Re: where is the middle road?
anyway read this article. This is an excellent summarization of the views of people who want to be on the middle road.
The link is http://www.dawn.com/2007/text/op.htm
The Lal Masjid phenomenon
By Dr Tariq Rahman
IT IS a fact that the Lal Masjid clerics violated the law on several counts: they encroached on CDA land; they allowed their students to occupy a library; they also allowed them to abduct Pakistani women, policemen and Chinese women. Then, when the Rangers were posted around the mosque, the students threatened and attacked them and burnt a building. They carried guns, some wore gas masks and they fired on security personnel. Is this not armed rebellion against the state?
If it is, which state would allow it? From what I know of Islamic political theory, the latter, too, does not allow armed rebellion against the state — irrespective of whether or not it is Islamic. There are many texts prohibiting disorder (fitna) and political philosophers make it clear that even a bad government is better than chaos and anarchy.
In Saudi Arabia, when militants occupied the Kaaba in 1979, they were attacked and wiped out. In short, it is part of the job of a state not to allow its writ to be challenged through armed struggle in this manner. If every group of vigilantes, with its own version of right and wrong, started kidnapping people and threatening armed struggle the state would descend into chaos.
What is permitted in democratic states is challenging the legitimacy of the rulers through elections, strikes, demonstrations, etc.
But letting anarchy loose upon the citizens is not permitted. That has to be ended; if possible through negotiations but if nothing works through force or the threat of force. So, anyone who blames General Musharraf’s government for challenging the militant clerics of Lal Masjid does not know what a dangerous course he or she is advocating.
This does not mean that everything the government did was right. It let the crisis simmer on for about six months. The stick-wielding girls of Jamia Hafsa were intoxicated by their unusual success as militants. They, as well as male students, dared to do more but were not stopped. They were spoiled into imagining they were heroes: the madressah was shown on TV; the maulanas were lionised; the girls were interviewed. This went to their heads and they started what they thought was a revolution.
All this could have been avoided if women police had been used and appropriate punishments handed out early into the crisis.
Also, one does not see how the intelligence agencies let so many arms and so much ammunition accumulate in the mosque. If there were hardened fighters, as evidence suggests there were, how did they get in? Either the agencies encouraged the maulanas to divert attention from the judicial crisis or they (the agencies) were really so ill-informed that they did not know what was happening right under their nose.
Moreover, if Maulana Abdul Rashid Ghazi had asked for safe passage at any time he should have been accommodated. True, this would have been considered a weakness by many and would have made the sacrifices of military personnel and students appear in vain but then, these things were worth risking.
What was not worth risking was the backlash of ordinary, middle-class Pakistanis accusing the government of brutality or, even worse, of having done all this to please the United States. So, both for humanitarian and political reasons, Maulana Abdul Rashid Ghazi should not have been allowed to become a martyr.
Yet another mistake was the ill-treatment meted out to the media which was prevented from going in, stopped from meeting people and even barred from seeing the Lal Masjid in its entirety the day after the operation was over.
Instead, the media should have been allowed to film and show everything, even if the scenes were shocking. Now that they have been denied this, media persons have adopted a cynical attitude towards the government which will eventually help the militants.
Helping the militants become stronger is neither in the interest of the government nor of the media nor, of course, of ordinary citizens. Indeed, it is not even in the interests of the militants themselves since history tells us that when one group of militants wins a war others challenge it and the country descends into civil war.
The media’s own role however, needs to be both praised and criticised. To begin with, the media was against the intransigent clerics. Reporters risked their lives and a cameraman was killed in covering the crisis. However, when Maulana Abdul Aziz was captured, the media turned irresponsible. He was ridiculed as he was shown in a burqa ad nauseam.
Later, he was even forced to appear in a PTV interview in that attire. That was really atrocious. One should never, not on any account, make fun of anybody or hurt a person deliberately. Disagreement with the maulana is one thing but not to respect his feelings quite another. This one unkind act might well have turned the tide against a peaceful settlement inside the Lal Masjid. Indeed, Maulana Abdul Aziz’s action should have been praised because fleeing is better than the kind of obstinacy which takes innocent lives.
Later, either because the media had been badly treated or because many media people themselves are susceptible to religious emotionality, many TV commentators started glorifying Abdul Rashid Ghazi. His last words were repeated several times and, on the whole, the government was blamed more than it should have been. Many of those who were blaming the government for inaction started blaming it for action. This was not helpful to anyone.
The media must understand that whereas its duty is to present all sides of a story, it also has to interpret events. If this interpretation goes against the basic principle that the state cannot be challenged by armed might, then it will mislead the public.
This is the beginning of a struggle against militant Islamic forces and the moderate sections of society. Whose side is the media on? This is a crucial question.
An even more vital question is: on whose side are the intelligence agencies? Elements in the armed forces? Political groups? Let us not forget that for a very long time Islamists have been used in fighting secular battles — America’s battle against the Soviets in Afghanistan and Pakistan’s battle against India for Kashmir — and the idiom of Islam has been used by the official media and in books, speeches, etc. to achieve the goals.
General Musharraf said in 2002 that he had reversed all this. But has it truly been reversed or are there elements somewhere that keep old policies in abeyance to be used some day? This is a question on which the fate of Pakistan hinges.
We must understand that the madressahs are not the only source of violence using the name of Islam. People educated in secular institutions — doctors, engineers and college lecturers — have been active in militant circles all over the world.The world is unjust and as long as the United States does not change its policies that are currently in favour of Israel and against the Palestinians and western powers are not sensitised to Muslim feelings and ideas, there will be anger.
This is the greatest threat to global peace but we can hardly influence foreign powers. What we can do is to change policies at home. Here too there is much anger. As Pakistan becomes more and more unjust and the gap between the rich and the poor gets larger, more desperate young men will emerge. They will use the idiom of religion to vent their frustrations.
If one looks at the images of the mosque one finds poor, rural people, generally from the margins of the country, mesmerised by the militant message of clerics. Were they expressing their anger and their sense of being marginalised and cheated by the system by fighting for the Ghazi brothers?
Our system is unjust and poor people respond to all those who appeal to them in the name of Islam or ethnicity or any such thing with blind fanaticism. This means that we must seriously pay attention to providing justice, material goods, services (such as hospitals, schools etc) and entertainment to the masses. Moreover, the elite should adhere to the law because one has the moral standing to challenge law-breakers only if one adheres to the spirit of the law oneself. I do not know if history will give us the time to reform ourselves but is there any harm in trying?