The Economist : Showdown at the mosque

Showdown at the mosque

Jul 12th 2007 | LAHORE

“SURRENDER or die” was the blunt warning given by Pakistan's president, General Pervez Musharraf, on July 7th to the Islamic vigilantes holed up in Islamabad's Lal Masjid, or Red Mosque. He was not bluffing. When last-ditch negotiations broke down in the early hours of July 10th, about 200 army commandos stormed the compound. Nearly 100 people, including a dozen soldiers and the head of the extremists, Abdul Rashid, were killed in the day-long battle. Resistance was fierce. The compound, far from being a madrassa housing harmless women and children, was a bunker for well-armed extremists. Some were from banned religious parties and groups, and some linked to al-Qaeda and the “Taliban” militias terrorising the tribal belt between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The battle brought to an end a tense week-long siege, and six months in which the mosque had been brazenly defying the government. Relief that the confrontation is over is tempered with anxiety about the fallout. Many Pakistanis think the extremists had it coming. The state had to enforce its writ where it was being so criminally flouted. For such observers, religious extremism is a curse which has laid Pakistan low and must be eliminated. But there are as many who insist that the militants should have been pardoned and Muslim lives saved. Naturally, the latter camp includes clerics and conservatives.

General Musharraf's political opponents are also trying to take advantage of the bloodshed to score propaganda points. The one discordant voice has been that of Benazir Bhutto, an exiled former prime minister. She supported the storming of the mosque as a necessarily strong message to wannabe extremists. But she qualified her endorsement by arguing that religious extremism was a consequence of army rule, and only full-fledged civilian democracy could counter it effectively.

Questions have also been raised about the role of the mainstream vernacular media, print and electronic. They had given Mr Rashid an uninterrupted platform to pitch directly to Pakistanis his stark message: revolt, enforce sharia law and topple the Musharraf government. Middle-class journalists are typically anti-army, anti-Musharraf and anti-America.

Conspiracy theorists—and Pakistan is swarming with them—accuse the government of scripting the prolonged drama. The aim, they say, was to divert attention from its other troubles, notably the protests sparked by General Musharraf's attempt in March to sack the chief justice.

The result of the military operation has been alienation among moderates across the country and outrage among the mullahs. Liberals and NGOs are anyway opposed to military rule, and human-rights activists have attacked the “brutish” army operation. If protests against the bloodshed turn violent, the government might be compelled to resort once more to force.

The prospects of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League (PML) in a general election due in the next few months look dim. General Musharraf's plans to stay in office with all his powers intact by orthodox means look nearly hopeless. Miss Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party is convinced his supporters plan to rig the election. The voters' list, they say, has been shorn of some 20m people, mostly opposition supporters.

There may, however, be a silver lining to the Red Mosque showdown. Optimists hope it will make the army realise that it is time to end its alliance with religious forces, in place since the jihad against Soviet rule in Afghanistan in the 1980s. Even the army must see the dangers the jihadists pose. They have made desperate attempts to derail the peace process with India; to assassinate General Musharraf; to Talibanise the frontier regions; and now to enforce their narrow brand of sharia law in the federal capital by armed blackmail.

Some analysts also argue that the PML is a drag on General Musharraf's agenda for “enlightened moderation” because it constantly seeks to ally with the mullahs. This might be good news for Miss Bhutto. She has been trying to clinch a deal with the general that gives her a fair shot at the next polls. Unfortunately, the tide of political and religious extremism can probably not be stemmed by the weak, ill-disciplined political parties without the army's active help. At a conference that wound up in London this week, the opposition parties failed to agree on a policy to get rid of General Musharraf. Miss Bhutto, eyeing an end to exile, may be wise in also seeking an accommodation with him.