Peshawar:
Maulana Fazlur Rehman, the emony of its eponymous Jamiat Ulema-E-Islam (JUI), said that taking up arms against religious scholars is not jihad but the dead and narrow spirit terrorism.
“The people who killed my teacher and a religious scholar are not mujahides but murderers. It is not possible to call my teacher a martyr and his murderer a mujahid,” said Fazl on Sunday during his visit to Darul Uloom Haqqania to offer her condolences to the family of Maulana Hamidul Haq.
Maulana Hamidul Haq, the head of the Jui-S, was murdered last week in a suicide attack on the eve of Ramazan in his seminar in Akora Khattak.
Hamid was the son of the late Maulana Samiul Haq, who was considered a founding figure for the Afghan and Pakistani branches of the Taliban. Many Afghan Taliban had studied at the Haq seminar.
Fazl said that some people, under the banner of Jihad, would draw a path to paradise. “However, raising a firearm against a religious scholar is the liaison of mind and not jihad.” He said that some extremists even aimed at mosques and that in Balutchistan, a religious scholar was recently killed during prayer.
“How can a firearm be used against a Muslim and a religious scholar? In Islam, the murder of a person is equivalent to the murder of all humanity. Any use of a weapon against Islam is not jihad-it is terrorism,” he added.
Referring to the attack, Fazl compared extremist ideologies to storm winds that were to pass. “These Madaris, the Mosques and these Ulema will prevail and the enemy will be confronted with embarrassment,” he added.
He said that the attack by Maulana Hamidul Haq was an attack on his house, his madrasa and his learning center. Fazl said that just when the sorrow on the martyrdom of Maulana Samiul Haq was still fresh, this odious incident had broken his heart.
“I was on an OMRA when I received this new tragic. The shock I lived cannot be put into words. Maulana Hamidul Haq was an innocent religious scholar; his only crime was his association with Darul Uloom Haqqania. The very walls of Darul Uloom are crying.”
Fazl revealed that he had received information according to which an operation was about to be launched in Darul Uloom Haqqania.
“When I met state officials, I asked questions about this operation, and I told them that if such an intention was continued, it would cost.
He said that the belief and the methodology of the great had been entrusted to him and that he maintained them. Fazl said he wanted to curse people who attacked the ulemas.
