“They also told girls who were on their way home from the English Language Center and threatened them, saying they should not go to the schools again.” It would be refreshing, in light of this and the abduction of the girls in Nigeria, if a Muslim spokesman who has condemned the abductions would refute on Islamic grounds the understanding of Sharia that this group and Boko Haram have. But they don’t bother.
“Panjgur incident: Militant group threatens English-language schools,” by Shezad Baloch, Express Tribune, May 8, 2014 (thanks to Jerk Chicken):
QUETTA: An armed group based in Panjgur, Balochistan’s western district, has threatened 23 English Language Learning Centers to shut down and stop imparting co-education and teaching in English, which they say is ‘Haram (prohibited) in Islam’.
Masked armed men barged into one language center on Wednesday and threatened the teachers and the young male and female students. “Co-education and learning English language is Haram (forbidden in Islam),” they told the teachers, according to one instructor who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The armed men destroyed the school’s furniture and tore textbooks during the incident.
Panjgur police have lodged an FIR against unidentified persons under the Anti Terrorism Act and security has been increased around the centers. “They also told girls who were on their way home from the English Language Center and threatened them, saying they should not go to the schools again,” SHO Panjgur police station Mohammed Murad told The Express Tribune .
However, the girls say they are not cowed. “I am not scared and will go to school under all circumstances,” said one of the girls, speaking with The Express Tribune over the phone. She said the man who was threatening the girls spoke in Balochi, with a local Panjguri accent.
The men have also distributed threatening letters across Panjgur. An organization calling itself Tanzeem-ul-Islami-ul-Furqan has circulated a list of those in charge of the private schools, accusing them of corrupting the minds of local girls by imparting Western education. Station House Officer (SHO) Panjgur Mohammed Murad said the organization has emerged recently.
“Private schools should stop girls’ education – both co-education and separate education,” warned the letter, adding, “We urge all van and taxi drivers to refrain from taking girls to schools. Otherwise, they will also be targeted.”
“It seems there has been a spill-over of Taliban culture into Panjgur,” remarked one of the heads of the language center, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “This development comes after the recent operation against Baloch militants. It seems someone is trying to radicalize people in Panjgur,” he felt.
The English Language Learning Centers remained closed for three days after receiving the threats. Hundreds of protestors staged a sit-in in front of the Deputy Commissioner’s Office. District administration and police officials assured the protestors that they will arrange foolproof security for the centers and the schools were reopened on Tuesday. However, attendance at the schools was comparatively low.
The Panjgur and Kech regions are known as centers of learning and the ‘intellectual capital of Balochistan’.
bernie says
Perhaps the girls should learn Esperanto instead…but wait, that was invented by a Jewish fellow named Ludovic Zamenhof.
Christian A. Beltram says
It is this extremely backward way of thinking that will destroy the civilizaed world if Militant Islam is allowed to advance in it.
Kepha says
Correction: It’ll probably destroy whatever vestiges of civilization that are left in Pathologicalstan!
Will Doohan says
I always liked the word from the Doonesbury comic – Berzerkistan
Huck Folder says
Borgistan, Zombiestan, Ebolastan, Pukistan, Phuckistan, …
Shane says
Yes, we must unite to stop these ignorant savages from turning the world back to the 7th century. Perhaps, feminists will now join with us to oppose the Taliban, Boko Haram, and other Islamic militant groups that oppress women.
Veracious_one says
Islam—the thug mentality religion…..
mortimer says
English is the passport for young women to the world. Urdu is the language of the conquerors of India…the ‘horde’ of Muslim invaders. Modern jihadists want to go back to India to finish the job.
The first part of jihad is the JIHAD AGAINST WOMEN. When women are subjugated to the will of the jihadists, they can turn on disbelievers and betray them as Mohammed did.
Mirza says
Mirza May 14, 2014 at 4:41 am
Miss Malala where are you? It is easy to make statements from the
safety of Britain, and to make stirring speeches from the safety net of the
United States. But I doubt you have changed attitudes in your native land in the slightest. The root cause is Islam itself, of which you a fervent adherent. The first thing you must do is to dump Islam publicly, and persuade your family to do so. Otherwise you are just another Muslim immigrant to U.K., where you compatriots are giving native British people nothing but trouble.
Jay Boo says
They have a point.
Everyone knows that Allah doesn’t read or speak English.
English is not an easy language to learn.
Let’s not embarrass Allah.
Lookmann says
With just 26 letters , English is the simplest and easiest language to learn. Compare this with ,say chinese ,25o thousand pictographs appearing as letters.
Point is, this ‘ allah’ fellow does not have the brains to read even 26 letters.
Aion says
Good. Anything that makes it harder for Muslims to come to an integrate into western countries is a good thing. Since all of them refuse to anathematize terrorist groups they all support them – I don’t care how how nice, civilized or respectable they seem. They can either anathematize them – or leave Islam – but they can’t refuse to anathematize terrorists and pretend to not support them.
No1 says
Please, please, please Muslims–listen to these jihadists and do not learn English.
Jaladhi says
Pakistan should be renamed “Jahillyastan” because that’s where they aspire to be !! There is nothing “Pak”(pure) in Pakistan – it is all “napak”, stupidity, jahillya(which they think other civilizations are). Let them follow their allah’s orders slide rapidly into the stone age.
Jaladhi says
>”. . learning English is prohibited in Islam”
Yes, anything that brings Muslims out of stone age is prohibited in Islam.
What is not prohibited in Islam :
Rape, incest, slavery, murder, stealing, invading, lying to no end, and all those normal human values which we human beings follow, etc, etc, …
Jacksonl03 says
“It seems there has been a spill-over of Taliban culture into Panjgur,”
A spillage of rotten sewage from one garbage dump into the slightly less full dump next door.
gravenimage says
Pakistan: Jihadists threaten English schools; learning English “prohibited in Islam”
…………………………..
Really? Shouldn’t someone notify Anjem Choudary and the fine fellows at CAIR?
In the end, though, this just goes to show how deep the hatred of the use of the mind runs in Islam.
The Taliban—despite their name translating as “student”, this only applied to Madrasses—targets schools, especially girls’ schools.
Then there is Boko Haram. The main focus has been, understandably, their abduction of girls—but an important point is that is was abduction of girls *from school*. This was not just a place to find lots of unguarded girls, but also specifically to prevent these girls from getting an education, and punishing them for attempting to do so, rather than their being married off.
And why not? “Boko Haram” means “Western Education is Forbidden”—or as the inimitable Hugh Fitzgerald succinctly put it, “Books, him bad”.
“Tanzeem-ul-Islami-ul-Furqan” translates roughly as the “Islamic Organization of the Criterion”.
This might sound pretty opaque, except that the 25th Sura of the Qur’an is “Al-Furqan”, a self-referential verse that claims that the Qur’an itself is the only means of determining good from evil.
And we know what *that* means—threatening young school girls = “good”. Learning—unless it is the mindless rote recitation of the Madrassa, = “evil”.
The Sura threatens those who listen to anything other than the Qur’an with “a blaze”—i.e., Jehannum (hell).
It also warns against taking “gods’ other than Allah, which these Jihadists see as studying anything other than Islam.
And yet, despite how consistent pious Muslims all over the world are in their hatred of learning, Westerners seem continually surprised by this—and worse, assume, somehow, that this cannot really be Islamic.
Alvin says
Typical backward idiots. No wonder they can never develop because of idiotic people who live like holy but only think of war and never peace. Tell me in which part of the holy book that it is not right to learn English? Or are you stupid and cannot understand your religion and choose to remain uneducated?