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Sunni hardliners threatened to strike hard this weekend, an important one in the Shi'ite religious calendar, prompting authorities to halt cellphone coverage in several areas to prevent bombings triggered by remote control.
Authorities have also restricted motorcycle travel, hoping to deprive suicide bombers of one mode of transportation.
The wounded were carried away in the northwestern city of Dera Ismail Khan, where a bomb targeting Shi'ites killed at least seven people, including four children, on Saturday.
Pakistan's Taliban, who are focused on battling the state but are also allied with Sunni sectarian groups, claimed responsibility for both attacks.
"For Interior Minister of Pakistan Rehman Malik, who blocked mobile phones across the country and banned motorbikes, you can't stop our activities against the Shi'ite community and security forces," Taliban spokesman Ehsanullah Ehasan said by telephone from an undisclosed location.
"We will keep continuing our activities and this is a failure of security forces, police and army that we have made successful attacks in Dera Ismail Khan."
EPA / Saood Rehman
Pakistani security officials inspect the site of a bomb blast targeting a Shi'ite Muslim mourning procession in Dera Ismail Khan, Pakistan.
Past attacks during the religious event have killed large numbers of Shi'ites.
Sunday's bomb, planted in a shop near a street market, also wounded five security officials, said senior police official Malik Mushtaq.
Doctors at a hospital in Dera Ismail Khan said five people were killed and 90 wounded. "There is a lack of ambulances and not enough hospital beds," said one. "People brought many of the injured to the hospital on rickshaws."
Hardline Sunni groups, which are becoming increasingly dangerous, have vowed to carry out more attacks as the Shi'ite mourning month of Muharram comes to a climax on Sunday.
Security officials say organizations such as Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) are stepping up attacks on Shi'ites, who they regard as non-believers, in a bid to destabilize nuclear-armed, U.S. ally Pakistan and establish a Sunni theocracy.
Al Qaeda, which is close to LeJ, pushed Iraq to the brink of a sectarian civil war several years ago with large-scale suicide bombings of Shi'ites.
More than 300 Shi'ites have been killed in Pakistan so far this year in sectarian conflict, according to human rights groups. The campaign is gathering pace in rural as well as urban areas such as Karachi, Pakistan's biggest city.
Shi'ites account for up to 20 percent of this nation of 180 million.
The growing death toll has discouraged some Shi'ites from taking part in processions this year during one of their most sacred rituals, when people flagellate themselves with chains and other items to commemorate the martyrdom of the grandson of Islam's prophet, who was killed during the battle of Karbala.
"If I were to compare with last year, the fear has definitely increased," said Sadia Fatema, 28. "Just last night me and my mother were asking my father and brother if they really had to go to the procession. We are worried."
Others say the pressure has made Shi'ites stand up to Sunni hardliners.
"There is fear, but there is also anger and defiance among Shi'ites," said one, who asked not to be named.
"Shi'ites never felt like a minority in Pakistan but now they are slowly being turned into a real minority. And Shi'ites will not let this happen."
Washington, a critical source of financial aid for cash-strapped Pakistan, has been pressuring the South Asian nation to crack down on militants based in tribal areas who cross the border to attack American-led forces in Afghanistan.
Pakistan, meanwhile, faces major domestic security challenges from a wide range of groups, including the Taliban, who capitalize on issues such as unemployment, official corruption and poverty to boost recruitment.
A series of army offensives has failed to break the back of militant groups based along the border with Afghanistan.
"Our children are being killed but the government is powerless," complained Shi'ite Amina Bokhari. "What is the purpose of this security they claim to give us?"
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*sigh* Please...Just seal our borders and let these beasts blow each other to bits..Thanks
""Our children are being killed but the government is powerless," complained Shi'ite Amina Bokhari. "What is the purpose of this security they claim to give us?" "
Where were these bigoted Shiite Islamic people when non-Muslims were going through these very barbaric and bigoted actions? Of course, now it is Sunnis!!!!!
Mind you: these people (Shiites, Sufis, Ahmedias, Baloochs, Pashtuns and so on) were part of genocide gangs of non-Muslims in Pakistan like in Lebanon!
Stop all aid to Pakistan. Don't waste our tax monies on liabilities and curses on earth!
Jonathan, I enjoy your posts. I am of the opinion that aid to Pakistan should be stopped but am fearful that it never will. What do you think it will take to cut off or at least limit the flow of the American peoples money to the corrupt supremacist government of Pakistan? Also, do you know of any predominantly muslim countries that donated/pledged help to Americans when a disaster like hurricane Sandy occurs?
Pickett: Thanks a lot.
Let us remember that discovering oil (even in ME including that barbaric, beastly and bigoted Saudi Arabia) and popularizing oil as an energy source is a Western (mostly US) contribution.
Using Iraqi wars and now sanctions on Iranian oil, many have made money. Most of Sunni Saudi and co and Iranian money are stolen from our back pockets.
They don't donate much or anything even to Muslims in trouble in Muslim nations. Whenever they donate a cent, they make a big show just like their fake Ramadan charity shows!
We saved the Sunni Saudi and co barbaric rulers through Iraqi wars; they enriched themselves by manipulating oil prices high and backstabbed us by funding their Salaffi and Wahhabi mosques all over the world including the US.
How many mosques were there in the US before and now?
British invented Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. US and allies kept them in map.
For solving world problems including economic ones, time has come to erase these two nations out of the map once for all.
Also it is better to shut the gates on Muslims coming from basket case nations like Pakistan, Bangladesh, Somalia, N. Sudan and other places. Change the requirements for immigration purposes.
Also kick out all problem inventing Pakis and others back to their Islamic hell holes.
What is it with this crazy religion called Islam.
When Muslims are not killing non-Muslims, they become hell-bent on killing each other. And when they're not killing each other they blow up statutes (remember the lofty Buddhist statutes in Afghanistan).
Muslims have been killing each other almost from the day their false prophet Muhammad eventually died like a poisoned rat after eating tainted meat. The sixty-two Muhammad breathed his last putrid breath while on the breasts of his third wife, the then eighteen-year-old Ayesha, with whom he first had sexual intercourse when she was only eight years and nine months (by our solar calendar).
Muhammad's body was barely cold and dumped in a hole in Yethrib (known today as Medina, home of Islam's second holiest site) when conflict broke out between Muhammad's son-in-law Ali, and Ayesha, who is praised today by the Sunnis as "the mother of the believers" and despised by the Shia as a "whore". The outnumbered Ali was eventually slain in a mosque in AD 660, and since then, Sunnis and Shia have been at each other's throats.
What goes around comes around. It's high time for the Muslims to wake up, and break the cycle of intolerance, murder and destruction that characterised the lifestyle of their false prophet Muhammad Ibn Abdallah, the deluded inventor of Islam, the world's only religion that originated in the dark depths of a cave (Hera)
Nice post.
1. Keep away from these barbaric, beastly bigoted Islamic beasts and their battles. We messed up by deciding the winner taking the sides of Sunni Saudi, Kuwaiti, Qatari, UAE and other Sunni Arab League bigoted seventh despotic beastly rulers.
2. Close the gates on them starting from the US, Britain, Europe and other non-Muslim nations. Also start kicking out all problematic Muslims from basket case Muslim nations like Pakistan, Bangladesh and others.
3. Even Allah is furious with these people. Look what their House of Saud is doing!
House of Saud, a strict Wahhabi, is not even tolerating Prophet Mohammad’s heritage places. House of Saud consists of a megalomaniac, despotic and bigoted ruler and highly corrupt, despotic, bigoted seventh century mindset 5000 princes and princesses.
In Mecca, the house of one of the wives of Mohammed was demolished and converted into public lavatories. Mohammed’s birth place may vanish with plans to have skyscrapers, mega shopping malls and a Grand mosque!
In Medina, ten years ago a mosque of grandson of Mohammed was dynamited and the religious police were celebrating on this. There are plans to pull down three seventh century mosques in future.
When Allah has decided to vanquish Islam, even Sunni Saudis and co, oil companies, Jewish extremists, Christian rights and their lobbyists can't even save them!!!!!
"government struggles to stop a wave of attacks by sectarian Sunni militant groups determined to wipe out the minority sect and seize power."
Shiites, Sufis and other minority sects and tribes people deserve every bit of what they are getting now. These very people looked the other when there were genocides of non-Muslims.
The US and allies should declare Pakistan a terrorist nation and stop all aid to Pakistan. Also close the gates on all Pakis. We don't these liabilities and curses on earth on our soil!
The Islamic extremist Frankenstein monsters have started backstabbing big time the inventers of Pakistan, British, and the masters (US and allies) who kept them alive.
In most of the Islamic terrorism and plots in the US, Britain, Europe and other places, Pakis have a hand.
Half of NATO forces deaths in Afghanistan are due to Pakis.
Before followers of Islamic cult set their feet on Afghan and Paki regions, these regions were quite peaceful and prosperous.
Once the cancer of Islam gradually got control of the region, those regions have become raping, stealing, looting and killing fields.
In Afghanistan, Paki proxies Taliban did not even tolerate Buddha’s statue in Bamiyan.
Many Paki areas and some Afghan areas have become breeding and exporting centers for illegal activities including drugs growing and trading and export of Islamic radicals and terrorists all over the world.
British invented Pakistan in 47 and Pakistan is supposed to be a pure Islamic nation. In Pakistan, it was massive genocides of minorities in between 48-50.
Percentages of Hindus and Sikhs were reduced from about 24 percent less than three years by rapings, stealing, lootings, terrorizing and killing on a massive scale.
Paki Islamic religious madness did not end there.
Sunni Pakis are after Ahmedias, Sufis (fake love and dance Islamic soap opera people), Shiites (20 percent), Hazaras, and Baloochs and other minority sects/tribes.
Shiites, Sufis, Ahmedias and other minority sects/tribes people are blown up while they pray in their mosques on Fridays. Ad even hospitals are bombed to kill those injured.
A Washington, DC based think tank Middle East Media Research Institute (www.memri.org) provides good details on what is going in Pakistan.
The Pakis don't stand a chance at stopping the Muslim on Muslim violence in their country as long as they are busy training and arming terrorists to kill Americans in Afghanistan and fighting with India. Just seal our borders and keep them out of this country.