Daily Times

Imran Khan narrates that the suicide attacks in Pakistan are a ‘backlash’ from the people of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), in response to the Pakistan Army operations and the US drone attacks in the region. On several occasions he has also claimed that the attacks were tribal revenge in line with the code of Pakhtunwali. In other words, Imran Khan is saying that terrorism in Pakistan is terrorism by Pakhtun culture. This narrative is not just far from the truth but also a blatant lie, or otherwise Imran Khan has no idea about the ground reality in FATA since 9/11.

An overwhelming majority of the US drone attacks since 2004 to this date have been in the areas of the Ahmadzai Wazir, Utmanzai Wazir and Dawar tribes in South and North Waziristan. Going by Imran Khan’s argument, most ‘innocent’ casualties in the drone attacks must be from these three tribes and thus ‘backlashers’ from these tribes are rocking Pakistan with terrorist attacks. But there are no Wazir and Dawar Taliban or non-Taliban ordinary people from these tribes who have been involved in any attacks inside Pakistan!

Those who are involved in deadly attacks inside Pakistan are al Qaeda foreigners — Uzbeks, Arabs etc — the Punjabis and the Pakhtuns from other areas including terrorists from the Mehsud tribe. Now, in Pakhtun tribal culture, the loyalty and sympathy of an individual go to his own tribe, clan or even sub-clan. How is it possible that Mehsud or other Pakhtun tribesmen are taking revenge for the ‘innocent casualties’ in the Wazir and Dawar tribes, whereas the latter tribes refrain from revenge? How is this explainable in Pakhtunwali? It becomes even more ridiculous when one thinks of the Punjabi, Arab and Uzbek militants attacking the state and society in Pakistan for revenge in line with Pakhtunwali for the ‘innocent’ civilian casualties amongst the Dawar and the two Wazir tribes of Waziristan!

Also, it must be remembered that, in the tribal context, revenge is closely linked with honour. Revenge is publicly taken to restore honour. Honour is personal and tribal. This implies that the person or tribe (sub-tribe, clan or sub-clan) whose honour has been violated must restore it by taking revenge with his/its own hands. No other person, tribe, sub-tribe, clan or sub-clan can take revenge for them to restore their honour. In this tribal context it looks hilariously non-serious to think of other Pakhtun tribesmen or other ethnic groups, such as the Punjabis, Arabs etc taking revenge to restore the honour of the Wazir and Dawar tribes!

The Ahmadzai Wazir, Utmanzai Wazir and Dawar tribesmen and women are overpowered by the ISI-Taliban-al Qaeda trio. The Taliban among these three tribes are the ‘good’ Taliban, the ones who carry out attacks on US and NATO forces in Afghanistan but refrain from committing terrorism in Pakistan. This is precisely the reason — their attacks inside Afghanistan — behind why their area is repeatedly attacked by US drones. The Taliban fighters and commanders from these three tribes are a tiny minority within their own homeland. The majority of the militants in their area are the Punjabis, al Qaeda foreigners and also Pakhtuns from other areas on both sides of the Durand Line, including the Mehsud militants, who were not eliminated by Pakistan in Operation Rah-e-Nijat but simply relocated to the Wazir areas in Waziristan.

The whole idea that suicide attacks in Pakistan are a tribal backlash is baseless. Let us not forget that the suicide bombers involved in the many attacks in Pakistan are teenage children. But teenage children do not take revenge on tribal society. One may argue that childhood ends in the tribal area before the modern legal age limit — 18 years. This may be true in many respects but, strictly in terms of revenge in line with Pakhtunwali, the norm is that revenge is taken by mature, adult men rather than youngsters under 18 years of age. There are rare exceptions when women and young people under 18 have taken revenge but this is only an exception. The norm is that mature adult men over 18 years of age take revenge.

Looking at the large number of young children under 18 who are used in suicide attacks, one is constrained to conclude that most of the ‘innocent’ casualties of the drone strikes are survived by no adult men over 18 years of age to take revenge! But this again is a hilarious idea especially given the fact — known to people who know the ground realities of the tribal areas — that the tribal families have been forced to offer a child and that children are also kidnapped to be trained as suicide bombers.

Above all, revenge may be imperative in the tribal context but pragmatism is even more imperative. In the tribal context, which is a bottom-up egalitarian culture, the notion of revenge successfully works as a deterrence and is rarely put into practice. The war on terror with so many powerful state and non-state external actors involved is a radically different context in which the idea of revenge has neither deterrence nor practical value in terms of settling scores with perceived enemies. This is precisely the reason why none of the tribal families of over 1,000 tribal leaders, who have been target killed since 2003 due to their anti-Taliban stance, have been involved in violent acts of revenge despite the fact that the families hold the ISI responsible for the killings of relatives and tribal leaders. These families can rightly be called pillars of Pakhtunwali in FATA. If these families have refrained from violent acts of revenge, the ordinary tribesmen are even less likely to commit violence for revenge. This explains why hundreds of thousands of tribesmen have preferred to live and work in degrading conditions during the displacement caused by the Pakistan Army operations rather than joining the Taliban who offer lucrative salaries. The elders of the Kala Khel tribe — in response to the deadly Taliban attack on their school children — requested the chief justice of Pakistan (CJP) to take revenge from the Taliban to give them justice. There are countless other examples of this kind in FATA.

The suicide bombings that have struck Pakistan are part and parcel of the strategic calculus of the Pakistani security establishment and the al Qaeda jihadi ideology, which has nothing to do with the tribal culture or sufferings of the tribal people in the war on terror.

(To be continued)

The writer is the author of Taliban and Anti-Taliban