NEW DELHI: Fresh from its rescue by China, Turkey and Malaysia from the FATF (Financial Action Task Force) blacklist, Pakistan has been backed by Al Qaeda in its efforts at creating mayhem in Kashmir—that was referred to as the Union Territory’s future by Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan Niazi at the UN General Assembly. “As-Sahab”, the media wing of Al Qaeda, has joined hands with pro-Pakistan groups and asked its followers to create an uprising in Kashmir following the abrogation of Article 370.
Al Qaeda has used a video, which has “Ustad Usama Masood” the spokesperson of Al Qaeda in Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) in it and a letter, written by him, to reach out to its followers in “Kashmir, Pakistan and the sub-continent”.
The video was released on 13 October and is the first such video that Al Qaeda has released on Kashmir and India after 5 August when Article 370 of the Indian Constitution was revoked. The face of Masood has been hidden to protect his identity.
As per the CIA’s factbook, “As-Sahab” is the official messaging arm of the core leadership of Al Qaeda based in Pakistan and Afghanistan and its functioning is handled by the top functionaries of the terror group. It has four separate components—questioning the “reality of democracy in India and in Kashmir”, how the use of “sword” (violence)
is the only way to defeat “tyranny and oppression” that is happening in Kashmir, attacking Pakistan for not helping the people of Kashmir and terming the UN as an anti-Muslim body for “ignoring” the situation in Kashmir. These four separate messages—but part of the same message—that have been narrated in Urdu and Hindi, when read together, are intended to convince the reader that a “mass-uprising” is the only way to “take back” Kashmir through violence.
The video and the letter, that were released by the AQIS, and is addressed to “Muslim brothers of Kashmir, Pakistan and the Subcontinent”, says that it is obligatory on the part of the followers of Al Qaeda to help the “oppressed brothers of Kashmir” who are living in the “worst prison” with no forms of communication while comparing the situation in Kashmir to that in “Turkistan”, Palestine and Syria.
It has also stated in the almost 23-minute-long video that democracy, to which a considerable focus has been given (almost 500 words), was a tool that was being used by oppressors across the world to subjugate the weak. The spokesperson, with the intention to discourage gullible minds from trusting democratic set-ups, has also spoken about how the media has portrayed the “truth as falsehood and falsehood as truth”.
In a clear message to the political entities of the state, Al Qaeda has said that those who compelled the Wahhabis in Kashmir “to abandon jihad and qital and to take up political struggle instead, should now admit that it has achieved nothing” and that it is only sword (violence) that can help the people of Kashmir and not dialogues, resolutions, condemnations and demonstrations of unity.
It has also blamed the civilian government in Pakistan for not allowing enough weapons and resources to reach Kashmir. This assertion of the Al Qaeda though falls flat on its face as recorded evidences have shown that Pakistan-based terrorists have been entering Kashmir for years now. Al Qaeda acknowledges that Pakistan has kept the “jihadis” of the valley subservient to the Pakistan army.
“If they didn’t prevent the jihadi troops of the Ummah from entering into the valley of Kashmir and didn’t try to keep the jihadi movement inside the valley to be subservient and dependent upon them and use all condemnable means to achieve this end, then today Kashmir would not be presenting such a heart-rending scenario,” the spokesperson said.
The spokesperson further calls the UN an “oppressive and anti-Muslim” body for “remaining deaf to the cries of the people of Kashmir” while asking its followers from Kashmir to Assam to “rise”.
Interestingly, in what can be described as Al Qaeda’s move to emerge as the “unifying” terror body in the valley, the spokesperson says that the “movement” and call for reaching to Kashmir was not limited to any group. “This movement is not specific to any particular group or party; rather it is the movement of all the faithful believers in Kashmir, all the Muslims in the subcontinent and the whole Ummah.”
“This is the beginning of the movement which will put to the sword all the standard-bearers of injustice and Kufr (infidelity) from Khurasan till Chittagong, and from Sindh to Hind (India). It shall bring the bounties of justice in the whole subcontinent under the standard of Tauheed. Today if it is encamped in the fields and deserts of Khurasan, then its second camp is Kashmir and Delhi and finally it would be in Jerusalem” it states, while giving the example of how Taliban managed to defeat the armed forces of the United States.
Reserving the most provocative of the words for the last, the spokesperson asks its followers to “strike” wherever they can. “I request all those who believe, to aid and assist with your lives and wealth, this blessed jihadi movement rising in Kashmir. As a reminder, I would also add that do not consider the battlefront against India to be limited to Kashmir, wherever you find the Indian Army and the polytheist rulers of India, within India and outside, strike them. Your strikes shall, Allah willing, result in a great change, and it will certainly cause the stranglehold on our Kashmiri brothers to loosen. Likewise, strengthen this jihadi movement with your pens and your tongues, and take full part in spreading the message and fundamentals of this movement.”
Al Qaeda is, like the Taliban, marching in lockstep with the China-Turkey-Malaysia protected Wahhabi army of Pakistan and its other terror affiliates.