in
the North-West Frontier Province of Pakistan. With their snow capped
peaks, the
sun
rays filter through cotton clouds and reflect over them creating a
soft shimmer.
This
is the home of Lajbur Khan, the abode of the proud Pashtuns who have
lived
here
as children of these rugged conditions for centuries. Beyond the
River Swat, there
is
no official road so people either travel by foot or in Land Cruiser
II jeeps over
narrow
gravel pathways.
He
would sometimes sit by the River, listening to the stream beat gently
against the
rocks
and watching the soft sunlight reflected from the water would soothe
him. Gazing at
the
fish swim underwater, as if they were gliding in vacuum freely in
slow motion, he would then
sit
lazily, half dreaming, and wonder if heaven could be any different.
The
carefree 15-years-old Lajbur lived with his mother and father about a
kilometre west of the River.
Everyday his father and him hiked to the River over narrow
mountainous paths
to
work at a tourist lodge by the stream.
While
Lajbur's father, Badshah Khan, would tend to the lodge, Lajbur would
go to the
River
and catch fresh trout for the tourists. The tourism business saw a
significant
decline
ever since the Taliban were engaged by the Pakistani Army and reports
began
channelling-in
of a war in northern Waziristan and of bomb blasts elsewhere in the
country
killing many people.
His
family were considering to send him to the nearby Mingora City to
live and
work
with his uncle at a shoe factory there where he would get paid better
and also
might
get an opportunity to go to school.
In
line with the Islamic culture, he was indoctrinated from an early age
with the
belief
that "heaven lies underneath the feet of one's mother;"
that one has to serve
his
mother with utmost compassion and devotion to earn God's favor.
Every
night, upon returning home from work, he would massage his mother's
feet and
tend
to her requests to run errands around their neighborhood. Once his
mother
sprained
her ankle by tipping over a stray stone while walking. That night she
moaned
with
excruciating pain and he sat by her all night comforting her and
rubbing her
feet,
tears of helplessness flowing down his cheek.
Teary
eyed, he kept whispering, "Ya Allah Tu Bakhshi" (Dear God,
have mercy on us).
In
the Spring, word came via a passing caravan that Lajbur and his
family were invited to
a
wedding on the outskirts of northern Waziristan. Since the tribal
bond of affection for
the
Pashtuns is a deed next to godliness, they were bound to attend this
event.
When
Lajbur broke the news to his mother, her face radiated a smile. At
this sight,
Lajbur
wondered, "Perhaps this is what angels look like." As he
did every night,
this
night, too, he rested his head in his mother's lap before going to
bed, he
said,
"I will go to Mingora tomorrow and buy you a dress for the
wedding." His
mother
dutifully kept massaging his scalp until he drifted off into peaceful
slumber.
A
Pashtun wedding is a marvellous event where the women wear colorful
embroidered
dresses
that are local to the tribal areas, and sing wedding songs in the
Pashto language.
The
men demonstrate their joy by heartily embracing their guests,
roasting plenty of meat
for
the occasion and firing numerous rounds of ammunition into the air.
The
sound of gunfire kept getting louder and louder as Lajbur and his
family approached
the
venue of the wedding. All he could think of at this instance was how
he would meet his
cousins
and friends and catch up on the lost time and how great will this
occasion be
when
all of a sudden there was an explosion and over the next few seconds
Lajbur
found
himself unable to talk or move and gradually started to lose
consciousness
until
his surroundings slowly became dark and quiet.
Lajbur
awoke in his uncle's home to find himself with a dislocated shoulder,
a fractured
arm
bone and numerous scratches on his face as a result of a shattered
jeep window.
He
was first told that it was God who created all that existed and that
everything must
one
day return to its Creator. And that all that happens, happens for the
best.
Next
he was told that a bomb had hit a jeep travelling behind their jeep,
and that
his
mother and aunt died in the explosion since they were both sitting in
the back seat.
His
uncle kept on talking, but by this time Lajbur's mind had went blank
and all he could
see
were figures of men standing there and mouths moving with no purpose
or consequence.
The
news next day revealed that an American drone aircraft targeted a
suspected militant
caravan
and which also resulted in a few civilian deaths. The Interior
Minister demonstrated
his
joy on TV and rattled-on about how evil was closer to being
eradicated.
Lajbur
watched the news and wondered what his mother did to deserve this.
"Who would
want
to kill an angel, someone who never even killed an ant?" he
thought. As weeks
went
by, he continuously felt empty from within. He started to work, but
did not want to
go
home after work. His behavioral pattern began to alter and he became
excessively
hostile,
fighting with his father over menial matters like talking to his
friends a little loudly.
The
vacuousness he felt after the death of his mother resulted in him
feeling escalating
emotional
pain, but over time this pain gradually replaced numbness and
bitterness.
He
never saw anything beautiful, he never felt joy, every time he heard
laughter he felt
his
brain being poisoned; he found nothing to live for, nothing to look
forward to.
One
day, he got into a fight with the lodge owner's son and beat him
unconscious for
which
the lodge owner wanted to have him beaten up. At this, Badshah Khan
begged
the lodge owner, Aliyar Khan, for mercy and agreed as a condition to
send Lajbur
away
from Swat.
Lajbur
arrived at Peshawar and was received by his cousin who took him
to
a small house near the famous Namak Mandi neighborhood. They, being
close, shared heartfelt moments talking about the past and eventually
about the events leading to the death of Lajbur's
mother. His cousin promised to take Lajbur to meet a learned man who
could help Lajbur cope
with his grief.
The
next day they arrived at a house in the old part of town and met with
Riasat Zaman,
who
seemed like a very caring, sincere and pious man. He expressed his
heartfelt
sorrow
at the demise of Lajbur's mother and reminded him of the pain he
felt.
"There
is nothing precious than one's mother on Earth. The only force that
can take your
precious
mother away is evil. I have lost a brother to the atrocity of this
evil and I know
from
experience how you feel. I can feel your pain. For the sake of
prevalence of good,
for
the sake of my brother, for the sake of your mother, for the sake of
every innocent
person
killed I have decided to fight evil and want you to join me in my
righteous
fight,
our Jihad against the infidels." He said.
Since
Lajbur had given up all hope of living, he pondered that the only
purpose to his distraught life
now was to avenge his mother's death.
Travelling
by night through unknown territory, Lajbur arrived at a strange
location amidst
mountains
just in time for Fajr prayer offered by Muslims at dawn. After
prayer, he met with
some
men who greeted him very warmly and then he was directed to a quarter
where he met other men who welcomed him with equal warmth. "Welcome
home, brother. From today we are one. From today, you will start your
duty to redeem yourself and to show your devotion to
God,"
one of them said.
After
training for many months in mortal combat and how to handle
explosives, he was
met
with Riasat at the camp. "The time has come, dear brother. God
has chosen for
you
the time and place where you are needed. A week from now, you will
present
yourself
as sacrifice to attain God's mercy, to glorify Him, and to prove your
love for your mother. I
will be with you in my heart and will meet you again in 3 days as
your companion
and
guide, " he said.
At
the camp, the only language he heard praised God and celebrated a
holy war
against
the West who had strayed off the right course. He was indoctrinated
that
it
was justified to kill the Americans and British and to their
supporters and allies
to
celebrate God's victory and that revenge was an act that was
justified in Islam.
Lajbur
felt proud that he was called to perform his duty to Islam, that the
West was
evil
and that the world must be purged of evil. "Paradise, my dear
brother. Your
destiny
is Paradise and your mother will meet you there," Riasat had
said.
That
day had come when he was dropped off close to an international bank,
strapped
with
40 kilograms of high grade explosives to be triggered by an
electrical switch. He
repeatedly
kept thinking of his mother, her laughter, the way she massaged his
scalp
every
night before he fell asleep. "I am coming soon, mother. Oh!
Allah, accept my sacrifice
for
I seek to only glorify you. Help us all Muslims against the evil
infidels. Amen." He
kept
reciting silently in Pashto.
He
was told to never hesitate and to press the trigger as soon as he
entered the lobby
around
the time of Asr (or mid-day) prayer as that is a sacred time, a time
when prayers and
sacrifice
is most likely to be accepted.
Before
entering the bank, he passed by many people on the way. By this time,
he was
so
numb from within that he only saw bodies moving without meaning to
what it meant
to
be alive or to be human. No one meant anything to him, he thought,
that he had
died
a long time ago with his mother.
He
passed the bank guard, emptily smiled at him and entered the bank.
Ever resolute, he was walking
toward the lobby silently reciting "Allahu Akbar"(God is
Great). The main lobby lay next to a
narrow corridor. As every Muslim should at the time of his death,
now he started to recite
the Kalima, the sacred declaration of Faith, "There is no God,
but God. And
Muhammad
is His messenger. There is no God, but God. And Muhammad is His
messenger.
There
is no God, but God. And Muhammad is His messenger."
Passing
the corridor, he turned into the lobby to reach its center. Just as
he turned
into
the lobby, a beautiful little girl walked up to him and held his hand
tightly and started to
giggle.
He was completely taken aback and a few moments later, a woman walked
up
to the girl and separated her hand from that of Lajbur saying, "No
Safia, that is
not
daddy." Safia was Lajbur's mother's name.
Lajbur
with the distraught expression on his face of a man who
is suddenly awoken from deep slumber kept staring at the little girl
in confused and conflicting
emotions of agony and love, who, sitting in her mother's lap, was
still giggling
at him and motioning a gesture of embrace at him. Something inside of
Lajbur started
to break lose, and he became increasingly uncomfortable. Something
about the girl began
to remind him of his mother.
He
stood there for a while, and then started to make way for the
entrance of the bank
to
get out of there. Just as he turned back, he saw a group of army
officers headed to
the lobby to conduct a banking transaction. Lajbur turned back,
again, walked to
the center of the lobby and began to shiver noticeably and perspire.
One hand on the
trigger, he kept staring at the girl.
Just
as he was about to press the detonator switch, he saw his mother
sitting on
the
prayer rug after Asr prayer and heard her voice reciting the Islamic
supplication,
"Rabbana
atina fid-dunya hasanatan wa fil 'akhirati hasanatan waqina 'adhaban-nar"
(Our Lord! grant us good in this world and good in the hereafter, and
save us from the chastisement of hell's fire).
He
turned to the bank entrance, again, facing the army officers with his
hand on the
switch
and undergoing rapid perspiration. It was as if he was frozen, unable
to
act,
shivering uncontrollably. The army officers saw him in that state,
and
immediately
realized his intentions. "Don't," one of them commanded.
But Lajbur's
hand
was still on the trigger and he was blankly staring at the officers,
befuddled.
Another
one of them recited a verse from the Quran, "If you kill one
person unjustly,
it is as if you killed the whole humanity, and if you saved one
person it
is as if you saved the whole humanity."
Lajbur
did not budge, his hand still on the trigger but unable to press it.
After
many
months of rigorous indoctrination by terrorists, he was brainwashed
to the point
that
he believed that he was doing a righteous deed. But the brief encounter
with the little Safia, challenged everything he knew and stood for.
He
began questioning himself that Islam was perhaps at odds with itself,
that perhaps
nothing
was real, that there were perhaps no consequences, that no one was
accountable for anything. That when we die, everything ends. That
people like Riasat
Zaman existed to manipulate the innocent minds of distraught young
people into
serving their evil, destructive agendas.
The
only truly real thing, however, he thought, was his mother and how
she loved him.
Thinking
this he started to cry, perspiring, hand still on the trigger. All of a
sudden, there was an explosion. A bank guard shot Lajbur in the neck from
behind from point blank range and he fell on the floor, gasping like a
fish out of water.
As
he lay bleeding, from the corner of his eye he saw the little girl Safia
as he breathed his last breaths who looked at him. A smile emerged on
his face and he motioned a gesture of embrace at her before his
vision started
to dim into grayness. His last words, before his vision went totally
blank were,
"Ya Allah Tu Bakhshi."
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