Pakistan groups still rally for jihad

While 90 percent of the votes went to mainstream parties in national elections last October, a coalition of religious par- ties made gains that allowed them to control two key provinces along the Afghan border, Northwest Frontier Province and Baluchistan.

While Western diplomats here publicly say Pakistan hasn't changed its policy toward extremist groups, many privately worry that these two provincial governments may be tacitly supporting the resurgent Taliban.

Such worries do seem warranted. The six-party coalition that now runs the two border states have publicly stated their opposition to the US war in Afghanistan, and their desire to impose Taliban-style social rules at home. Intelligence experts also say that some of these parties maintain close ties with militant groups fighting in Kashmir.

The popular religious party Jamaat-i Islami, for instance, has long funded Al Badr and Hizbul Mujahideen, which have both gone underground in the Pakistani portion of Kashmir. And the party of Jamiat-i Ulema-i Islam long had ties with the Taliban, most of whose leaders attended Jamiat seminaries in Pakistan.

Government officials, however, say that the government's ties with extremist groups ended after Sept. 11, and there is no going back to the old policy.

"The policy of the government is clear," says Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan, spokesman for President Musharraf. "There is no room for extremism in Pakistan, and we are absolutely sincere in getting it eliminated on our territory."

For the Jamaat-ud Dawa, which runs a network of social services, including 16 Islamic institutions, 135 secondary schools, five madrassahs, a college for science, and a $300,000-plus medical mission that includes mobile clinics, an ambulance service, and blood banks. Jamaat leaders reject the label of terrorism, but they say their mission under the Lashkar-i Tayyaba remains the same: preaching Islam at home, and fighting the enemies of Islam abroad (jihad).

"Jihad is not terrorism," says Qazi Kashif, editor of Jamaat-ud Dawa's newspaper. "It is not against the civilians, it is against the oppression, against the occupying forces in Afghanistan, in Kashmir, in Iraq, in Chechnya, in Palestine, in the Philippines. Our first priority is our nearby regime in Kashmir, against the Indian Army."

Unlike Osama bin Laden, who signed a document arguing that killing civilians was allowable if those civilians paid taxes to enemies, Mr. Kashif says the Koran strictly forbids killing civilians. "If you are against the civilians, that is not jihad. What happened [at the] World Trade Center, with the innocent women and children, we disagree with that."

But another Jamaat member, Tahir Rabbani, sees the present war in much larger terms. The duty of jihad, he says, will eventually demand a final battle between Islam and the West.

"Our task is to end oppression, and until Islam is established over the entire world, the jihad will be continued forever," he says. "There can be no peace without jihad."

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