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Our Patriots and Malala

by Ejaz Haider

Oli Scarff—AFP

Inside the minds of the haters spewing venom at the 20-year-old Nobel laureate

I hate Malala Yousafzai. I am variously a 20-something, a 30-something, a 40-something, even a 50-something. I believe I have cogent reasons for hating her. Consider:

I am a patriot. As a patriot, I know that the entire world, Darth Vader, Lord Voldemort, domestic liberals, rights activists, documentary makers, smoking girls, short dresses and the Army of the Dead are conspiring to undermine the integrity of my country. Malala is obviously part of this conspiracy. Why else would she be feted by leaders of the infidel world, who give her standing ovations?

She is a brand and they want to foist the brand on us. As part of the grand conspiracy, they decided to give her a Nobel Prize. You know how this works. It’s like those damned Oscars. The entire game is rigged.

Some of us patriots believe that as part of this grand design to launch her, they got someone to shoot her so she would get injured and the play could begin. The only problem was that the Tehreek-e-Taliban decided to take credit for it and that fellow Adnan Rashid, who was sprung by the TTP from Bannu gaol, even wrote a darned letter to her. All of this was to complicate things and take our attention away from the real conspiracy.

But the discerning know the truth. We know that if Malala were really shot in the head, she wouldn’t have survived. Also, what about the other girl with her? Why is she not being celebrated?

The other day a liberal idiot said to me that I was contradicting myself by first arguing that the entire episode was choreographed and then referring to the other girl who was shot with her. I told him that he needs to learn to go below the surface of things. The best dramatic choreography makes us believe that what we are witnessing is the real thing. Which is why the other girl was shot.

As if on cue, she was taken abroad for treatment. Why? When we have the best doctors here, why did she need to be treated abroad if not for her handlers to whisk her away and work on her brand? Since she left here, she is being worked on and now she has been sent back as a Trojan.

People argue that she has built a school in Shangla for girls. Sure. But they don’t realize that this is meant to discredit Pakistan and present it as a country where girls and women do not have equal opportunities, and we need foreign funding to even build schools.

A sophisticated ploy, for sure. The school will have the opportunity to educate hundreds of girls and instill in them subversive ideas that go against our traditional values. Why doesn’t anyone give funds to Darul Uloom Haqqania, except the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf government? Because, and the libs must understand this, Haqqania is in the forefront of the war against the infidels and holds on to our cherished traditions.

Malala even has a fund and donated, we are told, $7 million for educational projects in Pakistan. This is what I call the philanthropy trap. Besides, it works fine because it’s indoctrination through education, the surest way of sullying young minds. As part of this subtle campaign, she has also been arranging medical vacations for the victims of the Army Public School attack. All this is being done to present her as a messiah, to make it difficult for the patriots to expose the conspiracy that’s been afoot since Longinus and Brutus killed Julius Caesar.

Alas! there’s no Antony here to avenge Caesar.

Instead, we now have a government that actually invites her over and celebrates her. This is precisely the next turn in the brief she has been given by the Night King. Like the dragon pulled out and revived, she is here to bring the wall down, our defense against external aggression. Last I went to Swat, the girls there were already talking about her, resolving to be like her, to get an education and have careers. It all sounds great but no one save the patriots understands the consequences of this emancipation.

As our doyen, the man who wears laal topi, will tell you, this is 4GW: fourth-generation warfare. It’s not just fought with weapons, even though our doyen likes to practice shooting regularly in the event that someone does decide to shoot at him with a weapon. One must be ready to face any eventuality, after all. 4GW is fought on multiple fronts and mostly through non-kinetic means. That’s where Malala, her fund, her foreign funders, her Nobel, her tears and her speeches come in.

Our adversaries are geniuses. They have weaponized a young girl against the patriots and the entire qaum is berating them and refusing to appreciate the risks the patriots are taking to reveal the plot against Pakistan. Even Haqqania, the alma mater of many a proud mujahid, is quiet. That speaks for how efficiently and effectively this war is being waged. Let someone not say that I didn’t warn this nation.

Haider is editor of national-security affairs at Capital TV. He was a Ford Scholar at the Program in Arms Control, Disarmament and International Security at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution, Washington, D.C. He tweets @ejazhaider 

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3 comments

himanshumandpe1 March 30, 2018 - 9:08 pm

Something I said to an Indian friend who called Malala a drama Queen, “Actually, I end up being too harsh on some of the issues because I feel there is too much of demonizing being done around the Malala issue and when it comes from someone whom you expect to be liberal and progressive it jars the mind a bit. I will at least try to explain why I think it is morally wrong to call her a drama queen as briefly as I can. Malala comes from Swat valley in Pakistan. It was quite a peaceful place before TTP overtook the control. The TTP established Sharia law in SWAT and also closed down schools. Malala grew up watching people getting public floggings and girls being stopped from going to school. Her father was an educator and Principal. A lot of Malala`s values are said to have been an inspiration from her father. So here was Malala`s family watching Swat being bulldozed by the savagery of the TTP. This was also the time when TTP was at its peak. Except for a weak and corrupt government in center completely under army`s dictation as far as actions against militancy were concerned army`and another provincial government in KPK( The ANP) no one even dare to spoke against the TTP and protests from the government were too feeble. This was a time when most political parties were either acting as apologists of the terrorists or were cowering under their fear. Imran Khan aka Taliban Khan as he was called in those days by his opponents wanted a dialogue with TTP w/o preconditions. The CM of the biggest province of Pakistan, Punjab, begged TTP publicly to not carry attacks in Punjab. On one hand, Pakistan army has had a history of pimping its country to America and Saudis but at the same time domestically a strong anti-American wave was emerging due to drone attacks. At this time when the Americans demanded an operation in Swat by the army, the political parties in Pakistan started crying foul. So Pakistan army almost left the people of SWAT on their own fate. It was at this time, encouraged by her father Malala started writing blogs on BBC against the Taliban under an alias Gul Makai. She was barely 12 at the time but soon became famous and when her name reached the TTP who had been running a terror regime in Swat and NWFP they threatened her with assassination. It is said that Malala`s father encouraged Malala at the behest of CIA but there was no proof of that. However, my view is even if that was true what was the alternative for the man? His own army had left him, the political leaders including the governments were helpless. Schools were destroyed, people were being beaten/flogged brutally in public over issues like not keeping beards and not following other sharia stipulations. However, Malala despite being a child and despite having seen this reign of terror kept protesting and was finally shot in her head. The wound inflicted was so severe that early diagnosis said that even if she survives she may not be able to walk the rest of her life. After she was shot an international outrage forced the Pak army to carry an operation in Swat and thus the valley was freed. However, right-wing parties kept demonizing Malala and even said things like; she was not even shot and everything is a concoction from the CIA. The TTP issues a statement that if Malala survives and continues her fight against the TTP then they would make another attempt against her life. However, Malala whose disfigured face may have prompted the dislike among many was actually quite beautiful before her face was marred permanently by the bullet shot in her head. For next two years, she would recover from her injury which could only be treated in Europe. Post her recovery she was constantly discouraged from entering Pakistan. This ordeal had made her stronger. She now wanted to play an instrumental role in promoting secularism, education, and peace not only in Pakistan but wherever she could help. Her book `I am Malala` was written on her behalf by an American journalist and she also set up the Malala fund which has donated millions of dollars for children and education everywhere. Malala had become the darling of the west because she stood as a symbol against terror. Of course, she has had support and backing from others as you would expect some people to back up a noble agenda but it still takes a tremendous amount of conviction based idealism for a child of 12-21 yrs to do what she has been doing. She is pursuing her education at Oxford and she wants to become the PM of Pakistan. Her story is a true and wonderful story of courage. It is okay if people dislike her because sometimes we just don’t like people from the get-go. We do try to rationalize our dislike by substantiating ourselves with reasons but those reasons must not be fabricated. We can instead be honest in our dislike and simply say, “I just don’t like her/him”. We should, however, not mock the extreme difficulties these people had faced and still come out as winners. I apologize if I was harsh but I feel her criticism on the grounds that she is a CIA agent or she is a drama queen are unfair not just to her but to everyone who has ever fought against oppression and tyranny. We may not all be simultaneously unfortunate or fortunate enough to have found ourselves into their positions and maybe even if we ever did we may not be able to muster enough courage but we can at least celebrate their victories. It is also okay if we do not acknowledge their victories but we must try not to mock them.”

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WhatTheF April 6, 2018 - 6:57 am

Your comment is 263 words longer than the article!! Get a life!

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I Ahmed March 31, 2018 - 11:10 am

The pack of hateful lies, slanderous misinformation coupled with outright evil malevolence directed at a young girl who simply called injustice by its name and then forgave the ignorants who shot her in the head is bewildering to any sane person.

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