Among the Allies
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BACK IN KARACHI, where Daniel Pearl had been abducted and slain in January 2002, I visited the Binori Town madrasa, one of the initial centers of jihad in Pakistan, preaching and recruiting fighters for the war against the Soviets in the 1980s. Following September 11, 2001, its preachers praised Osama bin Laden, who had been an associate of its then-director. Pearl's kidnapper, Omar Sheikh, was said to have stayed at the Binori Town madrasa. The madrasa was considered a center of the Deobandi, a movement founded in the 19th century that is similar to contemporary Saudi Wahhabism in its puritanism and in its view that Muslims with differing interpretations, especially Shias, are infidels. In response to the overt anti-Americanism preached in the mosque, its imams had been warned by the police to avoid politics in their sermons.
Past the entrance to the red mosque, the light-skinned photographer I was with drew hostile glares from young men with wispy, immature beards. A murmur rose from the white courtyard as children rocked back and forth, repeating sections of the Koran that they could not understand, since they knew no Arabic. This was hefs, the initial part of the madrasa education, often taking three years; only after a child had memorized the Koran could he begin to learn what the words meant, what the prophet Muhammad had said and done, and how scholars explained it all. It took about eight years to complete these initial stages. Among the entranced children, swaying like Orthodox Jews at prayer, I spotted Asian and African faces.
I was met by Maulana Shoaib, an administrator and teacher. I asked him what jihad meant to him. "When non-Muslims see the life of Islam and see the love and affection it teaches," he said, "they automatically become Muslims. But if non-Muslims say, ‘No, we won't live with you or allow you to spread Islam,' then fighting is the last resort for a good Muslim with the help of Allah." In the past, students from his madrasa had gone to fight in Afghanistan during their summer vacations.
Dr. Abdul Razaq Sikander had been director of the school since his predecessor was murdered. Sikander had gold-rimmed glasses and a beard stained red with henna. We spoke in Arabic. He asked why it was that Jews and Christians in America were allowed to choose their own religious education, but his government was cracking down on madrasas. I told him that there was global concern over radical Islam in Pakistan, especially since three of the July 7 London bombers had been Pakistani. "July 7 was a big conspiracy just to accuse Pakistan," he said. "There is no proof who it was, and they were from the U.K." He expressed sympathy for the victims of September 11, condemning the attack. "According to the Koran, Jews are the enemy, but Muslims and Christians are close," he said.
As we finished, Sikander walked me out of his office to the courtyard, where the children were on their noon break, sleeping in ordered rows on the hard floor, arms swung over their eyes for shade. He didn't see any problems with the strictly Islamic education his madrasa was providing. "If he wants to be an alim," or scholar of Islam, "why does he need math or other education? Ask a doctor why he is not studying law. The education we provide comes from heaven. It is better than all other educations." (A former head of the ISI, Asad Durrani, offered a laissez-faire version of this argument, telling me there were about 20,000 madrasas, of which no more than 250 were "bad." "The madrasas at least teach people something and, ultimately, you are hoping they will find a job as a mosque mullah, that's all," he said. "They are not going to be scholars.")
Not far from Binori Town was one of Pakistan's largest madrasas, the Jamia Binuria Alamiya. Its principal, Mufti Muhamad Naeem, could watch all his students from the three closed-circuit televisions in his office, changing channels to view different halls or classrooms. He had 5,000 students, 3,000 of whom lived on campus. About 100 were foreigners from America, Europe, and the Persian Gulf, as well as Indonesia and Africa. He explained that there had once been white students from North America, but their presence had created problems he did not specify. He adduced a Canadian of Pakistani lineage named Imtiaz, who had been at the madrasa with his wife and 18-year-old son for five years. "Outside you have drugs, sex, and alcohol readily available," Imtiaz told me. "Thirteen-year-old girls have sex. We feared that by the time our son was 13 years old, he would be lost. Here, boys can be natural without being forced to have a girlfriend." Imtiaz asserted that "if criminals see the deeds of Muslims, they will be Muslims too. They will become connected to Allah and leave alcohol and murdering."
Imtiaz took me to meet a fellow student, Farhun Mughal, from Brooklyn. The 21-year-old had spent a semester at New York University, but he decided he wanted to learn more about Islam. He told me his parents had supported his decision. His vacation was approaching, and he was excited to see his family in New York. His roommate, Afzam, was from Long Island, which he called Strong Island. They had come together in January 2004. Mughal hoped to return to the United States to teach. He and Afzam had chosen this madrasa because it had many foreign students and treated them well. Foreign students like Mughal had to pay $50 a month and got larger rooms than their local classmates, as well as air conditioning.
