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Using his account on Twitter, Usama Mahmood, the spokesman of the Al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS), has posted a statement condemning that Pakistani army for killing more than 150 militants in what he described as "fake encounters" and arresting many women connected to the jihadis.
The statement is dated January 10 but was released through Usama Mahmood's Twitter account on February 5. The AQIS spokesman says that the Pakistani military, acting after the December 16 terror attack on the army school in Peshawar, in which more than 140 children died, has killed "mujahid brothers in the hundreds" in Pakistani jails and subsequently claimed that they were killed in encounters with the army. He also says that "several sisters" – a reference to women connected to jihadis – have been arrested in Swat district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
It should be noted that the AQIS had issued a statement on the December 16 attack in Peshawar, distancing itself from any role in it and had said that it was pained by the killing of children. The December 16 attack was claimed by Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), which is believed to be operating from hideouts in Afghanistan.
In the latest statement, the AQIS spokesman reminds: "We are extremely opposed to the Peshawar tragedy and all such incidents in which innocent members of the public, children and women or non-combatants, are the targets; we consider them anti-Shari'a; we feel pain for any such incident. We consider it our duty to prevent any such incident and because such incidents misdirect our objectives and targets we therefore consider such incidents as the cause of strengthening the system of kufr [unbelief]..." He then goes on to criticize the Pakistani reaction to the Peshawar attack, saying that it is meant to strengthen the system of unbelief in Pakistan.
Usama Manzoor, whose appointment to the post of spokesman was announced in early September along with the establishment of AQIS by Al-Qaeda leader Ayman Al-Zawahiri, urges the jihadis to target the Pakistani army for its misdeeds: "Oh mujahids, oh the lions of Allah willing to sacrifice for your Hereafter… There is only one path to come out of this dark night of the military's atrocities and the system of unbelief – and that is, we should target this criminal army… that defends this system and leads this system of atrocities, target this military which has crossed all limits of atrocities regarding the Muslims of Pakistan…."
The AQIS spokesman urges "all the organizations engaged in jihad and mujahid brothers present in them" to differentiate between the innocents and the criminals in launching their attacks. "Obedience to the Shari'a is success in our war," he notes and adds that "America and its servants, the rulers of Pakistan" are the "real enemies of Islam." He also reminds the Pakistani nation that the mujahideen are out to defend the Shari'a and end atrocities. Mahmood asks the Pakistani people to understand that these mujahideen do not get money from America as the Pakistani army does.
Source: Twitter.com/Usamamahmood35, February 5, 2015.
