Tag: Osama Bin Laden

Pakistan’s New Prime Minister

President Pervez Musharraf has sworn in Yousef Raza Gilani as new Prime Minister of Pakistan, and it appears that the new coalition government has firmed up the factions and set a course. I’m still betting on Zardari to eventually move into the position, and will look at Gilani as the seat warmer until I see clear indicators of independence. 

Over the weekend yet another charge was cleared in courts against Zardari, and there have been articles on clearing up his educational bonafides, both indicators to me that he’s still jockeying for the position or at minimum a seat in Parliament. Yet to come is election to office in a bye-election as a precursor, but we should see that soon now that parliament and national assembly are seated. 

The new Prime Minister, Gilani, has said that he will not be a “yes-man” in reference to Musharraf, so the impact to US-Pakistan relations will have to be seen. In a parliamentary country where you have both a prime minister and a president things can get confusing when it comes to divvying up executive powers, so things will get interesting.

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Pakistan Frontier Fatwa Declares the Taliban Takfir

AJ at Stratasphere has important news that appeared, and then disappeared from The Nation today.  If you follow the link in Google now, you get a different story.

The story said that a cleric in the frontiers had issued an edict declaring the Taliban “un-islamic”. This is a turn of the tables on the Taliban, for it’s the Taliban who are used to declaring other Muslims Takfir when they disagree with the Taliban tactics, intimidation and murder of other Muslims.

UPDATE: Jawa Report was able to dig up the story here.

I’ve said in the past that important news in the frontiers doesn’t always make it from the Urdu-language papers to the online dailies, and here is a case where perhaps some did. Luckily AJ cut and pasted part of the story: 

The alleged militant group familiarly known as “Taliban” was declared “out of Islam” by 73 different sects of Muslims through an edict (Fatwa) circulated in parts of the narrow tribal strip of Darra Adamkhel.

The edict in Urdu language was circulated on behalf of Mufti Zainul Aabideen on Friday night. The one page edict focuses on Talibans’s terrorists’ acts in the area, particularly slaughtering of human beings and suicide attacks.

…

It is for the first time that a religious scholar declared “Taliban” as being “out of Islam.” The edict said that all the acts of Taliban are against the basic norms of Islam and humanity. “Even the Taliban leaders are considering themselves and their directives as superior to true Islamic principles and directives as ordained by Almighty Allah,” the edict said.

Here’s the important part:

Elaborating his point of view, the author of the edict states that the Taliban declare those infidel who oppose their ideas and interpret Islam according to their own needs and ideas, which is contrary to the all-embracing ideas of Islam.
In this respect, the author of the edict invited the attention of Taliban Mufti Khalid Shah’s edicts against internationally recognized Islamic scholars like late Maulana Hassan Jan, Allama Taqi Usmani, Maulana Tariq Jameel and others. He said that such edicts of Mufti Khalid Shah against such highly credible and respectable religious scholars were available on Tliban-made CDs. 
Mufti Zainul Aabideen further states that Taliban, despite chanting slogan of “Allah’s rule on Allah’s land” are ignoring this slogan in the areas under their control. They not only impose the system of their choice in these areas, but also forcibly collect the so-called taxes and fines from the people. They justify their terrorist acts discussing in mosques, schools and other public places and claim, “There is no sin in killing 100 innocent persons for one guilty person.” Islam prohibits killing of innocent people whereas the Taliban are killing innocent Muslims. Even they congratulate the terrorists and suicide bombers on, what they claim, “entrance into the heaven for killing the innocent people.”
The author of the edict further states that Taliban give preference to the directives of their amirs (heads or commanders) instead of following the directives of Allah Almighty and sayings of the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH). Even Taliban affiliated to different groups are reluctant to recognize each other’s amirs (heads or commanders).
The author of the edict has in particular denounced slaughtering and beheading of the innocent people at hands of the Taliban. 
In the light of this edict, the author has requested Ulema and religious scholars to come forward to denounce such inhuman and immoral acts on the part of the Taliban.

More at The Post from a letter writer who pleads with the Ulema to speak out as well.

Number 1 With a Bullet: Pakistan Tops the Terror Charts

When you shelter vipers for ten or more years, you should expect to get bit. Especially if all your neighbors chase them home to you. After large-scale failures in both Iraq and Afghanistan, Al Qaeda and the affiliated terror groups that shelter under their umbrella have no place better than Pakistan to run or hide.

Pakistan will continue to bear the brunt of the war on terror in the forseeable future due to their ambivalence. From the Post:

LAHORE: Pakistan is not only among the countries with the highest incidence of terrorism but it also tops the list of suicide bombings, leaving Afghanistan and Iraq behind during the first three months of 2008.During this period, Pakistan experienced eighteen suicide attacks in which more than 250 people died. Whereas in both war-ridden countries, Afghanistan and Iraq, had a fewer number of suicide attacks.Iraq experienced thirteen suicide bombings which claimed 274 lives while 15 people died in three suicide attacks in Afghanistan during the first three months of 2008.In 2007, Iraq topped the list of bombings and fatalities among these three countries with more than 150 suicide attacks. Afghanistan had more than 100 suicide attacks and Pakistan came third with 56 attacks but had more fatalities than that of Afghanistan.

In America the vile Reverend Wright talks of chickens home to roost, but since late 2006 I’ve been predicting that Pakistan’s crows would come back to haunt them forevermore.

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New Osama Bin Laden Message Coming

Site has reported that a new message will be forthcoming from Osama Bin Laden. From Reuters:

Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is expected to release a new message, the U.S.-based terrorism monitoring service SITE Institute said on Wednesday.The message is entitled, “The Response Will Be What You See, Not What You Hear,” SITE said in a release.   

This is interesting in the wake of four attacks in Pakistan since we hit Al Libi – will Osama be telling us who we got, and is the speculation that Ayman Al Zawahiri is dead correct, or did we hit Baitullah Mehsud?:

 Jawa has the video, it’s a static pic of Uncle Binny with a voice over Motoon rant.     

UPDATE: Osama Bin Laden is dead, and has been for a while. I agree with Rusty’s analysis at Jawa, this is old retread tape from ’06. If Uncle Binny (I spit in the milk of his mother) is alive, then he needs proof of life for the Taliboys and Jihooties, they are certainly getting not only demoralized, but killed in droves.

The tape is generic mentioning zero current events that are important (Wilder Film, Pakistan elections, assasination of Bhutto, death of Al Libi, Yemen attacks, the Yeshiva attack, the list of things that could have been mentioned goes on and on.) This appears to have been made during the period of the first Motoon uproar, when the Pope was more in the news, and as such the tape is a fraud.