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

Inside Jihad
Pashtun Islamist government in Afghanistan. Almost all the Islamic
militant groups served as instruments of Pakistan’s regional policy.
The army needed them as much as they needed the army. After 9/11,
Pakistan’s support for the American-led war on terror pitted it against
its former clients. Although as the following chapter shows, this did
not mean that support for them in the state security apparatus was
completely withdrawn.
The Wahabi-inspired LeT, the most radical face of jihad in Pakistan,
was also more amenable to the ISI than any other militant outfits. After
the 2002 ban, it reduced its public visibility. Instead of challenging
Musharraf’s military led government, it agreed to work within new
parameters and restrict its activities to a ‘controlled jihad’ in Kashmir
while keeping a low profile inside Pakistan. However, this tactical
truce was a strained one. Islamist groups, even government-friendly
ones like LeT, were becoming radicalized by the ideological currents
of the region. Increasingly, their ambitions exceeded the goals of the
ISI. Even in 2000, the founder of LeT, Hafiz Mohammed Saeed told me
that he saw the struggle in Kashmir as ‘the gateway to the liberation of
Indian Muslims’. He went on: ‘We believe in a clash of civilizations and
our jihad will continue until Islam becomes the dominant religion.’ 6
A former university professor, Hafiz Saeed is not a charismatic
man; he comes across as shy and self-effacing, not the ingredients
that militant leaders are generally made of. Short and chubby, his
long beard dyed with henna, when I met him in January 2001 he was
always surrounded by his young followers. For him, killing infidels
and destroying the forces of ‘evil and disbelief is the obligation of
every pious Muslim’. 7 The horrors of the partition of India in 1947,
which uprooted his family from their home in Simla, left a huge imprint
on Hafiz Saeed’s personality. Millions of people were massacred in
the communal violence that followed the creation of the new Muslim
state. Thirty-six members of his family were killed while migrating
to Pakistan. There his family settled in the central Punjab district of
Sargodha. 8
Farm land allotted by the government, and hard work, brought
prosperity to the family. Hafiz Saeed’s parents were very religious. His
mother taught the Qur’an to her seven sons. Five of them were still
alive. Hafiz Saeed received his primary education in the village. After
graduating from the University of Punjab he joined the King Abdul
Aziz Islamic University in Riyadh where he also taught for many years.
During his stay in Saudi Arabia he developed close links with Wahabi