Mohammad Hussain / AP

Supporters of cricket star-turned-politician Imran Khan's party raise their hands during a peace march protesting U.S. drone strikes on the outskirts of Tank, Pakistan, on Oct. 7.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — The roars celebrating the re-election of U.S. President Barack Obama on television give Mohammad Rehman Khan a searing headache, as years of grief and anger come rushing back.

The 28-year-old Pakistani accuses the president of robbing him of his father, three brothers and a nephew, all killed in a U.S. drone aircraft attack a month after Obama first took office.

"The same person who attacked my home has gotten re-elected," he told Reuters in the capital, Islamabad, where he fled after the attack on his village in South Waziristan, one of several ethnic Pashtun tribal areas on the Afghan border.

"Since yesterday, the pressure on my brain has increased. I remember all of the pain again."

World leaders welcome Obama's 2nd term — but many challenges loom

In his re-election campaign, Obama gave no indication he would halt or alter the drone program, which he embraced in his first term to kill al-Qaida and Taliban militants in Pakistan and Afghanistan without risking American lives.

Drone strikes are highly unpopular among many Pakistanis, who consider them a violation of sovereignty that cause unacceptable civilian casualties.

"Whenever he has a chance, Obama will bite Muslims like a snake. Look at how many people he has killed with drone attacks," said Haji Abdul Jabar, whose 23-year-old son was killed in such a bombing.

Analysts say anger over the unmanned aircraft may have helped the Taliban gain recruits, complicating efforts to stabilize the unruly border region between Pakistan and Afghanistan. That could also hinder Obama's plan to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan in 2014.

Americans ignore 'great risks,' travel to Pakistan to protest US drone strikes

Obama authorized nearly 300 drone strikes in Pakistan during his first four years in office, more than six times the number during the administration of George W. Bush, according to the New America Foundation policy institute.

Since 2004, a total of 337 U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan have killed between 1,908 and 3,225 people.

The institute estimates about 15 percent of those killed were non-militants, although that percentage has declined sharply to about 1-2 percent this year. Washington says drone strikes are very accurate and cause minimal civilian deaths.

The Pakistani government says tens of thousands of Pakistanis have been killed in the fight against militants. Many were civilians caught in suicide bombings. Others were killed by the Pakistani army.

In Pakistan's largest city, 'Old Glory' is flammable and profitable

Getting accurate data on casualties and the effects of drones is extremely difficult in the dangerous, remote and often inaccessible tribal areas. The Taliban often seal off the sites of strikes.

Slideshow: Pakistan: A nation in turmoil

Muhammed Muheisen / AP

Images of daily life, political pursuits, religious rites and deadly violence.

Launch slideshow

While the aerial campaign has weakened al-Qaida, its ally, the Pakistani Taliban, remains a potent force despite a series of Pakistan army offensives against their strongholds in the northwest.

Seen as the biggest security threat to the U.S.-backed Pakistani government, that faction of the Taliban is blamed for many of the suicide bombings across Pakistan, and a number of high-profile attacks on military and police facilities.

For many Pakistanis, 'USA' means drones

"We are amazed that Obama has been re-elected. But for us there is no difference between Obama and Romney; both are enemies. And we will keep up our jihad and fight alongside our Afghan brothers to get the Americans out of Afghanistan," Pakistan Taliban spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan said.

On Thursday, a suicide bomber rammed the gates of a military base in Pakistan's biggest city, Karachi, killing at least one soldier and wounding more than a dozen people.

Pakistan's 'Generation Y' battles to shape country's future

Pakistanis were largely indifferent in the run-up to Tuesday's election, expecting little change to the drone attacks regardless of whether Obama or Republican challenger Mitt Romney won.

"Any American, whether Obama or Mitt Romney, is cruel," Warshameen Jaan Haji, whose neighborhood was struck by a drone last week, told Reuters on the eve of the election. "I lost my wife in the drone attack and my children are injured. Whatever happens, it will be bad for Muslims."

Pakistani politician Imran Khan, a vocal critic of U.S. drone strikes, said he believed Obama stepped up the attacks in his first term so he wouldn't look weak on national security.

"I think Obama essentially has an anti-war instinct," he told Reuters. "Without the worry of being re-elected, he will de-escalate the war, including the use of drones. This is positive."

Can social media propel 'rock star' politician Imran Khan to power?

But for Mohammad Khan, who is not related to the former cricketer, the damage is already done.

The February 2009 drone attack that destroyed his home left him as the main provider for 13 family members, forcing him to move to Islamabad and work with a real estate company.

"When the Sandy hurricane came, I thought that Allah would wipe away America," he said. "America just wants to take over the world."

More world stories from NBC News:

• World leaders welcome Obama's 2nd term - but challenges loom
• Analysis: Payback time? Israelis wonder what Obama win will mean
• China launches once-a-decade changing of the guard
• Analysis: Top 10 foreign policy issues facing Obama
• Embassy ballots give Chinese a glimpse of democracy
• Romney's English cousin sad he lost, sort of

Follow World News from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook

Wajahat Khan / NBC News

Imran Khan, seated at right, prepares to take part in his - and Pakistan's - first ever Google Hangout.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- In a country known for its constant chaos, nobody can make a crowd stop and listen quite like Imran Khan.

Khan's messages -- which almost always hinge on his apparent anger over the United States' demands on Pakistan -- make him the country's most-followed presence on Facebook and Twitter.  He is particularly popular among Pakistan's wired urban youth.  But while Khan's popularity online cannot be contested, whether it will translate into victory at the ballot box remains the big question. 

'Taliban Khan'
Critics contend that Khan is simply bitter about criticism he's received from established members of the media.  In particular, journalists and commentators question the former cricket star's popular but difficult to implement policies -- an end to official corruption within 90 days, cessation of all hostilities with militants, halt to CIA drone attacks and rejection of American aid.

Especially since the assassination attempt on 14-year-old education activist Malala Yousufzai, Khan's refusal to wholeheartedly condemn all militancy and terror has prompted his critics to call him soft on terror. 

While Khan's ideas have earned him the teasing but telling moniker "Taliban Khan" from members of the Westernized elite, they have proved wildly popular online.  

Pakistan's Generation Y battles to shape country's future

There is the official Facebook page for Khan (with about 487,000 'likes'). Its fans outnumber his party's official page by more than 100,000 members.

The "We Want Imran Khan to be the next Prime Minister of Pakistan" page also has more than 525,000 likes.

Wajahat Khan / NBC News

Badar Khushnood (foreground), a consultant with Google Pakistan, and a small army of Imran Khan's advisors and assistants tweet, shoot and text their way through the Hangout.

Khan also has about 400,000 followers on Twitter -- along with several assistants handling his and attached accounts -- tweeting rants, pictures and quotes from Pakistan's founders around the clock.

If social-media popularity equaled election results, Khan would already have a few terms under his belt.  In fact, so pervasive is his online persona that his detractors have branded him a virtual politician.  

However, while Khan might be the country's most popular political figure, he is hardly the Islamic Republic's most powerful; he boycotted the last election and his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) or Movement for Justice party, has no presence in a parliament.

US, Pakistan should 'divorce,' ex-ambassador to Washington says

Wired, but do they vote?
Whether Khan can translate online support into victory at the ballot box is highly contested. (When new elections will actually be held hasn't been decided although many expect them to be held in spring or summer 2013.) 

"Imran Khan's base, his core support, is urban, middle class and educated -- precisely the cohort that has access to the Internet and spends time online," Cyril Almeida, who pens one of Pakistan's most-read columns for Dawn newspaper, told NBC News. "Hence, his substantial online support. ... PTI is building a voter base starting from the social media."

 Almeida acknowledges that former President Pervez Musharraf -- who led the country from 2001 to 2008 and now lives in exile in London -- also has a substantial online following but "wouldn't win a local councilor seat if he stood for one."

"Imran is somewhere in between," Almeida said. "His rock star status online is wildly more exaggerated than his real-world support -- though he will win at least some seats come election time."

Thousands rally for Malala, girl shot by Taliban

Others, like Fahd Hussain, a primetime anchor at Waqt TV, which belongs to one of Pakistan's oldest and most conservatively aligned news conglomerates, says the Internet could still generate a Khan "tsunami."

"[The] social media support base of Imran should not be ignored," Hussain said. "It's massive and growing and creates political momentum."

Others question what online popularity will translate into, if anything.

Gibran Peshimam, the political editor of the Express Tribune newspaper, says that while Khan may be a heavyweight on the Internet, he is more of a lightweight offline.  

"The percentage of Pakistan's population that has access to the Internet barely breaks the double-digit barrier," he told NBC News. "In any case, the majority percentage of those who have this access to the Internet, and hence social media, is a non-voting sector. The well-to-do generally do not vote in Pakistan. They talk about voting, but barely any of them are even registered to vote."

"Large-scale support on the Internet in Pakistan does translate into numbers, given the youth bulge, but it certainly does not translate into large numbers -- unlike, perhaps, in the U.S.," he added.

Wajahat Khan / NBC News

Dr Awab Alvi is Imran Khan's social media guru. A part-time politico, Alvi is an Ivy-League trained orthodontist by day, and the brains behind the powerful outfit that is Khan's social media machine by night.

Echoes of Obama '08?
The comparison to the United States is a common one in Pakistan, and linked to the Khan camp's obsession with President Barack Obama's 2008 campaign in which social media played a key role in fundraising as well as getting younger Americans out to vote. So-called Khanophiles constantly point to the Obama '08 template as one that can be replicated, with some qualifications and modifications, in the Islamic Republic.

Two such Khanophiles are Awab Alvi and Faisal Javed.

Alvi is a tall, soft-spoken and self-declared geek who signs his emails as BDS, MSc & TED Senior Fellow.

Although Alvi, is a University of Pennsylvania-trained orthodontist who says he does not hold any office in the burgeoning PTI, the 36-year-old's non-stop Twitter feed gives him away as Khan's constantly-connected social media wizard.  His user ID, Teeth Maestro, one of the best known in Pakistani cyberspace, hints at both his full-time hospital job in Karachi and his part-time political potency.

His blogs generate as much revenue as a successful small business, and the official site of the PTI that he helps administer often crashes because of the high traffic his online events generate.  Alvi says the PTI has a 25-strong social media team featuring "volunteers scattered all over the globe."

More Pakistan coverage from NBC News

Faisal Javed, 31, is a telecom executive by day and a PTI deputy secretary by political leaning. He spends Monday to Friday at the chic Islamabad headquarters of Telenor, leading the Scandinavian cellular giant's advertisement buying and content strategy for Pakistan.

Wajahat Khan / NBC News

Faisal Javed is Imran Khan's deputy information secretary and acted as moderator for the Google Hangout. Javed's full time job is as a telecom executive, but he moonlights as a politico.

 But his evenings and weekends are reserved for the PTI.  Javed, who opens rallies for Khan, is known nationally as Khan's "stage secretary," introducing him to crowds across the country. His easy confidence and broadcaster's voice make him one of the more prominent young faces of Khan's media-savvy corps.

Behind the scenes at Khan's first Google+ Hangout, the zeal to replicate Obama's PR accomplishments was obvious.  As soon as Khan rolled in (along with a small army of assistants, advisers and bodyguards), Alvi and his team adopted a very American, no-nonsense mood that is not typical of Pakistani culture.

They kicked out all people dubbed "non-essentials" and started what seemed like a haphazard pre-battle briefing.

"How many people are watching me?" Khan asked.

"Thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions might be watching," said Alvi and his lieutenants speaking over each other.

Khan: "What does this mean, 'Google Hangout'?"

Alvi/his geeks: "People submitted questions, and then voted in the most questions. In three days, 15,000 questions were submitted and 13,000 questions were crowd-sourced via (text messages)."

Khan: "Is this live?"

Alvi/his geeks: "Yes! Obama has done it too! Ten people from all over the country and the world will interact with you. The questions and questioners have been chosen. All you have to do is answer them."

Americans ignore great risks, travel to Pakistan to protest US drone strike

The audio wouldn't connect for 20 minutes after the Hangout was scheduled, and even as the event went online, some anchors on Pakistan's infamous conspiracy-theory driven national television denounced the event as a "drama" which was "staged" and "not live," much to Alvi and his team's chagrin.  

A small Twitter/Facebook skirmish between the Khan camp and his detractors later ensued, where both sides argued over the "reality" of the Hangout. The online battle lasted about a week.

But overall the Hangout event went pretty much as planned. Khan waxed eloquent about the economy, militancy, America, education and Pakistan's several other existential crises. He promised to raze the walls of governors' mansions, pledged to make them public libraries and explained progressive taxation to a female college student.

In what was perhaps the most important sign of success, the event caused #HangoutwithIK to trend on Twitter. But what really made political history in Pakistan was that the national conversation of the country was fully online and not broadcast on television and radio for the first time. 

In Pakistan's largest city, 'Old Glory' is flammable and profitable

Later, Javed unwound with a Marlboro.

"You know why he did it? You know how he handled all those questions? Because he's neat and clean and has nothing to hide," he said.

What of the rural heartland?
Still, even if Khan's PTI wins seats in parliament on the back of his social-media campaign, he is still a long way from power, some analysts say. 

"The next step, to premiership, goes through the dusty, deceitful and a whole-lot-less-plugged-in territory of Pakistan's rural heartland," political editor Peshimam says.

Most of Pakistan's civilian power players have traditionally relied on the country's teeming rural areas for their support-bases.

Asif Ali Zardari's Pakistan People's Party, which leads the current coalition government, is entrenched in rural Sindh  -- the country's second-most populous province. Nawaz Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League (N) has always relied on, and thus come to dominate, the lush swathes of central and northern Punjab.

Aid workers become targets in Pakistan

While Khan is pushing hard to topple the de facto but unofficial two-party system by becoming a third force via social media, Pakistan remains a poor and rural-majority country where just 20 million of its 180-million people are connected to the Internet.

Wajahat Khan / NBC News

Members of Imran Khan's press corps at work.

"Several polls show that as a leader Imran Khan is very popular," says Raza Rumi, director of policy and programs at Islamabad-based think tank The Jinnah Institute. "(But) there are methodological problems with such surveys and often their urban bias has also been called into question.

"Khan will emerge as a political player in the next parliament but it would be premature to say what would be the strength of his party," Rumi added. "His huge presence on social media is linked to a substantial following, especially in the young segment of population. There is a strong relationship here. But to assume that Facebook or Twitter rankings will result in electoral gains across Pakistan would be wrong."

But Khanophiles like Javed, the telecom executive, aren't discouraged by such such sober assessments. 

"We can't ignore this medium.  There are two million of us [supporting PTI on social media]. And those two million have millions of friends and family members," he said during preparations for the Google+ Hangout session. 

"And while you may be right again that those two million are largely in the cities, they are a degree or two away from spreading our message to the towns and villages. And that's good enough for me."

More world stories from NBC News:

• 'Spy of the West': Al-Qaida, Taliban struggle to justify attack on Pakistani teen
• UK computer hacker wins 10 year fight against extradition to US
• Hurricane Paul to hit Baja California coast Tuesday afternoon
• Mystery kidney disease decimates Central America sugarcane workers
• Clinton: 'We did everything we could to keep our people safe'
• Demand for palm oil, used in packaged food products, leaves orangutans at risk
• Assad forces using cluster bombs, rights group says

Follow World News from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook

EPA / Saood Rehman

Imran Khan, head of opposition political party Tehrik-e-Insaf, speaks to supporters during a protest march toward the troubled South Waziristan region in Pakistan on Sunday.

Pakistani security forces blocked a convoy carrying thousands of Pakistanis and a small contingent of U.S. anti-war activists from entering a lawless tribal region along the border with Afghanistan on Sunday to protest American drone strikes.

The group, led by cricket-star-turned-politician Imran Khan, was turned back just miles from the border of South Waziristan. Khan, leader of the Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) party, was briefly detained. He was later released and sent back toward Tank district along with the protesters.

Pakistan's military and the civilian government publicly complain that the U.S. strikes - aimed at remnants of al-Qaida and the Taliban - infringe the country's sovereignty and cause civilian casualties. Yet the government has taken little concrete action against the strikes.

Khan, who blames the government for allowing the U.S. to operate in the country, had planned to lead the protest from the capital into South Waziristan, a tribal area frequently hit by the drone strikes.

But authorities blocked the protesters' path with shipping containers on the highway. After several delays the army told protesters it was unsafe to be on the road after dark and they turned back.

"The drones are inhumane," Khan said, donning a white turban as he stood on a vehicle in the town of Tank, surrounded by thousands of protesters.

"Are these people not humans? These humans have names. Drone attacks are a violation of human rights," he said.

Government officials and PTI leaders said a large number of security personnel were deployed on the Tank-Jandola road.

The PTI workers said when their convoy led by Khan entered South Waziristan, the soldiers stopped his vehicle and took it away.

"Imran Khan's vehicle was leading a motorcade of peace march toward his last destination Kotkai in South Waziristan after crossing over several barricades set up by the government to stop them from proceeding towards Waziristan. The security forces took him into custody and later freed him and returned all participants of the peace march to Tank," a PTI activist, Hussain Shah, told NBC News by telephone.

Senior PTI leader Shah Mahud Qureshi said the military officials told protesters that the road toward Kotkai, in South Waziristan, is dilapidated and it would be better for them to go back.

"We decided to peacefully return and organize (a) rally in Tank," the party leader said.

About 30 Americans traveled to Pakistan to take part in the protest and apologize for the strikes to men and women who had been maimed or lost family members. 

"We have to put pressure on the United States government," said Billy Kelly, a 69-year-old Vietnam veteran from New York.

Americans ignore 'great risks,' travel to Pakistan to protest US drone strikes

The United States says the strikes have killed top Taliban and al-Qaida commanders and civilian casualties are minimal. But it refuses to say how targets are selected or how the military determines whether the dead were fighters or civilians. 

The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, which tracks drone strikes, said between 1,232-1,366 people had been killed since the strikes began in 2004. Between 474-884 were believed to be civilians, it said. 

A recent report, Living Under Drones, a study by law professors at Stanford and New York Universities, said that large swathes of Pakistan's tribal areas were terrorized by the drones. 

Civilians were scared to go to school or work in case they were targeted, the report said. 

Getting accurate data on casualties and the effects of drones is extremely difficult since the government allows few foreigners into the tribal areas and the Taliban often seal off the sites of strikes. Drones also often attack people arriving at the site of the strike. 

The march highlighted the way that drones complicate the Pakistani government's already uneasy relationship with the United States. Americans often justify the strikes by saying Pakistan is unable or unwilling to crush the insurgency. 

Slideshow: Pakistan: A nation in turmoil

Images of daily life, political pursuits, religious rites and deadly violence.

Launch slideshow

"The government is making pro forma protests but Imran has shown the world he will do something," said Shamsad Ahmed Khan, a former foreign secretary. 

He noted the government declared a national day of protests over a blasphemous film last month, but it had never called for such a protest over the drone strikes. 

Some Pakistanis, however, questioned why the marchers were not talking about atrocities by the Taliban or the Pakistani army, both of which have killed far more people than the drone strikes. 

Columnist Saroop Ijaz said that the Taliban frequently and deliberately target civilians by bombing hospitals, schools, funerals and shrines. 

"Drone attacks began and continue because of the ideology of murder and not the other way around," he wrote in the Express Tribune. 

The Taliban denounced the march as political theater ahead of next year's elections and condemned Khan and his party as "secular and liberal.”

NBC News’ Mushtaq Yusufzai and Waj Khan and Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this story.

More world stories from NBC News:

• Abu Hamza, 4 others tied to al-Qaida arrive in US to face terrorism charges
• Israel shoots down unidentified drone
• France arrests 11, kills one in nationwide anti-terror operation
• Pope's ex-butler Paulo Gabriele gets 18-month prison sentence in 'Vatileaks' case
• Stay informed: Sign up for our newsletter

Follow World News from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook