Tears flowing down their faces, anguished facial expressions, bearded faces. These are the pictures from Pakistan news about people mourning and protesting for Osama bin Laden. What the international media repeatedly fails to mention is that these pictures belong to a very small clan of people, who do not share their views or opinion with the majority of the population.
I am talking about people of Pakistan, who watch movies, listen to music, play sports and live life in a normal way and who are devoid of any sadistic sense of brutality or vengeance.
When the US attacked Afghanistan in 2001, I was shocked. A 16-year-old, I felt sympathetic towards the Mujahedeen, and those who stood against this invasion. Most of the people I knew were ignorant about the pain caused by Taliban regime. We were drenched in emotional attachment of brotherhood and love for our people. When the videos of missiles striking the city of Kabul were shown, I was filled with anguish.
I felt it was wrong and inhumane to attack a country in such a barbaric manner. As I grew up and met people from Afghanistan, I learnt about the atrocities that occurred under the leadership of Osama bin Laden. I was horrified. I realised that it was not Osama bin Laden that I cared about; it was the people of Afghanistan. If they were happy, we had no right to bear a grudge against this war.
However, 10 years later, and more mature, my grudge against this war on terror is greater than ever, and why should it not be? This war on terror has done more damage to Pakistan than any other country. Over the past 10 years, we have seen how the attitude and lifestyle of our people has changed. Coming from a middle-class family, I speak for myself and my friends when I say, we were happier nation. The two things we would whine about were cricket and India. Life was easier, less complicated. Today, no one knows how the day would unfold, such is the uncertainty of life.
The list of “collateral damage” continues to increase. It is a term that shows how disrespectful our media can be. Of course we are talking about bricks, pieces of furniture and household items. We are also talking about countless men, women and children who have nothing to do with the attack on the World Trade Centre. Names converted into numbers, bodies converted into dust. All, the work of an automatically controlled aircraft drone. These drone attacks have become routine for those who live in the border areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan. These people are so distant from the mainland, that we do not hear their cries. Their existence meant nothing to an average citizen of the United States, nor does their death.
Bomb blasts and terrorists activities in Pakistan have now become routine. I remember the start of this series of terrorist activities. A wave of panic would erupt, engulfing the entire country after a blast. People would stop working, phones would start ringing. Now, you hardly check where your close family members are. Facebook updates confirm the status of others. Life does not halt. Work continues. No news is good news. The number of people who died in these activities can be countable. However, there are those who got injured, lost a body part, lost their jobs, lost their chance of a good life, those who were affected. These cannot be counted.
It is hard to explain the sufferings of this nation. President Obama said in his speech that “this war was brought to our shores”. This war was not only brought to the mainland of Pakistan, it still continues, as I write these words. For 10 years, we have suffered the affects of a war, which had nothing to do with our average citizen. For 10 years, we have sacrificed our lives and our blood for a battle, which was enforced on us.
For 10 years, we have been on the forefront of a battle that we never wanted to be a part of. For 10 years, we have faced perhaps the worse situation in our history. During this decade, the terror has increased, filling our hearts and our minds. I compare myself with the younger kids and I see they are more mature than I was at their age; a generation brought up in state of war, a generation that will continue to see this war for time unknown.
Yes, Osama bin Laden has been declared dead, I use the word declared because I just can’t help but have doubts about his death. The shady details of the entire operation performed to kill him appears like a scene from a B-grade flick. The way his body was buried in the sea “according to Islamic traditions” is too suspicious to believe. I mentally try to compare the proceedings after his death and that of Saddam Hussein. There is a stark difference. Questions should have been raised when it was decided that someone from inside a land-locked country, as resource-poor as Afghanistan, could plan an attack on the World Trade Centre.
Questions should have been raised when an entire country was raided in order to hunt down one man. Questions should be raised now that that man has been caught and killed after a US-run operation on the mainland of Pakistan, without any authority or knowledge of its officials. These questions are important because we the people of Pakistan are blamed, hurt, attacked and knocked down by both sides. The US and the international community as well as by the remnants of al-Qaeda and the Taliban. These questions are important because we avoided being bombed to the stone ages in 2001 after Bush threatened us. I am not so sure if we can avoid it this time.
Good article. You can’t help but feel for the people caught up in all this after reading it.
It may have helped the case for this article if the Pakistani Government had;
1. Prevented the use of Pakistan as a safe haven by Jihardists attacking into Afghanistan
2. Not bankrolled its own terrorist organisations which have been used to attack its neighbor India, and more recently seemed to have turned on their paymasters
3. Not helped set up the Taliban in the first place and supported them in their oppression of the Afghan people
4. Not provided Bin Laden with a safe place in the first place. Anyone who believes the Pakistani Government’s claims that it had no idea that Bin Laden had been living in the same place for six years, in a closely monitored military garrison town, less that 500 metres from a police station and half a kilometre from a military base and acadamy, is a fool.
It is noteworthy that the US is not forced to undertake operations against Taliban in other countries that border Afghanistan, only in Pakistan have the Taliban found such a welcoming environment anf government that allows them to continue to carry out peration across the border into Afghanistan.
Pakistan’s people may be suffering, however the cause of their suffering can be found in Islamabad, at least as much if not more so in Washington.
That is so true! Pakistan got the worst end of the stick. I hate to see us being eyed suspiciously in international media. I consider us heroes, but if you won’t take us as heroes, you have to understand that we ARE the victims here. We have normal lives. Our old watch TV and movies, our youth watches anime and plays videogames. We are the only ones who are actually getting killed, and the irony of it is that, after all that, we get generalized with that psychotic Taliban/Al-qaeda lot. We have lost over 40000 lives in this sham of a war, this mummer’s farce. We get killed in hundreds by US in “collateral damage” , we get blown up in hundreds by the terrorists, and the world (I am not referring to the aware/educated people out there, they know better!) still finds some reason to put us in the same box as terrorists. They aren’t against the US way of life, they are against ours!
@ Dear Michael:
Lets revisit history, shall we?
“1. Prevented the use of Pakistan as a safe haven by Jihardists attacking into Afghanistan.
2. Not bankrolled its own terrorist organisations which have been used to attack its neighbor India, and more recently seemed to have turned on their paymasters
3. Not helped set up the Taliban in the first place and supported them in their oppression of the Afghan people”
Jihadists attacking into Afghanistan? We helped US help Jihadist liberate Afghanistan from the Soviet. The US formed the Taliban, not us.
“4. Not provided Bin Laden with a safe place in the first place. Anyone who believes the Pakistani Government’s claims that it had no idea that Bin Laden had been living in the same place for six years, in a closely monitored military garrison town, less that 500 metres from a police station and half a kilometre from a military base and acadamy, is a fool.”
Bin Laden was not exactly shopping in Bakeries. He had not left the building for 6 years. He was one guy, who the world’s best Intelligence organizations could not locate using all their technology. Even US couldn’t be sure if he was there or not for over an year, after they were able to pinpoint the exact location from the help of ISI, even President Obama said that.
Also, if ISI has already helped US get a hold of every other terrorist they knew of, it doesn’t make sense that they’d keep Osama hiding. The prize money would have been too grand, and the glory would be too delightful for them to pass up this opportunity. You do understand that this was an equal, or a much better, opportunity for President Zardari to get re-elected, as much as it is for President Obama, right?
“It is noteworthy that the US is not forced to undertake operations against Taliban in other countries that border Afghanistan, only in Pakistan have the Taliban found such a welcoming environment anf government that allows them to continue to carry out peration across the border into Afghanistan.”
Yes, its noteworthy, because other countries bordering Afghanistan have no political significance whatsoever. Save for Iran which has never been an Afghan friend. Also, it is noteworthy that they didn’t find this welcoming environment Post-911, but during Soviet-Afghan War, when we opened our borders for Afghan immigrants who flew because of war.
“Pakistan’s people may be suffering, however the cause of their suffering can be found in Islamabad, at least as much if not more so in Washington.”
This, I totally agree with you. We made too many wrong choices. We are paying in blood.
Maybe if we stopped referring to “Pakistan” as if Pakistan was a coherent nation with a stable government we’d be getting somewhere. I don’t believe that the President or PM would have condoned the terrorist attack in Mumbai, but I’m sure there were people in the ISI and the Army leadership who were involved in guiding and supporting it. Probably they were the same people who helped bin Laden find refuge. Pakistan has been in a state of civil war for years, and like Iraq the war extends into the apparatus of government.
It’s revolting that Pakistani military or intelligence leaders could be deceiving the elected government and supporting those who are seeking to destroy it (and who have killed Benazir Bhutto, thousands of Pakistani soldiers and countless others). But we in Western countries who have been betrayed by our supposed “leaders” in recent years – especially in regard to Iraq and global warming – should be able to understand that the actions of an arm of government don’t necessarily represent the will or the interests of the people.