The Taliban (in both Pakistan and Afghanistan) have said time and time again that they NEVER intentionally target civilians or civilian areas (such as market places and mosques).
For example, Mullah Nazir (who was stayed as the Amir of the Taliban in South Waziristan) was asked the following question in an interview:
Q. There is another allegation upon the mujahideen that they do execute suicide attacks upon army men and other targets, but also deem it lawful to kill many Muslims along with them? What is your opinion about that? Is it lawful to kill a Muslim?
A. Actually, it is the ISI that executes operations at mosques, not the mujahideen. They are enemies to us and so they scare people that these (Taliban) are thugs and this and that.
We are mujahideen and we never carry out martyrdom operations in the vicinity of Muslims. It is the Army upon which we execute martyrdom operations. The Army that has aided the Americans is our target. We do carry out martyrdom operations throughout Pakistan, but we renounce and condemn those of them in mosques and marketplaces. It is our enemy that does them.
Regarding the bombing in a marketplace in Peshawar a few weeks back, the spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban, Azam Tariq, said, “We did not carry out this attack, and it’s the Pakistan secret agencies who are involved in it”.
And regarding the most recent bombing at Islamic University in Islamabad, note that the Taliban have not claimed responsibility for it (you can imagine that they’d be a bit pre-occupied to release a statement denying it right now). Despite that, all the govt officials and media outlets are pointing the finger of blame at them (even though they themselves are forced to acknowledge that they have not claimed responsibility for it).
For those of you who choose to take the word of the Govt and Army (who are currently stooges of the Americans and are falling over themselves to lick their shoes) over that of the mujahideen, consider this: WHY ON EARTH WOULD THE TALIBAN INTENTIONALLY TARGET CIVILIAN AREAS WHEN THEY HAVE NOTHING TO GAIN FROM IT?
I mean, put aside your biases and look at it rationally.
The Taliban believe Govt and military targets to be legitimately open to attack, and they always claim responsibility after attacking them. They have very strong Islamic scholarly justifications in believing so (the issue of whether they are right in thinking this, and that of innocent Muslims who are killed in the crossfire is something I will discuss in separate posts).
They believe that they are fighting for the rights of the people, to establish Shariah in the country. So then why would they suddenly turn around and attack the innocent Muslims for whom they’re waging jihad? Already the Govt and the lackey media has turned the majority of people against them, and such attacks would just alienate the people even further.
I have heard some really ridiculous answers to this question, such as ‘They just want to spread terrorism’ and ‘They’re animals with no conscience who just want to kill everyone’. Please people, use your heads. Throughout history, has any revolutionary/resistance movement, fighting for what it believes to be a just cause, just randomly started attacking people for no apparent reason, especially when such attacks would be detrimental to its cause?
On the one hand, people say that the Taliban are so clever, they plan their attacks so well, they are able to handle the latest technology, and then the same people turn around and say that their minds are so empty they’ll kill people left, right and center for no reason whatsoever.
I’m no conspiracy theorist, but it’s quite obvious that there’s only one party that is benefiting from such heinous attacks… and it certainly isn’t the Taliban.
