying to help her stand.

But Shukria was too heavy to lift, and the two gunmen, sitting astride a single motorbike, sped closer.

As Zarmina scurried away, the men took a more studied aim at those they already had shot, killing Shukria with bullets to her stomach and heart.

End quote

Such nihilistic, animal behavior has become the norm in the Muslim world. We are getting increasingly numbed, that hundreds of such stories no longer make the headlines. Imagine, killing a 13-year old school girl who wanted to go to school!

What Lies Beneath: Dispatch from the Frontlines of the Burqa Brigades Dear Pakis:
Take a moment to reflect upon this Op/Ed piece by Tom Friedman of The New York Times

At a Theater Near You ...
by Thomas L. Friedman
Reposted from The NYTimes

I knew something was up when I couldn`t get a cab. Then there were sirens and helicopters whirring overhead. I stopped a passerby to ask what was going on. He said something about a car bomb outside a disco six blocks from my hotel. A few hours later, I finally found a taxi. The driver warned me that it was nearly impossible to get across town. Another bomb had been uncovered in a car park. Next day, more news: a suicide bomber had driven his Jeep into an airport and jumped out, his body on fire, screaming ``Allah! Allah!``

Where was I? Baghdad? Kabul? Tel Aviv? No, I was in England. But it could have been anywhere. The Middle East: Now playing at a theater near you.

But this movie gets more confusing every time you watch it. When you watched it on 9/11 it was about America`s presence in the heart of Arabia. And when you watched it on 7/7 it was about unemployed and alienated Muslim youth in Britain. In Jordan not long ago it was about a wedding at a Western hotel. In Morocco recently it was about an Internet cafe. And two days ago in Yemen it was about seven Spanish tourists who were killed when a suicide bomber drove into them at a local tourist site. Wasn`t Spain the country that quit Iraq to get its people out of the line of fire?

Because these incidents are scattered, we`re growing numb to just how crazy they are. In the past few years, hundreds of Muslims have committed suicide amid innocent civilians — without making any concrete political demands and without generating any vigorous, sustained condemnation in the Muslim world.

Two trends are at work here: humiliation and atomization. Islam`s self-identity is that it is the most perfect and complete expression of God`s monotheistic message, and the Koran is God`s last and most perfect word. To put it another way, young Muslims are raised on the view that Islam is God 3.0. Christianity is God 2.0. Judaism is God 1.0. And Hinduism and all others are God 0.0.

One of the factors driving Muslim males, particularly educated ones, into these acts of extreme, expressive violence is that while they were taught that they have the most perfect and complete operating system, every day they`re confronted with the reality that people living by God 2.0., God 1.0 and God 0.0 are generally living much more prosperously, powerfully and democratically than those living under Islam. This creates a real dissonance and humiliation. How could this be? Who did this to us? The Crusaders! The Jews! The West! It can never be something that they failed to learn, adapt to or build. This humiliation produces a lashing out.

In the old days, you needed a terror infrastructure with bases in Beirut or Afghanistan to lash out in a big way. Not anymore. Now all you need is the virtual Afghanistan — the Internet and a few cellphones — to recruit, indoctrinate, plan and execute. Hence, the atomization — little terror groups sprouting everywhere. Everyone now has a starter kit.

Gen. Michael Hayden, the C.I.A. director, recently noted in a speech that during the cold war ``the enemy was easy to find, but hard to finish,`` because the Soviet Union was so big and powerful. ``Intelligence was important`` back then, he added, ``but it was overshadowed by the need for sheer firepower.``

In today`s war against terrorist groups, said General Hayden, ``it`s just the opposite. Our enemy is easy to finish, but hard to find. Today, we are looking for individuals or small groups planning suicide bombings, running violent Jihadist Web sites, sending foreign fighters into Iraq.``

I`d go one step further. The Soviet Union was easy to find and hard to kill, but once it died, it was dead forever. It had no regenerative power because it had no popular base. The terrorists of Iraq or London are hard to find, easy to kill, but very difficult to eliminate. New recruits just keep sprouting.

Of course, not all Muslims are terrorists. But it`s been widely noted that virtually all suicide terrorists today are Muslims. Angry Norwegians aren`t doing this — nor are starving Africans or unemployed Mexicans. Muslims have got to understand that a death cult has taken root in the bosom of their religion, feeding off it like a cancerous tumor.

This cancer is erasing basic norms of civilization. In Iraq, we`ve seen suicide bombers blow up funerals and schools. In England, seven out of the eight people detained in the latest plot are Muslim doctors or medical students. Doctors plotting mass murder? Could that be? If Muslim leaders don`t remove this cancer — and only they can — it will spread, tainting innocent Muslims and poisoning their relations with each other and the world.

What Lies Beneath: Dispatch from the Frontlines of the Burqa Brigades Re: # 309 Manto
They say that imitation is the best form of flattery. Thanks for cutting and pasting my post.
CIAO

What Lies Beneath: Dispatch from the Frontlines of the Burqa Brigades Re: # 307 Manto
From Monal Restaurant, could you see any fireworks? Did the body count go beyond 21?
CIAO