THE POINTING OF FINGURES AND THE LOOMING THREATS

The above picture (courtesy the Daily Star) sums up the interesting political situation in Bangladesh. The oppositions are blaming government, the government and the Islami parties are blaming Awami League and its allies and the general people are confused as it is pretty clear that the banned Islamic terrorist organization Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) is behind this. But who is behind them is still unclear.

If you read the leaflets (translated by Imtiaz) of JMB you will see that they have threatened the government also:

If the government does not establish Islamic rule and instead arrest Muslims for seeking Allah’s laws and suppresses ulemas (learned in religion) the JM will go into action against concerned people and authorities

I don't understand why the ruling qualition is taking this lightly? There are still patrons of JMB within the ruling Bangladesh Nationalist Party(BNP).

They are failing to comprehend that (As Nitin puts it):

"Far from scaring the West out of Muslim countries, the attacks will further bolster the international perception that Bangladesh is on the brink of state failure."

And what this state of failure will trigger? A civil war or another military coup, any one of which won't be good for Bangladesh.

Today I have heard some weirdest of remarks from the Islamic party leaders (actually they become very active only on Friday after the Jumah prayers).

* Shaikhul Hadis said: How can a banned organization have this much power to launch a coordinated attack? It must be the work of the ones who are trying to portray as a taliban state.
* Jamaate Islami spokesman Kamaruzzaman said: It is a ploy to defame the Islami parties.
* Another said: Islam does not support extremism, so these people are not really Islamic, some other force aided by another country is doing this in disguise. He expressed concern that Islami party activists may be harrassed during the police actions.

You have heard these lines before. I am surprised that they did not even consider a bit about the threat to the general people. Even if they wanted to disown these extremists (which is expected from them), they should have been a bit nice about asking the government to nab the perpetrators and demand their justice.

I think like many other previous unresolved attacks (Awami League, Kibria, British Highcommissioner) this issue will die down with the perpetrators ready to strike their second wave of attack.

The chance of the nation responding to the threat as one will remain an illusion.