Muslim leaders unite against the Taliban

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Mainstream Muslim religious leaders in Pakistan have formed an alliance to openly oppose the Taliban, a development that promises to give authorities broad-based support to fight militants who have imposed a reign of terror on much of the northwest.

In the past, military operations against the Taliban have evoked widespread accusations that the government was fighting Washington’s war, a view reinforced by a belief that dialogue and diplomacy could rein in the Taliban’s more barbarous practices.

The alliance, named the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) was formed Friday in Lahore, Pakistan’s most populous city. It initiated what it called a “Save Pakistan Movement” with the goal of stopping the growing “Talibanization” of the country.

The anti-Taliban alliance consists of eight Pakistani subsects of Barelvi Islam, a tolerant branch of Sunni Islam that is prominent throughout the Indian subcontinent, especially in Punjab, Pakistan’s most populous province.

The group says it will “unveil the real face of the Taliban before the public,” such as public executions, beheadings, amputations and floggings.

Fazal Karim, head of Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan, one faction of the anti-Taliban alliance, said: “Those who called themselves Taliban in Swat are terrorists and not humans. There is no room for suicide attacks in Islam.” Mr. Karim is also a member of the Pakistan’s National Assembly,

Word of the alliance comes as Pakistan’s army continued its offensive to push the Taliban out of the Swat Valley, pounding the former resort area with jets and helicopter gunships. Hundreds of thousands of refugees have fled Swat to escape the fighting.

Elsewhere in the North West Frontier Province, a suicide bomber killed at least eight people at a security checkpoint.

The anti-Taliban alliance plans to make its case by delivering sermons at Friday prayers, holding conferences, rallies and lobbying officials in the government and the army.

Participants in the alliance also said they were organizing a convention in Islamabad on Sunday to highlight their concerns, including reports of Taliban sympathizers within the nation’s military and intelligence services.

Mazhar Saeed Kazmi, who heads the Jamaat Ahl-e-Sunnat Pakistan, a leading member of the alliance, said the government should differentiate between rebels and patriots and keep the military and intelligence agencies free from sympathizers of the Taliban.

The two main groups of Sunni Muslims on the subcontinent are the Barelvis and Deobandis.

Taliban doctrine represents a violent diversion from Deobandi Islam, not unlike al Qaeda’s doctrine, a violent diversion from the Wahhabi or Salafi fundamentalist strain promoted by Saudi Arabia.

Most of the Afghan Taliban leaders studied at Deobandi seminaries in Pakistan and later came under the influence of Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda.

While there is no census data regarding the different sects, it is thought that Deobandis and Barelvis have equal numbers of adherents in Pakistan. The Deobandis, however, operate about 60 percent of the madrassas, or religious seminaries, the largest form of publicly available education in Pakistan. In recent years, the number of such schools has mushroomed from about 4,000 to 20,000 according to Pakistani authorities.

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