Taliban’s Unethical Demeanor
Posted by Javed Iqbal
Taliban have fired first salvo of what it promised to do, resorting to suicide bombings and other means of violence against members of a KPK based political party and their election campaigns for the upcoming parliamentary elections on May the 13th, 2013. The horrendous act of terror launched near an election rally on 31st March showed that there are no limits to against whom and where the Taliban can strike, especially in the restive areas of the KPK Province. A roadside bomb killed two people besides injuring a former MPA and an election candidate. TTP claimed immediate responsibility of the attack and vowed to launch more attacks to sabotage democratic system and the forthcoming elections. In an indication of their designs against the elections and the democracy, the Taliban have resorted to influence the minds in the Northern areas by regularly issuing pamphlets telling people to refrain from participating in election activities in FATA.
There is no immediate reprieve in sight from the continued Taliban violence in the country. A little while ago the Taliban had offered peace talks to the government but without cessation of its killing activities through suicide and IED bombings especially targeting the personnel of LEA agencies. Leaders of a few political parties with known links to the terrorists in one way or the other expressed their willingness and supported the offer of talks without taking into account the mayhem the terror outfit had unleashed on fellow country men. Appeasement of terrorists have never worked. Before supporting the talks such proponents ought to have looked at what had happened in Swat. We did peace pacts with them and virtually handed over Swat to them… and what next? They tried to run over Buner, Dir and now they are trying to run over the rest of the country. Thanks to the saner minds who renounced the TTP terror activities and did not fall in their trap of talking peace.
The persistent wave of violence and terror being conducted by Taliban and related factions, now over half of the last decade, has taken away countless innocent lives of children, widows, old and the young alike. All this is being done in defiance of Islamic teachings that bind Muslims not to kill their fellow beings and destroy their properties. Malala incident was the worst form of how low could Taliban stoop to in defying the Islamic teachings. Denying the right to education to children and the youth, especially the girls and the female teachers, they resort to blowing up their educational institutions, the shrines, religious places of worship and never find anything wrong in issuing video clips showing disrespect to dead bodies of their fellow Muslims. That the Taliban hanged a seven year old boy in Afghanistan after accusing him of passing information to the Americans is the most terrible act of brutality in a catalogue of horrors emanating out of the brand of Taliban. A UN report has accused the Taliban of violating women’s’ rights with ‘unabated severity’ including mass abductions and forced prostitutions.
Our Prophet Muhammad Sallallaho Wasallam, in his address on the occasion of Hajjatul Widah, emphasized on Muslims to protect human lives, property and dignity of the whole mankind. Muhammad Ali Jinnah also never wanted the country that he founded to be a theoretic state. He actually wanted Pakistan to be liberal, secular and progressive country where Muslims and non-Muslims could live with amity and thrive as a nation and be counted as a responsible nation in the comity of nations. Muslims are supposed to lead a life based on Allah’s guidance given in Quran central to which is preservation of human lives, property, intellect, progeny and religion. If Taliban think that they are truly the best of the Muslims, they ought to have contextualize the Quran and Sunnah where they would discover that our Prophet (PBUH) aimed to reform 7th century Arab society by giving women and weaker groups greater rights and relative equality. Islam speaks for pluralism which the Taliban continue to deny through their un-Islamic practices.
Islamic scholars have issued many fatwas emphasizing that target killings, suicide bombings and killing innocent civilians including children and women, are against the spirit of Islam and that self thought interpretations of Islam adopted by the Taliban was nothing but ignorance and digression from the actual teachings of Islam. The Taliban militants, in the garb of forcing their brand of Islamic religion, also indulge in criminal activities like making easy money through drug trade and hostage takings. Taliban are an evil that duel in the hearts of some men that want to control their fellow men and proclaim this in Allah’s name. All the civilized countries in the world have adopted the ‘zero tolerance’ regime against the terrorists, extremists and the fanatics. In Pakistan however, we know who the Taliban are, who are their supporters, what is their support infrastructure and where do their sanctuaries exist and yet we find ourselves unable to collectively take effective and lasting action against their venom. Reluctance in our national resolve to take on the venomous Taliban will only continue our slow slide into the oblivion.(Abdullah Mansoor)
