Book Review: The Pashtun Question by Abubakar Siddique

By Ayesha Chugh

First Post

21 June

In his book, Siddique includes an interview with a former Taliban foreign minister Wakil Ahmed Muttawakil. Through Muttawakil’s story, Siddique demonstrates how many impoverished Pashtuns living in Pakistan’s western borderlands ended up in Pakistan’s Deobandi madrasas and became militants in the 1980s.

http://www.firstpost.com/world/book-review-pashtun-question-abubakar-siddique-1582247.html

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Modernizing madrassas: A cheap option which won’t work

Hasan Suroor

First Post

21 June

A major focus of the teaching imparted at the madrasa has to do with the internalization of appropriate gender norms as defined in the Deobandi vision. Thus, strict purdah is rigidly enforced. Girls are not allowed to step outside the madrasa, not even for a walk or to make purchases in the local market.

http://www.firstpost.com/politics/modernizing-madrassas-cheap-option-wont-work-1581959.html

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Plugging all loopholes
Professor Alya

The Nation

June 21, 2014

In the last Juma speech, I heard the Imam inciting the public against operation ‘Zarb e Azb’, which has commenced with full public and government support. The government must keep watch over such a sensitive aspect of our weak society. The fact that most of the people belong to the ‘Deobandi school of thought’ and are appointed in mosques are Taliban sympathizers, must be dealt with. They are virtually the supply line for the terrorists and the government must take initiatives to curb them if they want the operation to be successful and stop further spreading of this ethnic rift.

http://www.nation.com.pk/letters/21-Jun-2014/plugging-all-loopholes

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Tawheed have succeeded in clamping down Sufism and Moderation and Traditionalism.
Lanka Web

June 20th, 2014
Herold Leelawardena

Wahhabi, Deobandi, and Mawdudist are only some extremist Islamic organisations that are active in Sri Lanka. Given the globalist (US) links to Wahhabism and remembering it is such Saudis backed Tawheeds that fought Gaddafi in Libya and Assad in Syria and fight Malaki’s Shia government as ISIS in Iraq now, are we to believe that Tawheed Jihadis have no hand in Aluthgama riots. Don’t forget, Iran is Shia and Sri Lanka is a close friend of Iran.

http://www.lankaweb.com/news/items/2014/06/20/tawheed-have-succeeded-in-clamping-down-sufism-and-moderation-and-traditionalism

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In the name of terror
By Mudasir Nazar

Kashmir Times

21 June

Besides overt, US has also launched covert policies to eliminate political and extremist interpretations of the Islam within Muslim society. To supplant Islamism, it promotes Barelvism and Sufi Islam which are considered as liberal versions of Islam and more tolerant towards pluralism. Even though such myths had been deconstructed by events like killing of Salman Taseer, governor of Punjab province of Pakistan by a person belonging to Barelvi group, but still US sticks to this policy. The basic objective behind the policy is to make way for multicultural Muslim society by eliminating Deobandi and Wahabi versions of Islam.

http://www.kashmirtimes.com/newsdet.aspx?q=33617

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Afghan hardline militants hang Taliban members

Hasan Khan

Central Asia Online
18 June

The differences between LeT and the Taliban are not only operational but ideological, Afghan political analyst Asmat Qani said, with LeT claiming to come from the Salafi school of thought, while the Taliban draw from the Deobandi.

Groups from different Islamic schools of thought do not trust one another, Safi, a youth organisation leader in Afghanistan, said.

The militant-on-militant violence is a by-product of every group positioning itself for post 2014-Afghanistan, Aoun Sahi, a journalist covering militancy, told Central Asia Online.

“LeT is expanding its presence in Kunar and Nuristan from Bajaur and Chitral, and this naturally would not be taken well by the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban,” he said. “The [TTP] uses the same two provinces to launch attacks and cannot afford losing them to some other organisation.”

http://centralasiaonline.com/en_GB/articles/caii/features/pakistan/main/2014/06/18/feature-01

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The Jerusalem Post

Protecting women’s rights
By JAGDISH N SINGH

16 June

According to a study, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has been spending billions of dollars in patronizing mosques, madrassas, journals and cleric training programs, with the aim of exporting Wahabism. Together with Abu Dhabi, Riyadh today pumps into certain Ahle Hadith and Deobandi madrasas an estimated $ 100 million annually to spread Wahhabism the world over.

Middle East observer Jonathan Schanzer says that in recent years there have been “systematic, massive and explicit efforts” at Talibanization led by Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The Islamist organization has “imposed strict rules on women, discouraged activities commonly associated with Western or Christian culture, oppressed non-Muslim minorities, imposed Sharia law, and deployed religious police to enforce these laws.”

http://www.jpost.com/Experts/Protecting-womens-rights-359506

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A President Rewards And Encourages Atrocities
Allan Erickson

Western Journalism
4 June

The Taliban is an Islamic fundamentalist (Deobandi) militant movement of Pashtun tribesmen created by Punjabi generals of Pakistan army and Salafist princes and clerics of Saudi Arabia. It ruled large parts of Afghanistan and its capital, Kabul, as the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan from September 1996 until October 2001. It gained diplomatic recognition from three Takfiri Jihadi states: Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. The main leader of the Taliban movement is a Deobandi cleric Mullah Mohammed Omar, and Kandahar is considered the birthplace of the Taliban.

http://www.westernjournalism.com/president-rewards-encourage-atrocities/#r8LWgmASIDkLLuG7.99

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Takfiri ISIL threatens to demolish Sunni shrine in Baghdad

ABNA

15 June

It is only the Salafis and Deobandis, represented by the ISIS aka ISIL aka Al-Qaeda, who have said that they want to destroy the shrines of Najaf and Karbala.

http://www.abna.ir/english/service/middle-east-west-asia/archive/2014/06/15/616153/story.html

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Takfir and terrorism
Tahir Kamran
June 22, 2014
The News on Sunday

Takfir denotes excommunication or declaration of a person or group of people to be non-Muslim. Although the instances of takfir can be gleaned from the early history of Muslims, it started featuring regularly in the Muslim discourse since the last quarter of the 19th century.

Deobandi clerics were at the centre of the trend of issuing takfiri fatwas. Though not a takfiri treatise as such, Rashid Gangohi’s Hadayatush Shia (Advice to the Shia) is the first published account where one can detect its sign. A Deobandi cleric, Abdul Shakoor Lucknownvi, not only built his career on denouncing Shias but left behind a strong legacy.

http://tns.thenews.com.pk/takfir-and-terrorism

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Who would kill Jaun Elia?
Shamil Shams
June 22, 2014
The News on Sunday

Jaun Elia, arguably the finest Urdu poet of the latter half of the 20th century, was a non-believer, an incorrigible skeptic. Jaun had studied at the Deoband school in India. Deoband used to be a different place at that time. It hadn’t yet transformed into a fatwa-giving factory. In 2002, Jaun died peacefully at Allama Ali Karar’s house in Federal B Area, Karachi; otherwise I’m sure he would have been cold-bloodedly murdered today by some religious fanatic – most probably a Deoband follower.

http://tns.thenews.com.pk/who-would-kill-jaun-elia/#.U6cfJvldWFs

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