Pakistan, Teaching Intolerance And Violence Doug Bandow January 09, 2012, The U.S.

may have no more difficult relationship than the one it has with Pakistan. This supposed ally plays a double game in Afghanistan, mi xes an unstable political system and weak civilian government with nuclear weapo ns, and acts as an incubator for religious intolerance. Obviously, Islamabad ha s its own, sometimes well-founded complaints against America. But there may be no more dangerous nation today than Pakistan. An important cause of conflict in that divided society is the educational system . All too often, both public schools and private madrassas promote intolerance and extremism. These attitudes have encouraged increasing violence which threat ens to consume the entire country with deadly effect. In November the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom publ ished a report written by Ashar Hussain (International Center for Religion and D iplomacy), Ahmad Salim (Sustainable Development Policy Institute), and Arif Nave ed (also SDPI). Pakistans birth was bloody, featuring violent conflict between and mass movement of Hindus and Muslims within the areas which became India and Pakistan. Althou gh Pakistans Islamic character was clear, founder Mohammad Ali Jinnah declared: M inorities, to whichever community they may belong, will be safeguarded. Their r eligion or faith of any kind will be secure. There will be no interference of a ny kind with their freedom of worship. Pakistan would be a much better place if these sentiments continued to reflect t hat nations reality. However, much has changed over the last six decades. For i nstance, General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq promoted Muslim fundamentalism to win publi c support for his military rule. Rising Islamic currents around the world creat ed greater receptivity to extremism. Most recently, American military operation s in both Afghanistan and Pakistan generated widespread antagonism. These factors alone would have created a tough environment in which to protect t he human life and dignity of religious, ethnic, and political minorities. Howev er, the education system for a growing youth population has created an equally s erious barrier. As the Commission observed: education plays a critical role in the fabric of Pakistani life, with the potential of bringing the society togethe r or tearing it apart. Today, unfortunately, education, so-called, is far too of ten doing the latter. For years schooling in Pakistan was largely secular, but the public system faile d to educate most students. Gen. Zia increased the money going to education, bu t simultaneously infused the education system with rigid Islamic content, explaine d the USCIRF. Before dying in a suspicious plane crash in 1988, the dictatorial Zia changed curriculum and textbooks for the worse. His government stated that The highest priority would be given to the revision of the curricula with a view to reorganizing the entire content around Islamic tho ught and giving education an ideological orientation so that Islamic ideology pe rmeates the thinking of the young generation. The problem was not that the syste m emphasized Islam, but instead promoted intolerant fundamentalism. Dr. Nasim A shraf of the Middle East Institute said the Zia years were the turning point for Pakistans educational system, creating the bedrock on which militant extremism was founded. The most obvious impact is that many religious minorities suffer through an educ ation which directly attacks their faith. Noted the Commission, minority studen ts are forced to study from textbooks and curricula that are biased against them and routinely face discrimination and intimidation from Muslim students and teac hers. So much for Article 22 of the 1973 Pakistani constitution, which states th at No person attending any educational institution shall be required to receive r eligious instruction, or take part in any religious ceremony, or attend religiou s worship, if such instruction, ceremony or worship relates to a religion other than his own. Even worse, though, warned the Commission, the educational system presents a chal lenge to the full implementation of protections for religious minorities, and in

some cases has even been linked to physical violence against them. And not just against non-Muslims. In effect, the Pakistani government now is training those who are determined to kill even Muslims to get their way. Last year Islamic ex tremists murdered a liberal Muslim governor as well as a Christian government mi nister. The killers came from the generation which studied under the Zia educat ional reforms. http://www.forbes.com/sites/dougbandow/2012/01/09/the-problem-of-pakistan-teachi ng-intolerance-and-violence/ -----------