How would you classify the hijackers of Islam that are causing all these issue in Pakistan, and your proposed level of dealing with each class?
Those that can be reasoned with.. using knowledge of Islam itself.. those that cannot. .. I leave to your imagination.
Auwaal aur Akhir - the solution to all problems is, even more Islamism, some seem to suggest - Essence of Islam? But Sir, there in Pakistan there are multiple "Essences" of Islam, which particular "essence" are you persuaded by?
We must not be fanatics - and were we fanatics before Zia? Were our Fathers and Mothers other than Muslim before Zia??
So what then is the credibility of arguments that to kill off the Islamist insurgent, we have to Islam the Islamists - May God save Pakistan, but then again, God helps those who help themselves.
In the end, we may end up with government telling us what Islam is and is not - now how is that different from what Zia imposed on us in the first place??
Drowning swimmers are not advised to keep sinking deeper, rather they are advised to get their heads out of water and then their body. This is not a hateful advice but is compassionate advice.
Ah.. but why cant one catch those swimmers.. hold them there, show them how to wade... and let them move on.
There are those who may still sink.. but there are also many who will swim better.
The idea is not to impose anything, the idea is to encourage them to explore by themselves.. and wean out those essences which have a track record of creating problems.
Somehow where there is a need for freedom of religion, we would rather let the ideologies that fuel the extremists live.. rather than wipe them out.
I believe that is an incorrect approach, weapons.. imprisonment may not be the only means of filtering out the extremist idea.
Interestingly, those who are directly responsible for introducing such ideologies have also found a workable solution.
"The counseling program to reeducate and rehabilitate terrorist sympathizers is part of a self-described "war of ideas" against extremism in the kingdom. This quiet struggle has been ongoing for some time, and the program represents a very unique Saudi solution to a Saudi problem. It incorporates many traditional Saudi methods of conflict resolution and conflict management. The fact that the program was started in secret, and not in response to outside pressures, is telling; its origins arose out of recognition in the kingdom that something had to be done to address extremist sympathies and is a tacit acknowledgment of the threat that the "war of ideas" posed.
When members of the Advisory Committee initially sit with a prisoner, one of the first things that they stress is that they are not employees of the Ministry of Interior or associated with the security forces [2]. Rather, they explain that they are independent and righteous scholars. Before the government adopted this technique, it was not uncommon for families to ask clerics and scholars to visit their family members in jail and talk with them about their behavior.
In their first meeting, committee members will simply listen to the prisoner. They ask them about what they did, why they did it and the circumstances that brought them to be in prison. Throughout the process, the scholars engage prisoners in discussions about their beliefs, and then attempt to persuade them that their religious justification for their actions is wrong and based upon a corrupted understanding of Islam. The committee first demonstrates that what the prisoners were tricked into believing was false, and then they teach them the proper state-approved interpretation of Islam.
The Advisory Committee runs two programs. The first includes short sessions, which typically run about two hours. While some prisoners recant their beliefs after the first session, typically a prisoner goes through several of these meetings. The others are called "Long Study Sessions." These are six-week courses for up to 20 students led by two clerics and a social scientist. Ten subjects are covered over the six weeks, including instruction in such topics as takfir, walaah (loyalty) and bayat (allegiance), terrorism, jihad and psychological courses on self-esteem. At the end of the course, an exam is given; those who pass the exam move to the next stage of the process, while those who do not pass repeat the course.
The Counseling Program is based upon a presumption of benevolence, and not vengeance or retribution. It presumes that the suspects were abused, lied to and misled by extremists into straying away from "true Islam," and that the state wants to help security prisoners return to the correct path. The vast majority of prisoners who have participated in the program, according to research conducted by the Advisory Committee, have been found to not have had a religious education during their childhood [3]. Most of the prisoners have been found by the committee to have an incomplete understanding of Islam, and the majority have been radicalized through extremist books, tapes, videos and, more recently, the internet. The Counseling Program, therefore, seeks to "correct" this misunderstanding by reinforcing the official state version of Islam."
While I disagree with the "state" factor in this.. it can be diversified for different communities.. those from which the young men originally came from.
moreover.. such a program can be expanded to seminaries.
Education is always the best cure for this.. and secular motives are also attractive.
But of the four people I know personally as supporters/members of Hizb-ut-tahrir.. two of them came from very moderate and balanced families.
One came from a very agnostic background.. and the fourth had a disturbed domestic environment.
If there is an option that is not as extreme as the Hizbi groups.. but equally or more attractive. Is it not worth pursuing?
