(PAK.) Farmers Put Down Plows to Take Up Arms Against US

[DUreader]

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/1111-09.htm


Pakistani tribesmen stay fundamentally faithful to Taliban
Farmers Put Down Plows to Take Up
Arms Against US
by Juliette Terzieff

Northwest Frontier province, Pakistan -- Rahimullah's fingers adeptly clean and
reassemble the Kalashnikov rifle on the dusty mud floor of the small village store. A
single bulb swinging from a wire bounces shadows back and forth across him as he
works.

"I am a Taliban. I believe in the movement and in the supreme leader Mullah Omar,"
the 25-year-old says to the approving nods of the 20-odd men gathered round to
hear his discourse with the foreign female reporter.

Like four of the others present -- and thousands of other sympathetic Pakistanis in
the past several years -- Rahimullah has traveled repeatedly to wage part-time jihad
on behalf of the fundamentalist Taliban: in 1996, when they overthrew an earlier
Afghan government; in 2001, as the U.S. military was set to invade; and earlier this
year, to help in the guerrilla warfare against the American occupation.

All three times he crossed the border near the Afghan town of Khost, where al
Qaeda ran its most infamous training camps, and support for the former
government is still very strong.


snip

[denverbill]

1. It takes guts to do that as a reporter.

I sure as hell would never do it.

[0007]

2. The Pakistani sound extremely passionate about ...

jihad on behalf of the fundamentalist Taliban and their leader Omar.

Very good article.

[varun]

3. the maddrassahs...

...in Pakistan are churning out thousands of Jihadis everyday. The "War on Terrorism" has acted a fuel to fire..this will only lead to more Jihadis.

[realFedUp]

4. Who's still funding the maddrassahs?

Saudis? US? I thought the idea was to cut
off the funding so these guys dried up.