It was just today that the Taliban assaulted Bacha Khan university, killing faculty, students, and four guards. At least 22 are reported dead. All four attackers were killed before they could detonate their suicide vests. As the New York Times reports, the Taliban stated their reasons:
Khalifa Umar Mansoor, a Pakistani Taliban leader, called reporters in Peshawar to claim responsibility for the attack and to say that four of their men were involved. He said the assault was in response for the execution in December of four men convicted of aiding the 2014 Peshawar school attackers.
Note that this has nothing to do with Western colonialism.
And do have a look at what that Prime Minister said:
Pakistan’s prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, condemned the attack. “We are determined and resolved in our commitment to wipe out the menace of terrorism from our homeland,” he said in a statement from Switzerland, where he was attending the World Economic Forum. “The countless sacrifices made by our countrymen will not go in vain, inshallah.”
It’s the last word that’s so ironic.
And could the target, a state school that teaches more than religion, with both men and women have anything to do with it?
There, fixed.
I was listening to an NPR story this morning while driving, and they reported that the Taliban are actually denying that this was them. Not sure what to make of that.
The attack came from a Taliban faction, but another faction came out to say that they did not support the attack.
Thanks for the clarification.
The Pakistan leaders always seem to be in denial regarding the Taliban – the folks likely to take over their own country, not to mention Afghanistan.
Kind of the same way the Democrats are in denial or at least don’t seem to care that the other party has been kicking their butts for several years now. In both cases, the response is underwhelming.
Sad how commonplace this kind of news is nowadays. Stupid times we live in.
So true.
Tragic.
“Note that this has nothing to do with Western colonialism.”
Somehow the usual suspects manage to trace everything back to Western colonialism.
It’s interesting that, “Inshallah” means, “As God wills” or, “If God is willing”- it’s rather a nifty little religious “out” in that if one’s plans don’t turn out, one can always say, “Well, I guess that wasn’t God’s will”. The Christian equivalent might be if one said, upon hearing of a van load of Pentecostals burned alive in a car wreck on the way to Bible study, “Mysterious, indeed, are the ways of the Lord”- gotta keep that “Lord” in there, somehow!
I think there is more to it. I think that, when a pious Muslim says something he plans to do or hopes to happen, e.g. “I intend to send my son to math school” or “I hope to hope good sales this summer”, he immediately adds “Inshallah” so that not to anger God. God is perceived as an omnipresent, pedantic bully who eavesdrops and as soon as he catches you in hubris, e.g. omitting “Inshallah”, will hit you with the heavy hammer on the head.
(The same with other believers and with superstitious people, just the code word will be different.)
I have never interpreted the use of “…God willing” in English conversation that way. If I really had to translate what I think people mean by it, it would be more like “if fate allows” or “if everything goes as planned.” The person is acknowledging that their plans may not survive contact with reality.
This is just too horrible for words.
“The countless sacrifices made by our countrymen will not go in vain, inshallah.”
Allah has to be one slapped about god with all sides having a go and claiming godly rights.
It conjures up a vision of gods, hog tied, gagged with spinning head absolutely perplexed as to who are the real faithful. In a perverse and individual level it it is proof of why we don’t see evidence of god, they have no fucking idea to whom to grant favour.
Godly default: Do nothing, divide and rule.
You have to wonder when it’s going to hit home, this eternal paradoxical contradiction of the faithful.
More accurately you could say it is not directly related to Western colonialism. Of course, such statements of indirect Western culpability are not really compelling, since it is fairly easy for one to claim that X indirectly causes Y. However one may put it, Islam (or the cultural milieu it is prevalent) is conducive to reactionary thinking and some people holding such thinking would engage in acts of violence. One could say that if it were not for CIA intervention, some secular, socialist ideology would have flourished in the Middle East, which would have provided a political environment where such reactionary and theocratic thinking would not have flourished. One should not forget the geopolitics of the Cold War.
What is more interesting to me is the notion that it has something to do with Western colonialism. Again, this is not to blame the West for this particular incident. If it is understood that something to do with Western colonialism, one would understand that the terrorists have some grievances against Western foreign policy and would likely be perceived as leftists (or at least motivated by leftist thinking). This incident would be framed by the media apparatus to portray far-left thinking as extremely dangerous to the international order and peace (not withstanding that there were many far-right militants in Latin America that were brutal).
I posted something in the Panda thread that was pretty innocuous (as it does not mention anything relating to politics or religion), and it did not show up.
I’ll apologize for whatever the host wants me to apologize for (as I am not aware of what lead me to be “suspended” from here). Without knowing what caused it, I apologize for being “too provocative”.
Sorry. I was a little paranoid.
You’re not suspended. LOL!: you posted the comment on the PICTURE PAGE. Many people do that, and I remind them from time to time to post on the main page, not the picture page.