But why to be cross with the US? It has always been
oppressive to freedom loving but subjugated nations. Its policy is to enslave
countries politically and economically in modern age. Americans dropped atom bombs on Hiroshima and
Nagasaki in 20th century taking a toll of the lives of more than three hundred
thousand men, women and children. The soil there cannot grow any greenery even
today. Kids are born with various debilities and disabilities. Thousands of
people were massacred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia in carpet bombing by the
Americans. Rusted bombs are still recovered occasionally from the farms there.
A scare of communism was created in Latin America, especially Chile. Widespread
killings were done in African and Muslim countries.
Desecrating a dead body is such an insignificant event in
face of these atrocities. US would not care for the living beings, leave aside
the dead. But those who created the US did it on the basis of the principles of
freedom and self-determination for the nations. Naturally the souls of those
founding fathers must be turning in their graves on finding the US converting
to a colonial country.
Innumerable write ups have been produced on the life and
death of Osama bin Laden. From publicity point of view his death is the third
biggest news of the 21 century.
According to a conservative estimate the US spent tens of billions of dollars
to locate him. Osama is the Frankenstein of the US being its creation. They
used him against the Soviet Union in Afghan war. He was privy to many secrets
of the US and its CIA. After the Afghan war was over, the US left Afghanistan
leaving Afghans in lurch. When the Afghans realized that not Russia but the US
and its colonialism were the real enemy of Muslims, they pledged to seek
revenge from the US. They did all that cut at the roots of the American
interests.
Unfortunately Osama or Taliban could not realize that their
actions did more harm to the cause of the Muslims. It was just because they
were obsessed with hatred towards the US. Osama was an educated person and many
of his comrades had received their education in western or American
universities. They found that the US was out to enslave the Muslims politically
and economically. In particular, the US wanted general loot of the oil booty of
the Arabs. They saw that the US adopted divide and rule policy vis-à-vis the
Muslims; they saw that it protected illegal occupation of Palestine by the
Israelis, and they saw that it was privy to the massacre of the Palestinians by
the Israelis. All this created lava of hatred in their mind against the
Americans. Thus not distinguishing between the oppressor or the oppressed,
innocent or the culprit, Al Qaeda let loose terrible terror against the US and
the European countries. The US did carpet bombing on Tora Bora hills, and
deployed one and a half lakh American and European troops against war in
Afghanistan which resulted in the killing of hundreds of thousands of Afghans.
Al Qaeda targeted American missions in foreign countries. In
9/11 attack the Twin Towers of World Trade Centre in NY and the building in
Pentagon. This was the first attack of the enemies of the US on the American
homeland which turned the US almost mad. The US began picking up anybody and
every body in Afghanistan and Pakistan whom she suspected of involvement in
9/11. The arrested persons were interned in Guantanamo Bay prison.
Al Qaeda attacked a train in Spain that killed about 250
persons. On 7/7 it made the British underground rail system its target that
resulted in the killing of many innocent people. Many of its horrible missions
did not materialize. The US and the western countries got exasperated by these
recurrent attacks. The US challenged Muslim countries, including Pakistan that
“those who were not with the US in war on terror were against the US and would
be sent back to Stone Age”. At the same time the US put a heavy prize of
millions of dollars on the heads of Al Qaeda and Taliban leaders.
Pakistani governments made a good use of the situation. They
picked up Al Qaeda and Taliban leaders, handed them over to the Americans and
in return received billions of dollars. General Pervez Musharraf has described
it fully in one paragraph of his book “In the Line of Fire”.
Man rumours were floated during past one decade about the
arrest and death of Osama. In 2003-4, I participated in a discussion in Europe.
We talked about Osama, whether he was alive or dead and if alive, where was he
hiding. I said with some analytical view that if he had managed to escape alive
from Tora Bora bombardment then, surely he must be hiding in some city in
Pakistan or must have taken shelter with some powerful elements in Pakistan.
Now that we know he had been living first in Haripore and then in Abbatabad for
last eight and a half years, it means that he had left Afghanistan as early as
2003 while the Americans and their allies were looking for him in Tora Bora and
Waziristan. Drone attacks killed thousands of innocent Afghans and Pakistanis.
Conflicting reports are coming in in the aftermath of
American raid on Osama hideout. On the one hand the US President and Pakistani
rulers claim that Pakistan rendered significant service to CIA in getting
Osama. President Obama thanked Pakistan for operation against Osama. But then
the Pakistani’s suddenly made about turn and began saying that Pakistan was not
informed about operation against Osama. It protested to Americans for violating
Pakistani air space. But ours is the age of computers and everybody feels a
compulsion to think that Pakistan was an accomplice with the Americans in their
operation against Osama. And if it was
not so, then is Pakistan a paralyzed banana state?
I for one cannot believe it. Pakistani army and its ISI are
a highly trained force and the ISI is one of the world’s most efficient
organizations. Despite several challenges looking straight into Pakistan’s
face, it has opted to be the standard bearer of jihad in the world. It is
unthinkable that three American helicopters stay put in Pakistani air
jurisdiction for two hours and neither the Pakistani army nor the intelligence
has any information about it. It has to be remembered that the site of
operation was Abbotabad where Pakistani Army has its Divisional Headquarter and
Kakol Military Academy. At a distance of
just 20 kilometers from the site of operation is Kamrah air base. It is
preposterous to say that Pakistan had no information of this operation.?
The fact is that Pakistan wanted to ward off the backlash
from religious extremist elements among the Pakistani people, Taliban and Al
Qaeda activists after the American operation was over. This was a gambit
jointly contrived and executed by the Americans and Pakistanis. This has been
confirmed by the statement of former Pakistani Corps Commander Salahu’d-Din
Tirmizi who categorically said that “the entire operation was executed with
full cooperation of Pakistan. Pakistan was forced to adopt this stand in order
to escape the torment of terrorism. Now the US is not a foreign power for
Pakistan. She is in fact the supremo of our rulers, and they are all the slaves
who have no guts to say no to its diktat.”
Please come out of blind emotionalism. Don’t label them
traitors who speak and write the truth. There are many around who could be on
the pay roll of India or Pakistan. Islam is a religion of pragmatism. It
repeatedly speaks of patience and enjoins upon Muslims to do deep thinking and
introspection on issues. Imagine a man who carries a prize of 50 crores of
dollars or 25 arab rupees on his head; here is a man who lives in a house in
Abbotabad with three wives and eight children; here is a man who is a kidney
patient and survives on the dialysis and needs medical support regularly, and
here is a man who has to fulfill the daily needs of his household. And then
Pakistani authorities aver that they had no knowledge on his being in
Abbotabad. This is the biggest lie of 21st century.?
I am ready to accept that President Zardari and the Prime
Minister, meaning political establishment and the bureaucracy had no wink of it
but definitely the top brass of the army and ISI were in know of it.
It has to be reminded that Pakistan has been an ally of the US in
latter’s war on terrorism. Pakistan has given large sacrifices also. Pakistan
even handed over to the Americans some top leaders of Al Qaeda like Khalid
Shiekh and some Taliban leaders during the regime of Pervez Musharraf. Even an
atomic scientist lady Arifa Sidiqe too was handed over to the Americans on
accusations of supporting Al Qaeda. All
this was done to convince American masters that Pakistan was their ally in war
on terrorism.
As a person and as an entity, Osama is dead but his thoughts
and his war against the US and the European countries will continue as long the
US and the European countries do not stop exploitation of the entire world in
general but the Muslims in particular. The British too had disposed the body of
Bhagat Singh and his colleagues after hanging them but they had to leave India
at the end of the day. Indira Gandhi ordered hanging of Maqbool Bhat and his
dead body was buried within the premises of the Tihar jail. But today Maqbool
Bhat is the brightest lighthouse for the people of the state. An organization may be liquidated, leaders
can be butchered, and their dead bodies can be disposed off clandestinely or
thrown into the sea. But staunch followers of truth and fighters for the rights
of oppressed peoples have their thinking and ideas which cannot be buried or
submerged under water.The US contrived the death of Che Govera in 1960s. CIA
buried him secretly. But his grave was identified after a lapse of thirty years
and he was re-buried with full rites and with great respect.
We need to remember that jurisprudence is the heritage of
Momins. Unfortunately, Kashmir leadership has made her people a hostage to
blind emotions. Movements in Kashmir have thrived on emotionalism and when
emotions cool down the movements also get fossilized. In the past our leaders
have generally made the armed organizations as their military wing and thus
contrived the death of the youth in forests, along roadside, torture houses,
prison cells, desolate lands, mountains and gorges. They left the orphans and
the kith of the martyrs to their fate. When India wrested the gun from them,
the same leaders bade farewell to the politics of violence and began condemning
it. Geelani gave the name of Islamic commandos to those who pelted stones and
then the same Geelani declared pelting of stones as anti-people act. Late
Mualana Showkat and living martyrs like me often suggested against closing down
of schools and unnecessarily stretching out the strikes. Nobody listened to us.
Whether Osama bin Laden was a terrorist or a great mujahid
is not the point. There is a UN resolution against him and Al Qaeda. It
declared Osama as the chief of Al Qaeda a terrorist organization. The US and
European countries, of who the UN is a handmaid, spend over 3 billion dollars
in locating Osama. They considered him responsible for the killing of thousands
of civilians. If I open a discussion on whether Osama was a terrorist or not, I
will provoke many followers of blind emotionalism against me. I would therefore
remain content with the commentary of a famous Pakistani journalist Manu Bhai.
This is what he says:
“There are many questions arising in the context of Osama
bin Laden. In the name of service to Islam he became the prime cause for
greatest decimation of Muslims and their destruction. He was the cause for
humiliation of Muslim travelers especially Pakistani Muslim travelers at all
international airports where they are required to undress and even take off
their shoes for security reasons. There are many questions about projecting
Osama first as a mujahid and then a terrorist.”There should be no need for any
further comment on the subject. According to Quranic injunction, killing an
innocent person is tantamount to killing all the humanity in the eyes of God.
It is true that after 9/11 event, Muslims came under great
stress. They are being harassed at the airports under the pretext of security
check. Western universities imposed a ban on the admission of Muslim students
in universities and professional institutions. Even issuing of passport and
visa too became very difficult.
Previously Muslim missionaries visiting western countries on propagation
missions were given visas but now these too have been stopped. Now if somebody
announces that namaze janazeh (prayer in absentia for a dead) be performed, is
it not doing harm to the struggle of Kashmiris? Will not Kashmiris be
associated with Al Qaeda? I cannot understand the logic of offering namaze juma
for the dead Osama after five days of his death. Since Jamaate Islami Pakistan
and Lashkar-eTaayyiba and other religious organizations offered prayer in
absentia for Osama on Tuesday and Wednesday, Geelani and Shabir Shah found no
justification in not following the suit. Reports say that Geelani’s appeal for
prayer in absentia was by and large ignored by the people in Kashmir so much so
that the Imam of Batmaloo mosque slipped out of the backdoor of the mosque
without offering the prayer in absentia.
Just two days prior to that, Mr. Tramboo had called a
conference in Belgium in which some European Parliament members were present.
Geelani and Shabir Shah talked to them on telephone about Kashmir
question. Now we are prepared to tell
the long tale of our woes of Indian oppression to any Tom, Dick and Harry
coming from the US or a European country and on the other hand we do not take
into account what impact will offering of Osama’s prayer in absentia have on
our movement? Mind you the Americans and the Europeans considered Osama the
greatest terrorist leader in the world.
Will Kashmiri leadership come out of egoism, urge for
temporary popularity and thirst for media publicity? Will they not spare the
helpless people of this state?
If we talk of pragmatism, then we shall have to speak about
Geelani Sahib. The government does not allow him to offer prayers and puts him
under house arrest so that he is not provoking the public. But when he
announced offering prayer in absentia for Osama, the government immediately
lifted the ban on him. The government made its point which was to convey to the
US that the government in J&K is also fighting elements that support Osama.
Thus happened what had to happen and Geelani Sahib has no inkling of what he
was doing.? Our separatist leadership should think over these issues.
Generally when a house catches fire, people try to
extinguish it. Indian media is a third rate media and Indian leaders have
stirred hornet’s nest in the aftermath of the killing of Osama. India should
know that the terrorist anywhere in the world have received their training in Pakistan
or Waziristan. For last twenty years India has been struggling hard to get
Pakistan declared a terrorist state. But since Pakistan is the need of the US
and the western countries, none of them would declare her a terrorist state.
India should remember that by unleashing propaganda against Pakistan and
running away from solving the issues will not help reduce the problems facing
India. It is a big misunderstanding to think that India can launch a US-like
operation against Hafiz Saeed or other wanted persons. Any venture like that
would be a precursor to horrible catastrophe. India should realize that
Pakistan will never hand over the leaders of such organizations as are declared
terrorist organizations and fighting against India. Pakistan will keep them
alive and support them. It is so because it is Pakistan’s defence requirement.
Al outstanding issues including Kashmir should be resolved
through dialogue. I would also advise Omar Abdullah not to challenge Kashmiri
people by claiming that the people took part in assembly or in panchayat
elections. This is their necessity. Kashmir is sitting on a keg of powder and a
small mistake by the government can blow it up. We should recall the past years
2008 – 2010. This government has not been able to give a glass of pure water to
the people. It is a mistake to think that a semblance of peace prevails here
because of the deliverance of the government. The fact is that there is egoism
among the Hurriyat groups, disunity, ideological contradictions and absence of
a definite programme of carrying forward the struggle for freedom. This makes
the government think that there is peace in the valley while it is only
superficial. This nation is not deficient in making sacrifices. I wish the
leadership had a concrete and definite programme to offer. Allama Iqbal has
rightly said about this community:
Nahin hai naumid Iqbal apni
kishte weran se
Zara nam ho to
yeh mitti bahut zarkhez hai saqi
This
article was published in "Daily Greater Kashmir" on 14th May 2011.
