Behind the Chairman’s Door

The domestic news channels are breaking this story out of Rawalpindi that in the area around Chaklala Air Base, there was Light Machine Gun fire at the President’s plane. Dawn News (the newest private news channel) is reporting that a home that was rented by a couple on Thursday was found to have anti-aircraft guns mounted on the roof and roughly 25 14.5 mm shells were found expended when the home was raided.

In addition, there are confirmed reports that President Musharraf’s plane came under rocket fire, but the ISPR has denied this claim saying that it had nothing to do with the President. President Musharraf is in Quetta today to tour the flood affected areas in Baluchistan.

This may be a response to the Lal Masjid siege, but another foolish step by the extremists. Over the past 24 hours, Ghazi Abdul Rasheed, the Deputy Leader of Lal Masjid, has made promises to lay down his weapons and release all the hostages inside, only to renounce it within hours. He has also repeatedly put forward the demand that he be allowed safe passage from Lal Masjid to any location of his choice in Pakistan with his family. His justification is that his brother was humiliated on state-run Pakistan Television network, which has been denounced by President Musharraf, and treated with no dignity. He said that the people that have surrendered to the security forces have been made to disrobe before they were arrested. And lastly, he claimed that the government was parading these Taliban in front of the media to cause further humiliation to them. For all of these reasons, the Deputy Leader of Lal Masjid feels that he should not be arrested, instead given safe passage.

Again the logic of the Deputy Leader shows numerous faults:

When he claims to be concerned about the sanctity of life of the students held up with Lal Masjid, he refuses to allow them to leave the masjid, nor will he surrender himself. It also seems that the only lives that have any sanctity are those of the students inside Lal Masjid, as last night the terrorists fired rocket launchers at an Armored Personnel Carrier and intensified their attacks on the security forces. If you are so concerned with the sanctity of the lives of the people inside Lal Masjid, surrender yourself to the security forces and bring this to an end. Rather, you continue to make inflammatory statements that “we will not surrender and will fight to the death.” Fine, you can fight to the death, but release the women and children hostages that you have taken.
The Deputy Leader feels that he has done nothing wrong, repeatedly stating that he is not a criminal. I think if you ask Osama bin Laden, he will say the same. I’m sure that Saddam Hussein said the same thing from his arrest to when he was executed. There are over 25 police cases registered against Ghazi Abdul Rasheed, not counting the potential of numerous dead bodies inside Lal Masjid. You must stand for all the deaths, vandalism, kidnappings, hostages and attacks that have been carried out from Lal Masjid, as you are the one that continues the fight. You choose to take the law into your own hands, which is not acceptable in any country of the world, and must be brought before the courts for judgment and, if found guilty, sentencing. Add to that the fact that you have provided a safe house for terrorists from TNSM, who I have written about in detail in other post on this blog, and Jaish-e-Mohammedi, a Kashmiri terrorist organization, and you regular support for the Taliban and Al-Qaeda. For those that are not familiar, the black flag that flies outside of Lal Masjid is the flag of Al-Qaeda.
He is right that ever person that has surrendered to the security forces has been asked to take off their shirts. This would not have occurred if the Deputy Leader didn’t tell the entire domestic media that they would carry out “thousands of suicide attacks” around Pakistan if the government were to use force against them. Again, the embarrassment that the people that surrender are feeling is because of the numerous incendiary statements that you have made against the government. And the brainwashed students are still talking about suicide attacks in the country to retaliate for the government’s action against the terrorists. There are no guarantees that there are not suicide bombers coming out of Lal Masjid and there is no reason that anyone surrendering should be trusted not to carry one out, which is why all the surrenderer’s are being moved to Adalya Jail for processing and clearance. Again, potentially innocent people are suffering because of your poor decision making and foolish rhetoric.
The Deputy Leader of Lal Masjid claims that they are under attack even though they wish to surrender and that the government should stop firing on the masjid. Excuse me?! If we go back to the day that started this siege in motion, it was radicals from Lal Masjid that were firing live bullets, grenades and molitov cocktails at the security forces, while the security forces fired tear gas cannisters in return. Even today, the extremists inside Lal Masjid are firing heavily on the security forces with advanced weaponry that is not in the hands of the normal, law abiding citizen.
Even the religious clerics that were trying to broker a peaceful end to the siege have told the Deputy Leader of Lal Masjid to surrender and be arrested to avoid the additional loss of life of innocent people. Maulana Fazl-ur-Rehman, who since Wednesday has been trying to convince Ghazi Abdul Rasheed to surrender and let the courts decide the cases against him; this morning on GEO TV flatly said that he must give himself up for arrest now, as there are no other options. The reply from the terrorist: “We will never surrender and will fight to the death.” As reported in the domestic media this morning, the Ulema (religious council) has warned all masjids in Pakistan not to speak about Lal Masjid and Jamia Hafsa in their Friday prayer speeches.
According to a survey announced last night, 82% of Pakistan supports the government’s action against Lal Masjid and wants to see both the Ghazi brothers brought to justice for their behavior, their insult of Islam and the nation of Pakistan. This is further evidenced by the sheer number of phone calls being placed to domestic talk shows commending the government and the security forces on the patience and tolerance that they have shown throughout this stand-off and the support of the military action. I am looking for the hyper link to the survey, as it was reported in the media this morning.