THE WRATH OF ALLAH

This is Rakaposhi, a 25,000-foot Karakorum giant that towers above the hidden kingdom of Hunza in far northern Pakistan. It is one of the world’s great sights to wake up in the morning and watch the sunrise light up Rakaposhi from the balcony of your room in Karimabad, Hunza’s capital.

Far northern Pakistan is far and away one of the most spectacularly scenic regions of our planet. Today unfortunately, it has become one of the most tragic. Tens of thousands of people lie dead and millions are homeless with their villages and lives turned to rubble by an enormous earthquake.

Having spent quite a bit of time exploring the region over the years, it is heart-breaking for me to think of what has befallen all of the friendly folks I met there. The region, however, had become infested with numbers of decidedly unfriendly folks as well. There are many hidden valleys that were used as Al Qaeda refuges and training camps for Jihadi guerrillas launching attacks into Indian Kashmir.

It has not escaped notice in both India and Pakistan that tens of thousands of people were killed in Pakistani Kashmir while right across the border in Indian Kashmir devastation and loss of life was minimal by comparison.

The Indian foreign intelligence agency is known as RAW – the Research and Analysis Wing – and focuses primarily on Pakistan. As good students of Machiavelli, the spooks at RAW are wasting no time having their agents spread the word among Pakistanis that this earthquake was sent by Allah to punish Pakistan for supporting terrorism.

The earthquake is being seen as a golden opportunity to turn perspectives around – to the belief that terrorism, the slaughter of innocent fellow human beings in the name of Allah is a blasphemous insult to Allah deserving of His Punishment.

Pakistan’s intel agency, the ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence), is the principal supporter of the Taliban, Al Qaeda, and Kashmiri Jihadis. Most all Pakistanis are well aware of this, and that ISI-protected and supplied terrorist bases were located in the earthquake-devastated area.

The extent to which these bases have been demolished and their terrorist inhabitants killed is not yet known – but it’s clear they’ve taken a major hit. Now comes the psychological hit, with the earthquake becoming known as The Wrath of Allah.

This earthquake was a horrible human tragedy. But in the War on Moslem Terrorism, which both India and the US are waging, it may be a turning point for the better.