– PAKISTAN’S MADRASSAS

 

Madrassa is an Islamic school that teaches Islam and Qoraan studies only.  The students of the Madrrassas are in the ages of 8 up to the late 20s’, they live in dorms attached to the Madrassas and study in age groups of 20 up to 40 students under an Islamic teacher which in places like Pakistan or Afghanistan are titled ‘Maulana’ – our teacher.

In Pakistan there are about 20,000 Madrassas with the total number of about 4 Millions students. Most of the Madrassas in Pakistan are not preaching radical interpretations of Islam but still there are few thousands Madrassas that are teaching the radical doctrine of Wahhabism and, in many cases, are funded by Saudi Arabia.

The Madrassas all over the Islamic World and especially in Pakistan were the breading ground and recruiting centers for all kinds of Islamic militant organizations, primarily Al Qaeda. The Maulanas detected the most devoted and talented students for the recruiters of the Global Jihad. For two decades many thousands were recruited, under the close supervision of the Pakistani notorious intelligence service – ISI to fight against India for the divided Kashmir cause.

Despite The 9/11 and the War on Terror the Madrassas recruiting system is still functioning almost undisturbed and is still the main source for young devoted Muslims recruits. It is also most likely that ISI is still involved in the recruiting system for his own needs.

There is a growing concern, especially in UK and USA that local Muslim citizens from Islamic background are sent to Madrassas in Pakistan and might return to their countries brainwashed as dedicated Islamic terrorists.  Indeed some of the London 7/7 perpetrators were recruited to terror through the Madrassas system in Pakistan.

The number of Westerner citizen students in the Pakistani Madrassas is only few dozens  and they can be easily monitored by local security services and even expose their connections to other suspects so, to sum it up, the risk of Islamic terror, imported to the western democracies through Pakistani Madrassas is  very low. Most of the Islamic terrorists in the western world are local, young, frustrated, home grown terrorists.

 

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