Frontline Pakistan : The Struggle With Militant Islam - Arz-e-Pak

The Conflict Within
External factors contributed hugely to stoking sectarian conflict in
Pakistan. The Iranian revolution evoked a strong reaction throughout
the Muslim world. The spill-over effect of the Shia revolution worried
many Arab rulers, as well as the Pakistani military regime, which was
trying to establish an Islamic system of a different kind. The rivalry
between Sunni Arab states and Shia Iran was further heightened during
the Iran-Iraq war. Money poured in from Arab countries anxious
to counter the radical Shia Islam sponsored by Iran’s revolutionary
regime. In the process, Pakistan became the battlefield in an intra
Islam proxy war. Iran and Saudi Arabia supported their respected
allies. The Saudi government had consistently backed and funded the
Deobandi school of thought in Pakistan which had many similarities
to the Wahabi version of Islam. 14 Madrasas funded by Saudi Arabia,
Kuwait and other Gulf countries, especially after the Soviet invasion
of Afghanistan, became the centre of Sunni militancy, as well the
recruiting ground for sectarian organizations. 15
Deobandi and Ahle Hadith mullahs whipped up anti-Shia sentiments.
Some Sunni leaders were on the payroll of Iraq. Pakistani and Iranian
intelligence agencies had also been actively involved in the proxy war
being fought on Pakistani streets since the 1980s. 16 The rise of foreignbacked
sectarian militancy set in motion a seemingly unending cycle
of violence. Afghanistan’s war-hardened fanatics declared their own
jihad at home against the Shia community. Armed with sophisticated
weapons they started targeting rival mosques and Shia leaders. 17
Although the Shia and Sunni conflict in Pakistan pre-dated the
emergence of the SSP, there had been a major escalation in sectarian
violence since the anti-Shia riots in Lahore in 1986. Two subsequent
events were to change the dynamics of the sectarian violence. In 1987,
Allama Ehsan Elahi Zaheer, a Saudi-backed Sunni cleric, was killed in
a bomb blast in Lahore. The following year, a prominent Shia leader,
Arif Hussaini, was murdered in Peshawar. He had spent time in Iran
and was believed to have been closely associated with Iran’s Islamic
regime. The assassin was a serving army officer, Majid Raza Gillani,
which raised suspicions of the ISI’s involvement in the murder.
The violence spiralled with the murder of SSP founder Haq Nawaz
Jhangvi in 1990, believed to have been carried out by Shia militants.
Sectarian clashes broke out in Jhang and spread to other parts of the
province. With some 5,000 to 6,000 well-trained militants, the SSP
unleashed a reign of terror. The SSP supporters blamed Iran-backed
Shia militants for the assassination of Jhangvi. In December that year,