Thirty-three minutes
On Thursday night PTV telecast an address on the issue by President Musharraf. “It was the president’s shortest speech, lasting only 33 minutes,” noted Dawn on Friday. The Daily Times listed the highlights: “Militancy, extremism and terrorism will be crushed; operation against Lal Masjid was inevitable; Ghazi to blame for failure of talks, demanded amnesty for himself and foreign militants; kidnapping of Chinese was ‘most unfortunate’ event; government tried to minimise casualties in operation; Lal Masjid extremists tarnished image of Islam; Militants had links in NWFP, FATA; Ulema, Wafaqul Madaris must help bring madrassas into mainstream; army backing NWFP government to fight militancy.”

Why the state matters
In the July 13-19 issue of The Friday Times, Moeed Yusuf takes up an interesting aspect of the response to the Lal Masjid operation and tries to answer “why citizens don’t back the state”: “While it is usual for conspiracy theorists to be at play in such situations, the ease with which people have bought into arguments that suggest that the state has engineered the entire drama is alarming. A large segment of the populace in urban towns holds the state responsible without having understood the complexity of the situation... In the initial phases of the episode, when the government was reluctant to take on Lal Masjid cadres, authorities were criticised for attempting to appease clerics. The call was for tougher action. When the ‘operation’ began, the opinion completely changed and the government was blamed for conducting an operation that was putting human life in danger.” The point, he says, is not whether there is something in the conspiracy theories. It is this: “The state is increasingly being considered an enemy, rather than a caretaker. In that sense, the Jamia Hafsa episode is only the latest in a host of events in the recent past where an anti-state posture has been adopted. Growing resentment vis-à-vis the state is a grave and potentially explosive concern... Under an antagonistic outlook towards the state, governments would naturally be inclined to shy away from pushing aggressive decisions through.”

... contd.