war against terrorism in pakistan essay

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Terrorism in Pakistan: the psychosocial context and why it matters

Asad tamizuddin nizami.

1 Assistant Professor, Institute of Psychiatry, World Health Organization Collaborating Centre for Mental Health, Benazir Bhutto Hospital, Rawalpindi Medical College, Rawalpindi, Pakistan; email moc.liamg@imazindasard

Tariq Mahmood Hassan

2 Assistant Professor, Providence Care Mental Health Services, Kingston, Canada

Sadia Yasir

3 Consultant Psychiatrist, Shifa International Hospital, Shifa College of Medicine, Islamabad, Pakistan

Mowaddat Hussain Rana

4 Director General, Centre for Trauma Research and Psychosocial Interventions, National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST), Islamabad, Pakistan

Fareed Aslam Minhas

5 Head Institute of Psychiatry, World Health Organization Collaborating Centre for Mental Health, Benazir Bhutto Hospital, Rawalpindi Medical College, Rawalpindi, Pakistan

Terrorism is often construed as a well-thought-out, extreme form of violence to perceived injustices. The after effects of terrorism are usually reported without understanding the underlying psychological and social determinants of the terrorist act. Since ‘9/11’ Pakistan has been at the epicentre of both terrorism and the war against it. This special paper helps to explain the psychosocial perspective of terrorism in Pakistan that leads to violent radicalisation. It identifies the terrorist acts in the background of Pakistan's history, current geopolitical and social scenario. The findings may also act as a guide on addressing this core issue.

Most nations are unable to reach a consensus on a legally binding definition of ‘terrorism.’ The term seems emotionally charged and, as such, governments have been devising their own definitions. So far the United Nations has been unable to devise an internationally agreed-upon definition of terrorism. Terrorism is suggested to be ‘the use of intimidation or fear for advancement of political objectives’ (Kruglanski & Fishman, 2006 ). Since the ‘9/11’ incident, Muslim countries in particular feel emotionally threatened with the word terrorism and perceive it as synonymous with the acts of terror carried out by so-called Muslim extremist groups. This is further complemented in the media by the unjust linking of such horrendous terror attacks to Islamic Jihad.

Terrorism has brought an enormous burden on South Asian countries through the adverse impacts on their social, economic, political and physical infrastructure. Pakistan has suffered particularly excessively from the social, economic and human costs due to terrorism (Daraz et al , 2012 ). Surprisingly, Pakistan is portrayed as being on the front line in the international war against terrorism and at the same time has been wrongly labelled as a sponsor of international terrorism. Terrorism in Pakistan is a multidimensional phenomenon and, among many precipitating factors, the psychosocial factors play an important role. This paper attempts to address what we believe are significant psychosocial determinants to terrorism in Pakistan.

Historical developments

Pakistan is a Muslim majority nation in South East Asia with India to its east, Iran and Afghanistan to its west, China and the landlocked Asian countries to its north and the Arabian Sea to its south. Pakistan gained independence from British colonial rule in 1947 and is the only Muslim country with nuclear weapons – a nuclear device was detonated in 1998 – and is thus part of the informally named ‘nuclear club.’ Pakistan is a federation of four provinces (Punjab, Sindh, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) and Balochistan), a capital territory (Islamabad) and a group of federally administered tribal areas in the north west, along with the disputed area of Azad Jammu and Kashmir.

Pakistan is the world's sixth most populous country with an average population density of 229 people per km 2 (World Bank indicators; http://www.tradingeconomics.com/pakistan/urban-population-growth-annual-percent-wb-data.html ). Since independence in 1947, Pakistan has been challenged not only by the trauma inflicted by its colonial occupiers but also by the mass murder of people migrating to the ‘new’ country. Hundreds of thousands of people were killed, looted, raped or burnt alive. At the same time, the stability of this fledgling country was significantly hampered by the lack of resources. Just a few years later, due to political instability and separatist movements and terrorism, the east wing of the country was separated from Pakistan; this paved the way to the creation of a new country, Bangladesh, in 1971 (Wadhwani, 2011 ).

The Soviet–Afghan war, which began in 1979, provided a breeding ground for terrorism in the region. A fundamental change was witnessed that altered the very character of the existing Pakistani society. Withdrawal of the Soviets revealed a Pakistani society that had been forced into one of violence and weaponisation, plaguing Pakistan with so-called ‘Kalashnikov culture’ and ‘Talibanisation’ (Wadhwani, 2011 ).

Pakistan's social landscape has for the most part been plagued with illiteracy, disease, insecurity and injustice. Since the 9/11 incident, Pakistan has been intricately linked with the many facets of the ‘war on terrorism.’ Some argue that Pakistan is a breeding ground for terrorist outfits, but it is certain that all of this havoc has resulted in the significant loss of innocent lives as well as loss of economic revenue. These fragile conditions provide a fertile ground for terrorism to grow.

Psychological influence

The act of carrying out terrorist activity does not come from a single moment of inspiration but rather from a complex process of cognitive accommodation and assimilation over accumulating steps. It is wrongly reductionist to label the terrorists as mad or psychopaths (Atran, 2003 ; Horgan, 2008 ). Terrorists’ motivation may involve a deep, underlying quest for personal meaning and significance. Several analyses of such motives have appeared in recent years. There are differences in these analyses regarding the type and variety of motivational factors identified as critical to terrorism. Some authors identified a singular motivation as crucial; others listed a ‘cocktail’ of motives (Sageman, 2004 ; Bloom, 2005 ).

The socioeconomic adversity combined with political challenges were bound to have a detrimental impact on the psyche of the average Pakistani. A terrorist adopts a dichotomous way of identifying their victims, the black-and-white thought that ‘I am good’ and ‘you are evil,’ with no intermediary shades of grey. This thinking leaves no doubt in their minds and they find it easier to kill their opponents with little or no sense of remorse or guilt.

The unmanned army drone strikes killed and maimed thousands of innocent civilians in poor and difficult to access regions of Pakistan. This infuriated people, leading them to take up arms against the perceived aggressors. This triggering of the relatives of the deceased to engage in such activity is the culture of revenge in Pakistan, which unfortunately can last for generations.

Self-sacrifice and martyrdom has been explicitly used in almost all religions and is aggressively exploited by terrorist outfits who groom suicide bombers using the ideology of Islamist martyrdom (Atran, 2003 ). Some have argued that suicide bombers may actually be clinically suicidal and attempting to escape personal impasse (Lankford, 2013 ). In grooming young impressionable adolescents, extremist organisations brainwash these adolescents into believing that the ultimate self-sacrifice by suicide bombing will elevate their stature in the eyes of God and send them straight to heaven. This is associated with massive financial compensations to the deceased family. Terrorist organisations in Pakistan, through this process of brainwashing, have been able to convert young impressionable Muslim adolescents into a ‘suicide bomber in six weeks’ (Nizami et al , 2014 ). In the current scenario of the existing war on terror, this complex process of recruiting young adolescents as suicide bombers seems irreversible.

The contribution of the religious schools

In the West, Madrassas (Islamic religious schools) have gained a reputation of being a sinister influence on young impressionable Muslims. These institutions are not completely regulated and can vary from a single room to large institutions offering schooling and boarding to hundreds of students at a time. A survey of just over 50 000 households in Pakistan found that children in Urdu-medium government schools and madrassas were from poorer households than those in English-medium private schools. The primary reason for parents to send their children to madrassas as opposed to mainstream schools was that these institutions provided a good Islamic education. The second most common reason was that the madrassa provided education that is low in cost along with the provision of food and clothing (Cockcroft et al , 2009 ).

Another survey indicated that in Pakistan only a minority of the religious schools promoted an extremist view of Islam (Bano, 2007 ). An interrogation of 79 terrorists involved in anti-Western attacks found that very few had attended a madrassa. This suggests that terrorist groups may selectively recruit better qualified people for technically demanding tasks (Bergen & Pandey, 2006 ). However, the religious seminaries have been implicated as playing the role of recruitment centres for the suicide bombers (Nizami et al , 2014 ).

In an effort to break this incorrect perception the Darul Uloom Deoband, the largest Islamic seminary in the world, hosted an anti-terrorist conference in 2008. This was attended by 6000 Imams declaring that ‘Islam is a religion of mercy for all humanity. Islam sternly condemns all kinds of oppression, violence and terrorism. It has regarded oppression, mischief, rioting and murder among sins and crimes’ (Press Trust of India, 2008 ). However, it is yet to be ascertained how many religious schools in Pakistan adopted this school of thought. With the revolution in the world of information technology, experts agree that the internet played an important role in the radicalisation and self-recruitment process into terrorist groups. Messages and videos on jihadi websites target the ‘soft spots’ of potential recruits and inflame their imagination (Kruglanski & Fishman, 2009 ).

The link between terrorism and mental disorder

With both mental disorder and terrorism in Pakistan being highly prevalent, it would be a fair assumption that the two may have a causal relationship. Walter Laqueur wrote that ‘all terrorists believe in conspiracies by the powerful, hostile forces and suffer from some form of delusion and persecution mania… The element of… madness plays an important role in terrorism’ (Silke, 2003 ).

However, apart from certain pathological cases, a causal connection between an individual's mental disorder and engagement in terrorist activity could not be established (Daraz et al , 2012 ). However, there can be a connection between an individual engaging in terrorist activity and developing a mental disorder as mental disorders worsen in stress, anxiety and depression.

The adverse impacts of terrorism lead the masses towards anomie and create the tendency towards suicide and mental illnesses (Daraz et al , 2012 ). Poor health, depressive symptoms, risky behaviours in young adults, personality variables, social inequalities, criminality, social networks and international foreign policy have all been proposed to be influential drivers for grievances that lead to radicalisation and terrorism (La Free & Ackerman, 2009 ).

It may well be that individuals with mild depression would be a better target for gradual psychological moulding. Female suicide bombers who are predominantly motivated by revenge as opposed to their male counterparts may have some degree of clinical depression (Jacques & Taylor, 2008 ). Personality traits are useless as predictors for understanding why people become terrorists. However, personality traits and environmental conditions are the contributing factors for terrorism (Horgan, 2008 ). There are protective and modifiable risk factors early on the path towards radicalisation. The benefits of early intervention have far reaching implications for preventing significant depressive symptoms, promoting wellbeing and perhaps social capital (Bhui et al , 2014 ).

By understanding, appreciating and addressing the psychosocial factors contributing to terrorism in Pakistan, one may find long-lasting solutions to the fall out on Pakistan's war against terror. This war has led to a loss of innocent human lives, compounded by the deep psychological scars for survivors which will undoubtedly persist for generations to come. An ongoing, concerted effort to gain peace and security in the region is essential and is the only way to counteract the revenge attacks and further brainwashing of young impressionable youths. These psychological determinants, however, are markedly different than terrorist activities in Western countries, where it seems that a different set of psychological rules apply.

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Pakistan and the “War on Terror”

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Mark N. Katz

Senior Fellow

Pakistan’s relationship to the “War on Terror” has been highly ambivalent. On the one hand, Pakistan played a key role in facilitating the U.S.-led intervention in Afghanistan from shortly after 9/11 up to the present. It has permitted the transit of matériel across Pakistani territory to U.S. forces in Afghanistan. Pakistan has also tolerated American missile attacks launched from Afghanistan against Taliban and al-Qaeda targets in Pakistan’s lawless border region with that country.

On the other hand, Pakistan has provided safe haven not just for radical Islamist movements targeting its rival India, but also for the Afghan Taliban. Al-Qaeda leaders Osama bin Laden and Ayman Al-Zawahiri, among others, are also believed to be hiding in Pakistan. Whether, to what extent and by whom within the Pakistani government they are being protected is unclear, but Pakistan certainly has not helped the United States to locate and capture them. There have also been press reports that Pakistan has blocked the efforts of some Taliban leaders to seek peace with the U.S.-backed Karzai government in Kabul. U.S.-Pakistani relations have become increasingly strained over how to prosecute the “War on Terror,” yet cooperation between them also continues.

The explanation for this ambivalence is that while the United States and Pakistan have some common goals, their priorities differ markedly. The U.S. was concerned primarily with the Soviet threat during the Cold War, and has been focused on the threat from al-Qaeda and its Taliban allies since 9/11. Pakistan, by contrast, has been primarily concerned with its struggle with India ever since the two became independent from Britain in 1947. The fate of Kashmir, the Muslim-majority region that was divided between India and Pakistan during the first war between them, has been Pakistan’s principal concern. It also has many others, including which of the two rivals will have predominant influence in Afghanistan.

Pakistan has also been vitally concerned with the preservation of its territorial integrity. The country is an agglomeration of ethnicities with little in common except an adherence to Islam. In the early 1970s, the conflict between what were then the two parts of the country — West and East Pakistan — was essentially over which ethnicity would predominate. Indian intervention in that war allowed East Pakistan to secede and become Bangladesh. Since then, the Pakistani military and security services have increasingly emphasized Pakistan’s Islamic identity to keep its remaining disparate ethnic groups together. But one group has been predominant in the Pakistani military and security services, and hence in the government, ever since independence: the Punjabis.

Kashmir provides a rallying point for all Pakistanis, who believe that the Muslims there should also be able to live in overwhelmingly Muslim Pakistan. Kashmir, however, has also posed a problem for the Pakistani government and military. Pakistan has neither been able to seize it from India nor to persuade India to give it up. But, while it has no real hope of acquiring Indian-held Kashmir, no Pakistani government can afford to acknowledge this or relinquish Pakistan’s claim. Doing so would not only be hugely unpopular inside Pakistan; it might also encourage other ethnicities (Pushtuns, Sindis and Balochis) to push for secession from the Punjabi-dominated state.

During the period of their Cold War alliance, the differing American and Pakistani priorities were evident: the United States sought Pakistan as an ally against the USSR, while Pakistan sought the United States as an ally against India. The height of Pakistani-American cooperation occurred during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, when the United States, Pakistan and many others backed the Afghan mujahideen, who were resisting the Soviets. Even then, however, Pakistan favored the Islamist Afghan mujahideen groups over the more nationalist ones. Islamabad seemed to think that it would have more influence over the former.

After the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1988-89, American concern about that country and South Asia in general diminished. Pakistan, however, remained focused on its rivalry with India. During the 1990s, then, Pakistan supported the rise of the Taliban, for several reasons: to restore order in what had become a chaotic country, to promote an Islamist ally that would sympathize with Pakistan over Kashmir and thus resist Indian influence, to establish a secure road network across Afghanistan to link Pakistan with newly independent Central Asia (thus benefiting the politically powerful Pakistani trucking industry), and even to extend Pakistani influence across Afghanistan into Central Asia. The Pakistani military and security services also believed that having an ally in Afghanistan would give Pakistan “strategic depth” in any future confrontation with India (though precisely what this meant and how it would work were ill-defined and poorly thought out).

With Pakistani help, the Taliban was able to seize control of most of Afghanistan in 1996. The Taliban, though, proved to be an extremely difficult ally for Pakistan, providing safe-haven to several radical Islamist groups, including al-Qaeda. After al-Qaeda launched the 9/11 attacks and it became clear that the United States would intervene militarily in Afghanistan in retaliation, the Bush administration forced Pakistan to choose between siding with the United States or with the Taliban. Pakistan formally chose to side with the United States, not due to a genuine change of heart regarding the Taliban, but due to the fear that Washington would side with India against Pakistan if it did not, and in the hope that siding with (or appearing to side with) the United States against the Taliban would strengthen Pakistan vis-à-vis India. Anticipating that the United States would not remain in Afghanistan, and that the Taliban and perhaps even al-Qaeda might prove useful to Pakistan vis-à-vis India later, Pakistan tolerated and even supported their presence on its territory in the region bordering Afghanistan.

It would have been difficult for Pakistan to do otherwise. Pakistan has long supported radical Islamist groups that are primarily concerned with Kashmir and India. How could it draw a distinction between these “good” Muslim radicals, on the one hand, and “bad” Taliban ones, on the other — especially when Pakistani public opinion views both favorably? But at the same time, the Pakistani government has not wanted to alienate the United States either (at least not too much). So Pakistani policy since 9/11 has been a confusing mixture of supporting, sheltering and tolerating the Taliban and al-Qaeda to some extent, but also supporting U.S. actions against them at the same time.

Not surprisingly, the U.S. government has grown increasingly frustrated with Pakistan; its support for the Taliban has frustrated American military efforts in Afghanistan. But many Pakistani Islamists, especially the Pushtun, condemn the Pakistani government for cooperating with the United States at all. A Pakistani Taliban has arisen, mainly among Pakistan’s Pushtun population, which has fought against Pakistani government forces.

Pakistan’s too-clever-by-half policy of supporting the United States against the Taliban and supporting the Taliban against the United States has not only frustrated American efforts in Afghanistan; it has contributed to the rise of a radical Islamist threat inside Pakistan itself. At this point, a Pakistani government decision to turn against these radical Islamist forces — or just end its support for them — might result in accelerating the threat that they pose to the Pakistani government.

Despite this, the Pakistani leadership has, characteristically, remained focused on its rivalry with India. With the United States and NATO having announced that they will withdraw from Afghanistan between mid-2011 and the end of 2014, Pakistan seems more worried than ever that the Karzai government will ally itself with India to the detriment of Pakistan. And so, Pakistan has continued to support the hard-line Afghan Taliban. The irony, of course, is that if the Taliban returns to power in Afghanistan with Pakistan’s help, the Taliban is hardly likely to be more amenable to Pakistani influence after it has less need of it — just as occurred during the 1990s. Indeed, if the Afghan Taliban decides to help its Pushtun bretheren across the border in Pakistan, the Pakistani government may find itself faced with its own very serious Islamist insurgency — along with an unsympathetic international community as a result of the policies Pakistan is pursuing at present.

Mark N. Katz is a Visiting Senior Fellow at the Middle East Policy Council and a Professor of Government at George Mason University. Links to many of his publications can be found on his website: www.marknkatz.com

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Terrorism in Pakistan has declined, but the underlying roots of extremism remain

Subscribe to the center for middle east policy newsletter, madiha afzal madiha afzal fellow - foreign policy , center for middle east policy , strobe talbott center for security, strategy, and technology @madihaafzal.

January 15, 2021

This piece is part of a series titled “ Nonstate armed actors and illicit economies: What the Biden administration needs to know ,” from Brookings’s  Initiative on Nonstate Armed Actors .

According to the South Asia Terrorism Portal, Pakistan saw 319 terrorism-related incidents in 2020, and 169 associated deaths of civilians. That represents a decline, from a high of nearly 4,000 such incidents in 2013, with over 2,700 civilian deaths (see figure below).

This fall is largely due to the Pakistani army’s kinetic operations against the Pakistani Taliban — also known as the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) — which had been responsible for the majority of deaths of civilians and security forces since 2007, the year it formed officially as an umbrella organization of various militant groups. Over the years, American drone strikes targeted and killed successive TTP leaders, including Baitullah Mehsud in 2009, Hakimullah Mehsud in 2013, and Mullah Fazlullah in 2018. The Pakistani military’s Zarb-e-Azb operation (named for the sword of the Prophet Muhammad) began in 2014 — after a TTP attack on the Karachi airport that June — and increased in intensity after the Peshawar Army Public School attack of December that year, which killed more than 130 schoolchildren. Since 2017, having largely routed the TTP (because of limited information access to the area, there are questions about how many terrorists were killed, versus simply displaced across the Pakistan-Afghanistan border), the military’s operation entered a new phase of “elimination” of militant groups. The operation is called Radd-ul-Fasaad, which literally means elimination of all strife.

Figure: Terrorism-related fatalities in Pakistan

While this top-line picture in terms of number of attacks and casualties is clearly a positive one, the TTP has been regrouping since last summer. Various breakaway factions pledged allegiance to the group last July, and there are reports of it making a comeback in at least six districts in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa “ with the intimidation of locals, targeted killings, and attacks on security forces .” The TTP is reported to have killed at least 40 security forces between March and September 2020. Official Pakistani sources blamed India as “behind” the revival. On the other end, the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement, an ethnic protest movement that claims human rights violations against civilians by the Pakistani military during its operations against the Taliban, has alleged (without systematic proof) that “the Taliban are being allowed to return” to the tribal areas in a “secret deal with the military.”

The TTP, of course, maintains ties with the Afghan Taliban and al-Qaida. Some have speculated that the TTP comeback may be linked with the Afghan peace process and Pakistan’s fencing of the border with Afghanistan, both of which threaten the group’s sanctuary in Afghanistan. (A U.N. report from July 2020 stated there were 6,000 Pakistani fighters in Afghanistan, most affiliated with the TTP.) There has also been some speculation that the Afghan peace process might include, at some point, a separate Afghan-Pakistan deal, with Afghanistan denying safe haven to the TTP potentially in return for Pakistan denying sanctuary to the Haqqanis (though it is unclear whether that will be possible, or acceptable to Pakistan). Pakistan has already raised questions about Afghanistan’s sanctuary for the TTP.

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The Islamic State in Khorasan (ISIS-K), which operates in Afghanistan and is the Afghan Taliban’s rival, has been responsible for recent attacks in Baluchistan, including of 11 Shia Hazara coal miners this January — complicating Pakistan’s already violent sectarian landscape. In discussing this attack, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan again blamed India for “backing ISIS” to “spread unrest” in Pakistan. (Pakistan has also long claimed that India uses Afghan soil — on which ISIS-K is based — to destabilize Pakistan.)

Anti-India militant groups continue to have a foothold in Pakistan, but Pakistan has begun taking action against the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) in recent years, especially in the wake of its enhanced monitoring by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) in 2018 for terrorism financing; it is a key goal of Khan’s government to have Pakistan removed from this “grey list,” because it hurts the country’s image and causes it financial harm. Most notably, Pakistan has sentenced Hafiz Saeed, the leader of the LeT, to 11 years in prison for terrorism financing. Another LeT leader, Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, was also recently sentenced to five years for terrorism financing. The United States has acknowledged these steps, but has argued that Pakistan needs to hold these LeT leaders accountable for more than terrorism financing. Pakistan has taken less action against Jaish-e-Mohammad, the terrorist group responsible for the Pulwama attack of February 2019; its leader, Masood Azhar, is at large. Notably, Pakistan-based militant groups have not been responsible for any violence in Kashmir since the Pulwama attack; in an interview later in 2019, Khan asked Pakistanis not to engage in any violence or “jihad” in India, because it would be blamed on Pakistan and would harm it. That signal seems to have worked.

Placing the blame on India for terrorism in Pakistan is something the country has long done, although not always in as direct a manner as in 2020. Beyond linking the recent ISIS-K attack with India, Pakistan also linked the Baluch Liberation Army’s June 2020 attack on the Karachi Stock Exchange with its eastern neighbor (Pakistan has longed argued India supports the Baluch insurgency). In November, the Pakistani foreign minister, in a splashy press conference, released details of the “ dossier ” Pakistan has compiled linking India to funding, arming, and training terrorists (including the TTP) against Pakistan. Only the summary — not the full dossier — discussed in that meeting has been made public. It found a receptive audience in a Pakistani population already wary of the Narendra Modi government for its actions in Kashmir and the alarming rise in intolerance toward Muslims in India. The Pakistani government says it has shared the dossier with the U.N. and various governments, but those parties have not publicly acknowledged it.

Pakistan’s strategy toward militant groups has long been two-pronged, as it were: to take overt (and successful) action against groups targeting the Pakistani state and citizenry — the TTP — without taking action against the groups it has considered “strategic assets,” including the Afghan Taliban that have sought sanctuary on its soil and anti-India militants that its intelligence agencies have covertly supported. Underlying this approach has been an effort to hedge bets: regarding the Taliban’s possible influence in Afghanistan after an international withdrawal, and regarding militant proxies who may give Pakistan parity on an otherwise lopsided conventional military footing with India. There are signs some of this is changing. For instance, Pakistan has developed a good relationship with Kabul, especially in recent months, but it also knows its leverage over the Taliban keeps it relevant to the Afghan peace process. The FATF listing has induced Pakistan to take its strictest action to date on militant groups, especially LeT. It also helps that Pakistan is keen to shed an image associated with terrorism. Yet the long-term sustainability of actions Pakistan has taken in response to pressure from FATF remains to be seen; will they be reversed when the FATF grey-listing is lifted? And what happens after the international withdrawal from Afghanistan is complete?

The central issue is not one of state capacity, but an unwillingness of the Pakistani state to paint all jihadist groups with the same brush, to recognize the linkages in ideology that connect them all — and to acknowledge how those ideologies find fodder in Pakistan’s laws, educational curricula, politics, and indeed the very nature of how Pakistan has defined itself, as I detailed in my book . This issue holds for Pakistan’s military, and also across its spectrum of major political parties, as has been demonstrated over the last 12 years with all three of them successively holding power. That lack of recognition of how terrorism and extremism are connected, and of the very roots of extremism, is the crux of the problem: Militant groups can always find recruits, from other groups or from the general population. Non-armed right-wing fundamentalist groups, notably the Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP), share these ideologies, glorify violence (the TLP, after all, celebrated the murder of Salmaan Taseer for daring to propose reform in Pakistan’s blasphemy laws), and enjoy growing support and sympathy.

For a brief time after the Peshawar school attack of 2014, there was some clarity in recognizing the homegrown nature of the Pakistan Taliban, and the country devised a National Action Plan to tackle extremism and terrorism. While it was incomplete and never acknowledged the deeper roots of extremism, it was a start. But it has gone by the wayside as the Pakistani state has turned back once again to blaming India for terrorism in the country. Meanwhile, the underlying roots of extremism — the country’s curricula, the way its politics works, and its laws, which have all primed its citizenry to buy into and sympathize with the propaganda of extremist groups — remain intact. Pakistan’s claims about India deserve to be heard and investigated, as the international community ignoring them only worsens Pakistan’s sense of victimhood, but that does not absolve the state of its own policies that have fostered extremism and allowed terror groups to proliferate on its soil.

As the Biden administration takes office, it is worth recognizing the effectiveness of the FATF tool, and the limited leverage of the United States to effect real change on security matters in Pakistan, at least initially. Ultimately, Pakistan must be the one to connect the dots linking all the terrorist groups on its soil and their ideologies, acknowledge how it has contributed to extremism within its borders, and decide on addressing the roots of that extremism. I would argue that the best way to encourage it to do so is for America to develop a relationship with the country that is separate from Afghanistan, and separate from India: to deal with Pakistan on its own terms. Meanwhile, security concerns in Pakistan are more or less contained, with the FATF listing and the Pakistani state’s action against the TTP being the primary mechanisms for that control, and the Biden administration need not make them the center of its Pakistan policy.

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Pakistan and the 'War on Terror': The Current Situation

The US-led 'War on Terror' has resulted in serious implications for Pakistan, with the Taliban and extremism posing a continuing threat to the country's stability. The Pakistani Government's efforts to rid the country of the threat of such extremism are seen to have fluctuated in the past, but are regaining strength to combat Taliban rebels.

By M. Nasrullah Mirza for RUSI.org

The US involvement in Afghanistan has resulted in a dramatic impact on neighbouring Pakistan. An influx of millions of Afghan refugees (many of whom took part in the mujahedeen against the Soviets) resulted in small arms proliferation, drug trafficking and increased sectarianism. Furthermore, foreign militants have been able to infiltrate through Pakistan's porous borders. In addition there has been an increase in the number of religious madrassahs in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP).

Many would argue that the US has implemented controversial and perhaps misguided policies during the War on Terror; overthrowing regimes in Kabul and Baghdad, and waging war against the so-called 'Al-Qa'ida in Iraq' and the Taliban in Afghanistan. Consequently, since Pakistan joined the US coalition in the War on Terror, the country has faced a Taliban rebellion across and within its own borders, threatening its very survival. Moreover, the failure of the US, NATO and ISAF forces to control the situation in Afghanistan has aggravated the problems in the FATA and the NWFP.

Until late April 2009, it appeared that Pakistan was succumbing to an onslaught of Taliban groups which had occupied large chunks of territory in the northwest, especially in the Swat valley, and were launching suicide attacks all over the country. The approval of a 'Sharia-for-peace' deal in Swat reinforced the view that Pakistan lacked the will or capability to fight religious extremists. There were a limited number of targeted military operations conducted, resulting in a number of Al-Qaida and Taliban leaders being killed or captured but they lacked crucial popular support.

The state has achieved a comeback

However, encouragingly, in the last five months the state has regained the initiative. The Pakistani Army launched a successful offensive in Swat and Malakand to resume control over most of the affected areas. This has been followed by a campaign to increase intelligence-sharing and limited air and ground operations in South Waziristan hitting a number of high-value targets including Baitullah Mehsud, leader of the Pakistani Taliban, who was reportedly killed in a drone strike on 5 August.

While many observers still view Pakistan as a country entangled in jihadist militancy, the government's counterinsurgency campaign has taken centre-stage. This does not mean that the extremists are no longer in a position to pose a security risk. They are and will remain a significant threat for the foreseeable future, but the state has gained the upper hand in the struggle. It can now be argued that, contrary to the general assessments of the West, the Taliban will not be able to seize power, Pakistan will not disintegrate, there will not be another military coup, nuclear weapons will not go astray and Sharia will not become the law of the land.

Triggers for Pakistan's new counter-insurgency strategy

The most important question regarding Pakistan's progress is how the government turned the situation around, given the complex historic relationship between the country's security establishment and militant groups. They helped create the militant groups to wage a Jihad against the Soviets in Afghanistan as a proxy for the US during the Cold War. This relationship, along with unfavourable public opinion, has long prevented the state from launching all-out military operations, even in the face of a growing threat to Pakistan's integrity. The Mumbai terrorist attacks of November 2008 brought Pakistan and India near to war, at a time when the former was also facing a rampant insurgency at home.

The dual security threats from domestic insurgents and foreign jihadists, coupled with political and economic instability, created intense pressure on Pakistan. This pressure led to a consensus within the civilian and military establishment that regaining control over the militants was critical to the survival of the country. While Pakistan was trying to fulfil its obligations in the US-led War on Terror to tackle religious extremists, a number of elements moved into Al-Qa'ida's orbit.

The first challenge for Pakistan was to deal with renewed pressure from the US and defuse tensions with India in order to avoid war. This required going after the groups Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Jamaat-ud-Dawah (JuD) and the Pakistani Taliban. However, the state's pre-occupation with the crisis triggered by the Mumbai attacks and consequent focus on the LeT/JuD problem provided the Pakistani Taliban time and space to further entrench themselves in the FATA and in Malakand in the NWFP.

'No alternative' to fighting Taliban rebels

Pakistan was able to ward off the threat of war with India but, in the process, the Pakistani Taliban assumed a more menacing posture. Islamabad had begun to realise that there was no alternative to fighting the Taliban rebels. Clearly, Islamabad was not capable of waging an all-out assault against the entire rebel movement, which entailed battling multiple groups in a number of theatres. A lack of consensus within the state and minimal public support meant that any all-out military offensive would only make matters worse.

Moreover, there was the risk of aggravating the situation in cases where Taliban groups that were not fighting against Islamabad could align with Mehsud and Maulana Fazlullah's groups. The fear of pushing more Pashtuns into the Taliban's orbit served as a major obstacle, preventing the state from taking meaningful action beyond limited successes achieved by selective military and Frontier Corps-led security forces in the FATA's Bajaur agency. These considerations, and the need to buy time, led to negotiations with the Taliban group in Swat, resulting in the peace deal known as the Nizam-e-Adl Regulations establishing a Taliban brand of Sharia.

Excited by their victory in the Swat region, the Taliban group decided to move forward, sending its fighters into other districts of Malakand and demanding that Sharia be imposed in the entire country. The Nizam-e-Adl regulations were violated in April 2009, immediately after they were negotiated. The Taliban quickly moved to capture more territory in the adjacent area of Buner. The movement's spokesman, Muslim Khan, proclaimed that Pakistan's capital Islamabad would be captured soon. Despite this, the Pakistani army remained indecisive, because public opinion was largely against the use of military force.

At this point, however, Sufi Mohammed, a leader of the Swat Sharia movement, provoked a backlash by declaring that democracy and Islam were incompatible; that the Pakistani Constitution was un-Islamic; and that those who opposed Sharia were Kafirs (non-Muslim). He condemned the courts and accused Pakistan's other right-wing Islamic parties of being puppets. These comments did not go down well with the mainstream Pakistani Muslim population. 

Meanwhile, the suicide-bombing campaign of the Mehsud-led Pakistani Taliban targeting both the security forces and the general public in major cities like Rawalpindi and Lahore, generated widespread public anger. Both factors changed public opinion in favour of action and strengthened the military's will to launch an all-out offensive against these extremists.

'Operation Rah-i-Rast'

Consequently, in late April, the government embarked on Operation Rah-i-Rast with the goal of eliminating the Taliban's stronghold in the Swat region. Though the offensive was limited to Swat and its adjacent districts, the state took advantage of growing public opinion against the Taliban and launched a major media campaign against 'Talibanisation' that proved extremely useful. It was also very timely, as more than 2.5 million residents of the greater Swat region vacated the area, facilitating military operations.

Within a couple of months, the army successfully cleared Taliban militants from the region. Indeed, the so-called 'Swat Taliban Network' was disrupted and its war-making machine destroyed to the point where it no longer has the capability to regain control. However, the leadership is still at large, which means a low-intensity conflict will continue to simmer for sometime. Security forces are likely to remain in the area, where reportedly there are plans to build a permanent military garrison in Swat.

Alongside the return of internally displaced persons (IDPs) and the rehabilitation and reconstruction of Swat and Malakand, the army's operation is being extended to South Waziristan. A large-scale offensive like that of Swat would be difficult in this area because of the nature of the terrain, coupled with its status as an autonomous region. However, selected joint air and ground attacks are continuing and are suited to eliminating the remaining hardcore of Taliban and Al-Qa'ida elements. Meanwhile, in coordination with the CIA, Pakistan's army was able to eliminate Mehsud, under whose command the Pakistani Taliban had been able to launch a broad insurgent movement throughout the FATA, large parts of the NWFP, and in parts of the core province of Punjab. Mehsud's death has badly damaged the command structure of the Pakistani Taliban.

The Way Ahead

The retaking of Swat and its subsequent benefits has meant that Pakistan has gained an important edge in its struggle against the Taliban. Though the Swat Taliban have been damaged, they have not been entirely defeated. This cannot happen until their leadership is captured or killed.  As IDPs return to the region, a massive amount of reconstruction and development work is necessary to prevent unrest that the Taliban could exploit. Restoring the authority of the state entails the re-establishment of political administration and enforcement of law and order in the region.

No doubt Mehsud's death has wounded the Taliban, but they are very much entrenched in the Waziristan region, along with Al-Qa'ida and other transnational allies. Any counter-insurgency campaign in the area is going to be more difficult than the offensive in Swat. The challenge is how Islamabad re-asserts state control over areas on its side of the border and addresses the accusations of cross-border infiltration.

Pakistani public opinion has largely turned against the Taliban, but some pockets of social and political support continue. This will require a social and political strategy aimed at the de-Talibanisation and de-radicalisation of society, winning the hearts and minds of the people. Pakistan's ability to advance ahead successfully depends on the intertwined objectives of being able to contain political instability and to improve fragile economic conditions. Although the judicial crisis ended with a promising independent judiciary, political stability remains elusive because of the country's fragmented political landscape and the weakened state of civilian institutions, including Parliament. The recent Supreme Court decision to declare former President Musharaf's November 2007 emergency decree unconstitutional has shifted responsibility for holding Mr Musharaf accountable under Article 6 of the Constitution to Parliament. Domestic political instability and external interference to save Musharraf has set off intense political polarisation in the country, which is very dangerous to the continuation of the present political arrangement. Moreover, the fragile economic condition of Pakistan presents a very gloomy picture. A loan from the IMF has helped Pakistan avoid bankruptcy, but it will not be possible to return to normality unless economic conditions begin to improve to the point where Islamabad is able to meet its chronic financial obligations. Pakistan claims the loss of $40 billion dollars for fighting the War on Terror.

Against all odds, Pakistan is trying to eliminate extremist elements from its soil and contribute as much as it can to the War on Terror. However, the main obstacle is the atmosphere of mistrust that exists between Pakistan and the West. Though this may have historical roots, it is more appropriate to attribute this to Washington's controversial policies and the very high expectations placed on Pakistan.

Many allege that the Pakistani Army and intelligence agency (ISI) are maintaining links with Al-Qai'da and Taliban militant groups to manage Afghanistan and to counter Indian influence in the region. Such claims are vehemently denied by Pakistan. Pakistan believes that it has been discriminated vis-à-vis India over civil-nuclear technology which will disturb the balance of power in the region; Indian and pro-Israel lobbies in the US are being given a free hand to defame Pakistan; its all-out efforts of counter-terrorism are being taken for granted and the US is not listening to its concerns about Indian involvement in fomenting insurgency in Balochistan.

Until this element of mutual mistrust is addressed, and Pakistan's concerns are dealt with effectively, Pakistan's commitment to eliminate terrorism and religious extremism from the region remains a distant goal. The launch of a successful military operation in Swat and Malakand is not the ultimate solution to growing extremism in the region; there is a need to devise and implement a multi-pronged social, political and economic strategy to de-radicalise society, promote political culture and stabilise the fragile economy. Pakistan's ability to move forward successfully depends on international support vis-à-vis its concerns about India, long-term commitment and sustainable engagement to improve its fragile economic conditions and strengthen its national institutions.

M. Nasrullah Mirza, PhD, teaches Defence and Strategic Studies at Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad and currently he is working as Pakistan Fellow at RUSI in Whitehall, London. The write-up is based on his discussion at the FCO, London on August 25, 2009. The author can be contacted at: [email protected]

The views expressed above are the author's own, and do not necessarily reflect those of RUSI.

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The Deep Roots of Pakistan’s Terrorism Crisis

Considering some militants as instruments of regional influence while fighting others has had disastrous consequences..

After 101 worshippers, most of them policemen, were killed in a suicide bombing at a mosque in Peshawar, Pakistan, on Jan. 30, experts  speculated  that Pakistan’s leaders might be on high alert. But several weeks later, it is business as usual in Islamabad.

Instead of treating increasing terrorist attacks as a national emergency, politicians are posturing for the next election . The military leadership is busy dealing with the challenge of former Prime Minister Imran Khan, who has galvanized support while criticizing the generals. To make matters worse, Pakistan is mired in an  economic crisis : Its foreign reserves are at a nine-year low, inflation is at a 48-year high, and the Pakistani rupee  lost  22 percent of its value last year. To avoid a default, Islamabad hopes to unlock another $1.1 billion in loans from the International Monetary Fund.

Pakistan’s political and economic troubles are intertwined with its inconsistent treatment of terrorists. For decades, Pakistan has allowed some terrorist groups to operate freely while cracking down on others. Militancy, and foreign sanctions resulting from terrorist financing, have in turn made it difficult for Pakistan to attract investment. Sympathy for jihadis among the public and within law enforcement and intelligence, along with inaction by members of the political class, has allowed domestic militant groups to operate with some impunity. Islamabad must change its tack if it hopes to prevent a full-blown insurgency and recover its global standing.

Islamist and sectarian groups first launched attacks inside Pakistan in the early 1990s, following the end of the Soviet-Afghan War. After the success of the Afghan mujahideen in driving out the Soviets—with U.S. support—Pakistan’s security services mobilized similar ideologically motivated groups to try to force India out of long-disputed Kashmir. Pakistani jihadists fought in the civil war in Afghanistan that followed the collapse of the Soviet-backed regime from 1992 to 1996, and later alongside the Taliban beginning in 2001. (Pakistan supported the Afghan Taliban regime in the 1990s.)

Islamist groups recruiting in Pakistan cited hadith—traditions and sayings attributed to the prophet Mohammed—that  prophesied  a great battle in the Indian subcontinent. Pakistan’s security services expected that radicalization through religion could help break the deadlock over Kashmir and empower Pakistan’s allies in Afghanistan. The strategy instead made Pakistan a battleground of competing interpretations of radical Islamist ideas. In the last 30 years, Pakistan has supported some jihadi groups and tolerated others, while also participating in the United States-led war against terrorism.

This juggling act has eroded Pakistan’s international standing and led some jihadi factions to target Pakistan’s military and security forces, occasionally inviting retaliation. When the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan in 2021, Islamabad  saw  Kabul’s new regime as a potential close ally. After 2001, Pakistan continued to cultivate the Taliban as a counterweight to more liberal United States-backed factions; these were seen as too closely aligned with India. But during its second round in power the Afghan Taliban has proven to be  less friendly  than Islamabad expected, clashing with Pakistani border guards and publicly criticizing Pakistani policies toward Afghan refugees.

At the same time, Pakistan is facing violence from Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), an offshoot of the Afghan Taliban movement that is ideologically aligned with the Afghan branch but draws its leaders from within Pakistan. The TTP has claimed responsibility for many attacks in the latest spate of terrorism in Pakistan; a TTP splinter group said it had carried out the January mosque attack. The group seeks to overthrow Pakistan’s government and create an Islamic emirate. For years now it has waged war on the state, describing the conflict as the Ghazwa-e-Hind  (Battle of India)—forecasted as a precursor to the end times by the Prophet Mohammed.

Pakistan’s security services and some politicians, including Khan, have  advocated  a nuanced approach to the TTP and other militant groups, suggesting the groups reflect Islamic aspirations that need not be seen as inimical to Pakistan. But events have repeatedly proven that compromise with armed and violent radical Islamist groups is impossible. Just as Afghanistan’s Taliban hard-liners explain their  failure  to moderate as a function of their faith, the TTP justifies its actions in the name of Islam and sharia. Factional competition over which group is more faithful to radical interpretations of Islam also plays a role in the militants’ intransigence.

Rising Terrorism Stirs Protests in Pakistan

Long-suffering residents near the Afghan border are voicing their grievances with militancy—as well as the powers that be.

Years of contradictory policies have undermined Pakistan’s ability to tackle the challenges posed by Islamist militancy. Former President Pervez Musharraf, who led Pakistan’s military government from 1999 to 2008, publicly admitted to cultivating and training Kashmiri militants and  supporting  armed proxies in Afghanistan. He also  said terrorists such as Osama bin Laden were seen as heroes in Pakistan. Meanwhile, his government selectively cracked down on some militant groups, only to back off later.

Considering some militants as instruments of regional influence while fighting others has disastrous consequences: More than 8,000 members of Pakistan’s security forces have  lost  their lives in terrorist incidents since 2000. In 2014, the TTP  attacked  Peshawar’s Army Public School, killing 141 people, including 132 children of military officers and soldiers. The Jan. 30 attack targeted policemen. Both attacks appeared intended to demoralize the Pakistani military and law enforcement and to dissuade Pakistan’s leaders from going to battle with the TTP.

Meanwhile, domestic terrorism has adversely affected the country’s economy, which is now mired in crisis. Pakistan’s Ministry of Finance estimates the country has lost $123 billion in direct and indirect costs due to terrorism. Many foreigners no longer want to travel to Pakistan, which directly effects tourism and exports. Pakistan’s large troop presence along the Afghan border with Afghanistan, occasional military operations, and intelligence operations have all added to the defense budget. Falling foreign direct investment and foreign sanctions over terrorist financing and money laundering have also taken an economic toll.

Periodic negotiations between the Pakistani government and militant groups in recent years have only convinced the militants that the authorities lack the resolve for a sustained fight. Several peace deals and cease-fire agreements between Islamabad and the TTP have broken down. Last November, the TTP terminated the latest cease-fire , negotiated last June, and threatened new attacks across Pakistan in retaliation for the security service’s actions.

Pakistan would do better to abandon its “two steps forward, one step back” approach to domestic terrorism. Defining some jihadi groups as Pakistan’s allies in regional conflicts—against India’s control of Jammu and Kashmir, for example—has generated sympathy for militants, which helps even more extreme groups evade scrutiny even as they launch attacks against Pakistani citizens. This sympathy also aids the militant groups in recruitment, interferes with intelligence gathering, and forces the government to make more concessions during peace talks with the groups.

It is time that Pakistan’s leaders recognize that violent, radical Islamists are not just disgruntled individuals who can be placated with a negotiated settlement. They hold strong beliefs and a sense of destiny, and believe in using violence to shape the world according to their outlook. Before Pakistan’s militants take advantage of ongoing political chaos and economic adversity to orchestrate a full-blown insurgency, leaders in Islamabad must end years of uncertainty about their policy on terrorism. And before they can do that, the country needs a national consensus with the full support of its generals. Unfortunately, there is currently no sign that the country is moving in that direction.

Husain Haqqani is a senior fellow and the director for South and Central Asia at the Hudson Institute as well as the diplomat-in-residence at the Anwar Gargash Diplomatic Academy in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. He served as Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States from 2008 to 2011. Twitter:  @husainhaqqani

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August 05, 2010

Pakistani analysis on extremism, its causes and solutions

Yesterday, I attended a conference on counter radicalisation strategies organised by the Pak Institute of Peace Studeis (PIPS) and the United States Institute for Peace (USIP). I'm pasting my notes here because I think many readers working on the region and Pakistan in particular will find them useful. But at the same time, for the general reader, it provides a rare opportunity to see what professional analysts with an intimate knowledge of context and history as well as the advantage of local language knowledge make of current situation.

PIPS is a fantastic organistation. Unfortunately, I don't think the Pakistani government has the capacity to take on what they have to say. Counter Radicalisation Strategies conference

Hosted by Pak Institute for Peace Studies (PIPS) and US Institute for Peace (USIP)

Amir Rana, director of PIPS: Radicalising factors in Pakistan are: 1. Inequality - contributing 2. Religion - catalyst 3. Politics - major factor 4. State of mind - contributing factor 5. Socio-cultural - transformational

Radicalisation amongst Pakistan's societal groups: 1. Lower income - poor governance, religious networks = Talibanisation 2. Middle Income - political and ideological radical tendencies, informal educational institutions = sympathy for Talibanisation, sectarianism etc. 3. Upper income - isolation from rest of society (also common in Muslim/Pakistani diaspora) results in identity crisis. This is shared with diaspora communities. The catalyst is the religious-extremist environment. This manifestation is very different form the other two groups.

The general manifestations of growing extremism and radicalisation are: 1. The Islamisation of Pakistan 2. Militancy in AfPak.

Catalysts: Globally networked organisations eg. Hizb ut Tahrir and al Huda.

It's clear from opinion polls such as Pew etc, the common man is against manifestations of militancy. Support for al Qaeda's methods is very low. In Pakistan it support for al-Qaeda and/or suicide bombing comes in at about 10%-15%. In the rest of the Islamic world you'll find up to 85% support for such measures.

Support for terror is low, so why is there much extremism in Pakistan? Because extremist networks are a major driver. There are literally hundreds of groups that are sectarian, anti democracy etc. If you include large and small groups, we are talking about 600 distinct entities. This is transforming small level of support into a high level of actual violence.

Saba Nur, PIPS researcher: Topic: women

Gradually, the role of women in extremism is growing. There have been cases of women trained for suicide bombings.

Women have very limited access to religious knowledge (mostly parents)

When asked about religion; most women said scholars had an important role to play in public life.

A high percentage of women though that sectarianism was important to "keep Islam pure".

Wahjat Ali, PIPS researcher and journalist: Topic: Emerging trends in Radicalisation in Pakistan

There is a need for counter narratives to take on the extremism narrative. "The fight against extremism will be fought in the craggy mountains of Waziristan but it will be won in the newsrooms."

Dr Shabana Feyaz, asst. Professor of Defence Studies at Quaid e Azam university.

Extremism in Pakistan is a mixed bag. It's anti US, anti Jewish, anti capaitalist, ethnic, sectarian etc.

There needs to be a state societal partnership. The ideology of extremism needs to be challenged educationally and socially.

Military force is necessary but it can't lead. We need a more wholeistic approach.

The state should be an engine of transformation. The government needs to work on the rule of law and governance.

We need a new societal contract between the rulers and the ruled.

We have to engage the youth. We have a huge youth bulge. A huge percentage of the population is between 15 and 35 years of age. There needs to be a qualitative shift in education from primary to university level.

Women need to be engaged to wean brothers, sons etc away from extremist ideas. Women are often on the receiving end of extremist practice because they are often seen as the symbols of collective religiosity.

Moeed Yusuf: United States Institute for Peace

We tend to believe Pakistan's problems are external. Why is there this inclination to refuse to do anything until outside problems are dealt with.

There is a core message: A Western conspiracy aimed at destroying Pakistan is radicalising the whole country.

The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, when they first appeared, said they weren't against the Pakistani state, only that they were against the United States and government's role in US foreign policy.

This was picked up by the media and gained popular appeal.

If you see the problem as only US driven (Afghanistan etc) then what happens? The Taliban come to attack Pakistani cities, Pakistan does nothing. There is no talk of de radicalisation or counter extremism.

Does it matter how it started? The change has to come from within. The solutions reside in-house.

The coming issues for Pakistan are: Need to increase the economy by about 5% a year just to employ young people entering the work force. The option of sending the spare workforce abroad is no longer there (to a greater degree) Urbanisation is rising and the urban poor are the main recruiting ground for extremists There is easy access to militants.

In essence; if you believe the extremist narrative and want to get involved and fight, then you will be able to find people to facilitate you.

Imtiaz Gul, journalist and researcher:

The rule of law and governance is a major driver.

Ijaz Haider, scholar and journalist.

The government's interventions so far has only been the use of conventional force. There is no counter radicalisation or counter extremism.

Previously, the government relied on Barelvis to counter extremist thought and this led to Baraelvis being killed. Pursuing this further could lead to violence between the two groups.

An overall societal effort is needed. Not rely on coopting one group or individual.

Pakistan is a country of many communities and religions. Even if people say they are Muslim, people follow vastly different interpretations of the faith.

Sharia is like a unicorn. No one knows what it exactly entails.

The problem is beyond the specific ideology of extremism. It's about society in general. For eg, seminary students mishear a religious leader referring to Christians and think local Christians have defamed the Quran, and then lynch them. This is a societal problem.

Extremism in a wider sense is a gangrene is Pakistan.

Tariq Rehman: Former army guy and now an educationalist:

Anything from the government is not trusted. This is a trust deficit issue. When TTP said they didn't kill Benazir, people believed them rather than the government of Musharraf.

Why not use educational tools (books and processes) to instil the values of coexistance and not extremism

Sherry Rehman PPP MP and former minister of information

We are aware of what's happening. There needs to be a look at integration of the state's actions. Interagency coordination is a challenge.

We need to have a look at governance. There is a lack of governance.

Even a commitment from all political parties against terrorism is not easy. There are always ambiguities and exceptions. We need interagency coordination.

We have huge gaps in policy execution. Civil service reform hasn't happened for a long time. It's been talked about but hasn't happened.

Governments don't plan for the next 40 years, it's true. This is because they are worried about the coming year.

"You should be able to hold a government accountable without threatening he premise of democracy."

"We have to remember that we (Pakistan) was complicit in the policy that brought terrorism home."

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Prosecutor Says Sept. 11 Suspects Can Be Held Past War Crimes Sentence

The argument, in a pretrial hearing, dealt with the unresolved question of whether a prisoner who completes such a sentence is entitled to release from military detention.

By Carol Rosenberg

Reporting from Guantánamo Bay, Cuba

Regardless of the outcome of their someday trial, the men accused of plotting the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, can be held forever as prisoners in the war against terrorism in a form of preventive detention, a military prosecutor told the presiding judge on Wednesday.

Defense lawyers were asking the judge to rule that, if convicted, Mustafa al-Hawsawi, one of the suspects in plotting the attack, would have any sentence to a term of confinement reduced by the number of days he was held by the United States before trial. He has been held since 2003.

The argument, in a pretrial hearing in the decade-old Sept. 11 case, was the latest installment over a long-running, unresolved question of whether a prisoner, once he completes a war crimes sentence, is entitled to release from military detention.

Col. Joshua S. Bearden, an Army prosecutor, said the answer was no. He urged the judge to reject the request as both premature, because the government is seeking the death penalty in the case, and beyond the scope of his authority.

No date has been set for the start of the trial of the four men accused of conspiring in the commercial airliner hijackings that killed nearly 3,000 people on Sept. 11, 2001.

Mr. Hawsawi has been held for the past 20 years but not as punishment or exclusively for trial, Colonel Bearden said. The prosecutor said the charges against Mr. Hawsawi were separate from the detention that keeps him “off the battlefield” in the U.S. war with Al Qaeda.

Mr. Hawsawi is accused of helping some of the hijackers with finances and travel arrangements from the United Arab Emirates on behalf of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the self-described mastermind of the Sept. 11 plot. The two men were captured together on March 1, 2003, in a raid on a house in Rawalpindi, Pakistan.

“Make no mistake about it,” Colonel Bearden said. “The conflict is still going on. Hostilities still exist.”

Sean M. Gleason, a lawyer for Mr. Hawsawi, a Saudi national, argued that his client was in pretrial detention from the moment of his capture because the United States had already issued an arrest warrant for him and prepared a secret indictment against him. By that measure, he said, the prisoner was so far entitled to 253 months of sentencing credit.

Mr. Hawsawi’s lawyers wrote in their brief that even though “the death penalty lurks as a potential sentence,” that should not prevent the judge from granting relief “that would open the door to a different sentence.”

His lawyers have separately asked the judge to dismiss the case because of Mr. Hawsawi’s torture in U.S. custody.

Defense lawyers for the suspects raised the issue as a pretrial matter, arguing that military commissions defendants should be entitled to sentencing credit just like other U.S. military or criminal defendants.

In 2010, the Pentagon added a rule to the Manual for Military Commissions specifically stripping war crimes judges of the right to award such credit. But Mr. Gleason argued that Congress never included that provision in the various laws that created military commissions, and so his right to credit was essentially retroactive.

The judge, Col. Matthew N. McCall, did not ask questions on Wednesday about the overarching preventive detention doctrine. But he asked why one “criminal process” should not be “run like any other criminal process.”

“They are law of war detainees forever, until the hostilities have ceased,” Colonel Bearden replied.

James G. Connell III, representing another defendant, Ammar al-Baluchi, has similarly sought sentencing credit. Mr. Connell argued that a defendant, especially when he considers whether to plead guilty to a crime, should know how much credit he would receive for time served.

Mr. Connell also disputed the prosecutor’s characterization of Mr. Baluchi as a “law of war detainee” in his first years in the C.I.A.’s secret overseas prison network, known as black sites. Prisoners held under the law of war are entitled to visits from delegates of the International Committee of the Red Cross, he said. The Sept. 11 suspects were captured in 2002 and 2003 but were not allowed to meet Red Cross representatives until October 2006, a month after their transfer to Guantánamo Bay.

Of the 30 detainees at Guantánamo Bay, 11 have been charged or convicted; 16 have been approved for transfer to other countries, with security arrangements; and three are indefinite detainees without charge or trial being held under that doctrine as prisoners of the forever war against terrorism.

An earlier version of this article misstated the legal disposition of detainees at Guantánamo Bay. Of the 30 people held there, 11 have been charged or convicted, not tried or convicted.

How we handle corrections

Carol Rosenberg reports on the wartime prison and court at Guantánamo Bay. She has been covering the topic since the first detainees were brought to the U.S. base in 2002. More about Carol Rosenberg

How Columbia University became the epicenter of disagreement over the Israel-Hamas war

A history of protests, a widely diverse population and a newly minted president have ripened the conditions for campus strife at columbia..

Americans disagree vehemently about the Israel-Hamas war. The conflict has divided friends and strained families , become a third rail in the workplace, and poses a serious political problem for President Joe Biden. 

Over the past week, all that roiling discord seems to have focused with laser-like precision on one place: Columbia University in New York City. 

The Ivy League school’s lush campus on the Upper West Side of Manhattan is known for many things. It’s where the popular TV show “Gossip Girl” was often filmed . It’s where Barack Obama finished his bachelor's degree and Hillary Clinton is now a professor . It even has a Donald Trump connection (Trump once called the university’s former president a “ moron ” for refusing to buy land from him for a new campus). 

And when law enforcement arrested more than 100 protesters on campus last week, a day after the university's president testified in Washington about her handling of a spike in antisemitism, it recalled an era of foment in the late '60s that put the school on the national map.

The tumult on the New York City campus is more than just a political spectacle, though. It has become a microcosm of the intractable challenges facing higher education in the 21st century – from managing political interference to balancing freedom of speech with a need to keep students and staff safe.

It's not a shock Columbia has become a focal point for campus strife. The school is based in the largest U.S. city, with the second-biggest Jewish population in the world after Tel Aviv. About a fifth of the country's Muslim population is in New York City, too. The campus is easily accessible and open, a vestige of the political upheaval caused by students during the Vietnam War.

Columbia has taken flak for years from progressives who view its growth into West Harlem as an example of gentrification, and conservatives who see it as a bastion of liberalism. 

All those factors have influenced the level of outrage on and around campus in recent weeks. As similar protests crop up at other universities, the demonstrations at Columbia – and the choices its leaders are making – are having a butterfly effect on schools nationwide. 

“I am deeply saddened by what is happening on our campus,” Minouche Shafik, the university's president, wrote in a message to students and staff Monday morning. “Our bonds as a community have been severely tested in ways that will take a great deal of time and effort to reaffirm.” 

What happened?

On Wednesday, Shafik traveled to Washington to address Republicans who had called her to a hearing about antisemitism on Columbia’s campus. 

Columbia University president testifies: Minouche Shafik fends off questions that took down her Ivy League peers

Flanked by other administrators, she fended off a salvo of tough questions from Republicans and Democrats alike, many of whom expressed dismay about reports that Jewish students have felt unsafe since Hamas’ deadly attack on Israel Oct. 7. Grilling from those same lawmakers tripped up the presidents of Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania at a similar proceeding in December, ultimately pushing them out of their posts. 

Shafik managed to dodge the mistakes of her peers but drew the ire of many Columbia faculty with her responses to questions from some politicians about individual professors whom lawmakers singled out.

“People feel extraordinarily betrayed by her lack of following university protocol,” said Patricia Dailey, an associate English professor and vice president of Columbia's chapter of the American Association of University Professors. “She’s caved already to the ways in which this discourse is framed.” 

Things only got more hectic from there. While the cameras were trained on Shafik in Washington, students set up camps on lawns at the center of campus, demanding the university sever all its ties to Israel.

The next morning, Shafik called in the New York City Police Department to clear out the demonstrators. Officers arrested more than 100 people. Law enforcement officials later said no injuries or violence were associated with that specific protest, according to the campus newspaper , the Columbia Daily Spectator. 

Tempers flared on the edges of the partially closed campus as rallies continued over the weekend. By Monday the White House had jumped into the fray, condemning reports of antisemitic rhetoric around the campus. A university rabbi warned Jewish students to stay home for their safety, though the campus Hillel chapter disagreed with that recommendation. All classes were held online Monday.

By then, students at a growing number of universities across the country, including Harvard, Yale and the University of California, Berkeley, were taking their cues from Columbia, launching similar protests in solidarity.

History of protests

Colleges and universities have long been hotbeds for activism, playing an important role in shaping public sentiment on controversial issues. At Columbia, campus activism has a particularly contentious history.

In 1968, massive student demonstrations threw the campus into violence and chaos. Anger over the university’s ties to the Vietnam War, and its plans to build what would effectively have been a segregated school gym on public land, led to hundreds of arrests. In the end, administrators ended the school’s relationship with a war-connected think tank. Construction on the gym was halted. The 1968 protests altered administrators' attitudes about Columbia's relationship with the city, creating an impulse that persists today to make the campus feel open to the broader community.

It took Columbia decades to recover its reputation and its endowment. The fallout from the upheaval sent the university into a financial tailspin, souring relationships with rich donors.

Some New Yorkers still haven't forgotten the episode.

Outside the school’s gates Monday, a 70-year-old Columbia alum who identified herself by her first name, Daphne, held a sign that read, “50 years ago I was here to end the Vietnam War … Today I am here to say FREE PALESTINE!” She declined to give her full name because she said she feared being doxxed.

New to the job

Like the now-former presidents of Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania, Shafik is new to her job. She took over the presidency just last year. Her lack of familiarity with the campus' history and internal dynamics likely hasn't been the best thing for all the controversy, said Robert McCaughey, an emeritus history professor at Barnard College and the author of “Stand, Columbia: A History of Columbia University."

And like her ousted Ivy League peers, she faces calls to resign. Republicans in the New York congressional delegation urged Shafik over the weekend to step down, while Democrats from the Empire State have been more judicious.

The fact that she called in police somewhat placated Rep. Virginia Foxx, a congresswoman from North Carolina and the powerful Republican chair of the House education committee. She has not called for the president's ouster.

McCaughey, who has studied every leader of the university, said he believes Shafik's presidency will survive.

"She’s got some time.”

Contributing: Clare Mulroy

Zachary Schermele covers education and breaking news for   USA TODAY. You can reach him by email at [email protected]. Follow him on X at @ZachSchermele .