Is it too late to vote, yet again, in the poll to name the most important religion-news stories of 2007?
The events keep unfolding all around us, one shock after another.
The Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was assassinated near the capital, Islamabad, on Thursday. Witnesses said Ms. Bhutto, who was appearing at a political rally, was fired upon by a gunman at close range, quickly followed by a blast that the government said was caused by a suicide attacker. …
A close aide to Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf blamed Islamic militants for the assassination, and said it was carried out by a suicide bomber. Ms. Bhutto’s death is the latest blow to Pakistan’s treacherous political situation, and leaves her party leaderless in the short term and unable to effectively compete in hotly contested parliamentary elections that are two weeks away, according to Hasan Askari Rizvi, a leading Pakistani political and military analyst.
The assassination also adds to the enormous pressure on the Bush administration over Pakistan, which has sunk billions in aid into the country without accomplishing its main goals of finding Osama bin Laden or ending the activities of Islamic militants and Taliban in border areas with Afghanistan.
No ghosts in that story at all. Right? The phrase “Islamic militants” covers it all, right now, and if that does not work then we have “extremist Islamic groups” mentioned later in the same story. All of this is, of course, linked to that great goal of the ages — a form of government in a Muslim culture that is neither an Islamist state nor a military/royal machine. Is anything else possible?
Near the end, we read another quote from inside the current regime:
The [Musharraf] aide dismissed complaints from members of Ms. Bhutto’s party that the government failed to provide adequate security for Ms. Bhutto. Ms. Bhutto herself had complained that the government’s security measures for her Karachi parade were inadequate. The government maintained that she ignored their warnings against such public gatherings and that holding them placed herself and her followers in unnecessary danger.
Asked of the bombing was planned in the country’s lawless tribal areas — where Mr. bin Laden and other Qaeda members are thought to be hiding — the aide said “must be, must be.” Militants based in the country’s tribal areas have carried out a record number of suicide bombings in Pakistani this year.
Here is my question, yet again. Is the word “lawless” accurate in that paragraph? There is no law at all, or is the form of the law the whole point?
Meanwhile, let’s also flash back to that Newsweek cover story: “Where the Jihad Lives now.” That’s the package that proclaimed Pakistan the most dangerous nation in the world.
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Comments (8) |
December 27, 2007, at 12:01 pm
Nice ghost catch, sir. “Lawless” is the term used since Kipling and Conan Doyle for that area, but the on-the-ground reporting from Waziristan shows they have such an excess of Sharia law they have to export it …
Isn’t it only fair to point out that it’s a pretty “imperialist” reading of the indigenous context to call it “lawless”?
December 27, 2007, at 12:17 pm
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December 27, 2007, at 1:54 pm
Someone I know who used to be a reporter and traveled in Afghanistan and Pakistan during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan has more than once said that he believes the Pakistan security service (ISI) is in cahoots with al Queda and the Taliban. There’s no way that any of us can know for sure if Musharraf ordered her killed or if some members of his security service did it on their own or whether it was solely the work of al Queda or maybe even another group working with them.
Please define “Islamist” in this context. The word is as bad in my view as evangelical- it’s a invitation to projection. And to ask the question you did opens the door to an ongoing debate about cultural versus religious factor snd comparisons with other nations such as Africa, Asia and South America. The mess there also underlines the wisdom of the founding fathers in strictly separating church and state in the US.
December 27, 2007, at 2:12 pm
One followup - we’re sure to hear the word martyr tossed around a lot over this trajedy. It’s worthwhile remembering that the word means different things to different people. For example, in the Muslim context there’s this “hadith” I found on Wikipedia:
That’s quite different than what non-Muslims mean by that word.
December 27, 2007, at 2:23 pm
JERRY:
I have been trying to find out what ISLAMIST means for several years.
http://www.getreligion.org/?p=2899
The assumption is that it had to do with a combination of Islamic militancy and attempts to establish theocracy (word accurately used).
But I don’t know anymore. I think you’re right that the term is basically meaningless.
I am beginning to think that Sharia is too vague, now. There is sharia and then there is real Sharia, Sharia that will please the people who will kill in order to establish that concept of law.
This is ALL about the rule of law. Not democracy. The rule of LAW.
December 28, 2007, at 8:13 am
[…] Rev. Kit Ketcham has posted an excellent article regarding her reaction to the news of Prime Minister Bhutto’s death, rightly seeing it as an attack on female authority in male dominated societies. She not only represented democracy and moderation, but equality for women and the modernizing of Pakistan. Terry Mattingly of GetReligion.org also points out the very dangerous situation which this places the United States in his article about her assassination. […]
December 28, 2007, at 2:50 pm
tmatt wrote:
Er, I’m confused. What about the Republic of Indonesia, the largest Muslim country in the world? They haven’t had a singular strong-man since Suharto.
But that begs the very question at hand that reporters miss all the time—why is the latter the REAL Sharia and the former not? Especially since millions upon millions of Muslims live under various forms of Islamic-influenced law and ‘informal social order’ (a more adequate description of Sharia) quite peacefully. Until reporters covering Islam get a grasp on the indigenous and localized nature and historical process of Islamic jurisprudence and law, there will never be an acceptable common understanding of the term.
December 28, 2007, at 9:15 pm
I remember when traveling in NW Pakistan in the late ’80s, we were told not to leave the pavement of the highways in the tribal areas. People told us that the laws of Pakistan didn’t apply there, even though we were in Pakistan, and if we got kidnapped, the government couldn’t help us since the tribes were pretty much in control of those areas.