Author: AP
Publication: Fox News
Date: September 24, 2001
Students at the Haqqania school
at Akora Khattak, Pakistan, read propoganda about a "jihad," against America.
Monday,
AKORA KHATTAK, Pakistan -
At one of Pakistan's biggest Islamic schools, students begin their studies
with prayers for a Taliban victory if the United States goes to war with
Afghanistan.
"Oh Allah, defeat the enemies of
Muslims and make Islam and the Taliban victorious over the Americans,"
an all-boy class of 12-year-olds prays before beginning a lesson on the
Quran, Islam's holy book.
Fired by a conviction that Islam
must be defended, older students at the Haqqania school - and thousands
like it across Pakistan - are ready recruits for the Taliban in a "jihad,"
or holy war, against the United States.
"The only thing we talk about these
days is whether America will attack," said Syed Samiullah, 24, a student
at the school, located in Pakistan's Northwest Frontier Province that borders
Afghanistan. "I am ready for jihad, and so is every student you talk to
at the school," he said.
The Sept. 11 terrorist attacks that
shook the United States also reverberate in Pakistan, where the government's
decision to provide "full support" for U.S. military action against the
Taliban in next-door Afghanistan has placed the government on a collision
course with militant Muslim organizations, some of them armed.
AP
A boy at the Haqqania school at
Akora Khattak, Pakistan. Some Pakistanis fear that if the United States
attacks Afghanistan, the militant groups will swing into action.
"The biggest danger for Pakistan
is from young, disillusioned and angry Pakistanis, many of them poor and
jobless, who may be driven to join the radicals in a jihad," said Mirza
Aslam Baig, Pakistan's army chief until he retired in 1991.
Schools like Haqqania have strong
links to militant groups that recruit students for guerrilla training.
Most are sent to fight Indian forces in Kashmir, the disputed Himalayan
region claimed by both countries.
Of all of Pakistan's religious schools,
or madrassas, Haqqania is considered among the most militant. Most of the
Taliban's leaders studied here.
Its 3,500 male students mostly study
the Quran, though the curriculum also includes some secular teaching such
as mathematics and geography. Students sit cross legged on a carpet, rocking
back and forth and chanting from the Qurans resting before them on low
tables.
Since most of the madrassas are
unregistered, no one knows how many there are here. Unofficial estimates
put the number of schools at more than 30,000 and the number of students
at several hundred thousand. The schools are largely funded by wealthy
Pakistanis and donors in other Muslim countries.
The religious schools have a strong
hold on Pakistan's impoverished masses. They provide not only basic education
but also food, clothing and other necessities to students, many of whom
come from poor families.
Haqqania's message of holy war may
be stronger than that of other madrassas, but critics say the schools as
a whole foster intolerant attitudes. The government has been trying to
persuade them to adopt more secular curricula, but many schools have resisted
those efforts.
Many of the schools are telling
the young that America is gearing up for a war against Islam.
"The United States should think
a thousand times before attacking Afghanistan," said Maulana Sami ul-Haq,
rector of Haqqania. "Religious fervor is something that can't be assessed
beforehand. If America attacks, then jihad becomes an obligation, and then
there is no saying what will happen."
That is the message of the Taliban
in trying to rally Muslim support worldwide against the United States.
And in the madrassas, which train the rising generation, that message has
resonance.
"The United States is an enemy of
Islam, and we will defeat the enemy," said 14-year-old Mohammed Abid, as
other boys his age or even younger waited for a lunch of lamb curry and
potatoes.
