Posted by Dr. Gopal Unnikrishna Kurup
The Peshawar Carnage.
The Peshawar school massacre of children by the Taliban is the nadir of depravity to which human mind can fall . The only other parallel in modern history that could perhaps outdo this devilry is the one by Chechnya Islamist militant separatists on a Beslan school in North Ossetia, Russia in September 1-3, 2004. In all, at least 385 people were killed there, including 156 children. The youngest was two years old.
As night fell on Tuesday in Peshawar, a teeming, volatile city near the Afghan border of Pakistan, security forces wrapped up an operation that lasted more than eight hours and involved intense gun battles.
At least 132 students and nine staff members were killed on that day in the bloodiest massacre Pakistan has seen for years when Taliban gunmen broke into the school at about 10 am and opened fire. A teacher was burnt to death in front of the students in a classroom. “One of my teachers was crying,” a student narrated from hospital. “She had been shot in the hand and was crying in pain. One terrorist then walked up to her and started shooting her until she stopped making any sound. All around me my friends were lying injured and dead.” The school is located on the edge of a military cantonment in Peshawar, where the militant gunmen , equipped with suicide vests entered through a graveyard which is adjacent to the school.
The horrific attack, carried out by a relatively small number of militants from the Tehreek-e-Taliban group, a Pakistani militant splinter group also sent dozens of wounded flooding into local hospitals, as terrified parents searched for their children. The attack on the military-run high school attended by more than 1,100 people, bulk of them children of army personnel, but many of them civilians too , pierced the heart of Pakistan's military establishment. Pakistan has both created and lived with terrorist attacks for years, but the scale and savageness of this latest attack reverberated around not only the country but the world. “There is not a belief system in the world that can justify such an act. I think what this shows is the worldwide threat that is posed by this poisonous ideology of extremist Islamist terrorism. said David Cameron, British Prime Minister. Prime Minister Narendra Modi personally spoke to his counterpart Nawaz Sheriff.
Taliban sent a few clear messages here. They attacked a soft target that was very sensitive to the army, - clearly, an attempt to demoralize the military. May be, the second is to do with Malala who herself has been shot earlier by Taliban and who is now receiving accolades from all over the world and whose views on modern education for all is opposed by Taliban who wants Islamic schooling system. Thirdly the Taliban is showing that in their fight against the state, this part of Pakistan is already ungovernable.
The heinous attack and massacre of children by Taliban, the extent of depravity and savage brutality it exhibits emphasize the lessons this failed errant state that is Pakistan, should learn, who terms terrorists as "good terrorists" and "bad terrorists" and employ the former kind to attack India, The historical unholy covert connections between the Pakistan army, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), security police, and the Taliban itself –abetted by the corruption and avarice of the political elite of the country has been a double-edged sword. As Hilary Clinton remarked, you cannot rear poisonous snakes in your backyard and expect them to bite only the neighbors. For many years, the ISI and the Pakistani army helped to fund and arm the mujahedin and then the Taliban in Afghanistan, first against Russians and then covertly against Americans and the ineffective Afghan regime, even after America discovered that Pakistan was a Trojan horse hiding Osama bin Laden. And the Afghans are complaining that Pakistan is assisting the Taliban in its struggle against the pro-American regime in Kabul
Now that the snake in the backyard has bitten them, the Pakistan security forces regard the Taliban as their principal enemy. When stories of Pakistani military barbarity against the Taliban in Pakistan – reports of the execution of Taliban prisoners in Waziristan, whose bodies were left to lie upon the roads to be eaten by animals – came out recently, the revenge by the Taliban had also become certain.. Now that the all out retaliation by the army is sure to make the battle between the Pak military and the Islamists more vicious in Waziristan, it also ensures that more brutal could be the response of the Islamists. Pakistani military offensives against the Taliban are now seen by the victims in Waziristan as part of America’s war against Muslims.
Pakistan is on the horns of deadly dilemma: its army has to hate and fight the Taliban – but it also needs Taliban - for use against India.
The Peshawar Carnage.
As night fell on Tuesday in Peshawar, a teeming, volatile city near the Afghan border of Pakistan, security forces wrapped up an operation that lasted more than eight hours and involved intense gun battles.
At least 132 students and nine staff members were killed on that day in the bloodiest massacre Pakistan has seen for years when Taliban gunmen broke into the school at about 10 am and opened fire. A teacher was burnt to death in front of the students in a classroom. “One of my teachers was crying,” a student narrated from hospital. “She had been shot in the hand and was crying in pain. One terrorist then walked up to her and started shooting her until she stopped making any sound. All around me my friends were lying injured and dead.” The school is located on the edge of a military cantonment in Peshawar, where the militant gunmen , equipped with suicide vests entered through a graveyard which is adjacent to the school.
The horrific attack, carried out by a relatively small number of militants from the Tehreek-e-Taliban group, a Pakistani militant splinter group also sent dozens of wounded flooding into local hospitals, as terrified parents searched for their children. The attack on the military-run high school attended by more than 1,100 people, bulk of them children of army personnel, but many of them civilians too , pierced the heart of Pakistan's military establishment. Pakistan has both created and lived with terrorist attacks for years, but the scale and savageness of this latest attack reverberated around not only the country but the world. “There is not a belief system in the world that can justify such an act. I think what this shows is the worldwide threat that is posed by this poisonous ideology of extremist Islamist terrorism. said David Cameron, British Prime Minister. Prime Minister Narendra Modi personally spoke to his counterpart Nawaz Sheriff.
Taliban sent a few clear messages here. They attacked a soft target that was very sensitive to the army, - clearly, an attempt to demoralize the military. May be, the second is to do with Malala who herself has been shot earlier by Taliban and who is now receiving accolades from all over the world and whose views on modern education for all is opposed by Taliban who wants Islamic schooling system. Thirdly the Taliban is showing that in their fight against the state, this part of Pakistan is already ungovernable.
The heinous attack and massacre of children by Taliban, the extent of depravity and savage brutality it exhibits emphasize the lessons this failed errant state that is Pakistan, should learn, who terms terrorists as "good terrorists" and "bad terrorists" and employ the former kind to attack India, The historical unholy covert connections between the Pakistan army, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), security police, and the Taliban itself –abetted by the corruption and avarice of the political elite of the country has been a double-edged sword. As Hilary Clinton remarked, you cannot rear poisonous snakes in your backyard and expect them to bite only the neighbors. For many years, the ISI and the Pakistani army helped to fund and arm the mujahedin and then the Taliban in Afghanistan, first against Russians and then covertly against Americans and the ineffective Afghan regime, even after America discovered that Pakistan was a Trojan horse hiding Osama bin Laden. And the Afghans are complaining that Pakistan is assisting the Taliban in its struggle against the pro-American regime in Kabul
Now that the snake in the backyard has bitten them, the Pakistan security forces regard the Taliban as their principal enemy. When stories of Pakistani military barbarity against the Taliban in Pakistan – reports of the execution of Taliban prisoners in Waziristan, whose bodies were left to lie upon the roads to be eaten by animals – came out recently, the revenge by the Taliban had also become certain.. Now that the all out retaliation by the army is sure to make the battle between the Pak military and the Islamists more vicious in Waziristan, it also ensures that more brutal could be the response of the Islamists. Pakistani military offensives against the Taliban are now seen by the victims in Waziristan as part of America’s war against Muslims.
Pakistan is on the horns of deadly dilemma: its army has to hate and fight the Taliban – but it also needs Taliban - for use against India.
