The spokesman for al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS), Usama Mahmood, has released a statement condemning the Pakistani Talibans attack on the Army Public School in Peshawar earlier this week. More than 140 people, mainly children, were killed during the assault. AQIS four-page statement was released on Mahmoods official Twitter feed. In an accompanying tweet, Mahmood writes that the massacre of innocent children makes our hearts burst! Mahmood stresses in the statement that al Qaeda only learned of the attack through the media, and his statement is based on the assumption that those reports are accurate. In particular, Mahmood says, it is al Qaedas understanding that the attackers targeted children on purpose and that most of the victims were children. Mahmood argues that al Qaeda carefully selects its targets inside Pakistan so as to avoid unnecessary civilian casualties. He says that the group focuses on American targets, the puppet rulers in Pakistan, and Americas mercenaries in the Pakistani security and intelligence services. It is true that the Pakistani Army is subservient to the US, Mahmood writes, and America is completely dependent on Pakistans military to suppress any voice advocating for the implementation of sharia law in Pakistan. But this cannot justify an attack that seeks revenge from innocent Muslims, Mahmood writes. In harsh terms, Mahmood condemns the Pakistani Talibans attack as un-Islamic and says that al Qaedas jihadi scholars have already set forth the rules for engaging the enemy, which were not followed in Peshawar. The attack violates the jihadis version of sharia law, Mahmood claims. Mahmood also portrays al Qaeda as the defender of Muslims inside Pakistan. Addressing our beloved Pakistani Muslims, Mahmood says their defense is our responsibility and al Qaeda seeks to relieve their pain. Other al Qaeda operatives on Twitter have similarly come out against the attack. One of them is known as Shaybat al Hukama, or the eldest of the wise. On his own Twitter feed, al Hukama writes that al Qaeda strongly condemns the massacre of innocent children in Peshawar and declares its innocence in front of Allah for the shedding [of] innocent blood. Al Hukama is an al Qaeda media operative and works for the groups senior leadership. In his tweets on the Peshawar attack, posted earlier today, he appears to speak in AQIS name as well. Other prominent jihadist groups condemn Peshawar attack Al Qaedas statement follows a similar condemnation by the Afghan Taliban earlier this week. Other groups have followed the Afghan Talibans lead. A group called the Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan Jamaat ul Ahrar (TTP-JA) broke away from the Pakistani Talibans leadership earlier this year. The TTP-JA includes some of the strongest elements of the original Pakistani Taliban coalition. Like them [the Afghan Taliban], we condemn the attack on the school and killing of innocent children, Ehsanullah Ehsan, the TTP-JA spokesman, said earlier this week. Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, both of which have longstanding relationships with al Qaeda, have similarly condemned the attack. The head of LeT, Hafiz Saeed, has reportedly blamed the carnage on India. The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), another al Qaeda-linked group, is one of the few jihadist organizations to endorse the Peshawar siege. According to the SITE Intelligence Group, the IMU has released a statement calling the attack justified and defensive. Meraj
Posted on: Sat, 20 Dec 2014 19:38:30 +0000
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