Suicide Mission Meet Samir. He's a family man, he's in his forties - and soon he'll blow himself up
Paul Harris in Peshawar
Sunday November 11, 2001
The Observer
Samir Ullah will die for Islam. He will die for
Afghanistan. The only real question is how many
Americans he can take with him.
Ullah is a suicide bomber. This week he will leave the
Pakistani city of Peshawar and cross into Afghanistan
to join other such fighters, known as fidaiyan, or 'those
who kill themselves'.
He speaks slowly and thoughtfully. His answers are
exact and considered. There is little room for doubt.
'We have been prepared for this mission in the name
of humanity and also in the name of Islam to put an
end to oppression and suppression of our people,' he
says.
In Peshawar talk of jihad and martyrdom is cheap.
Bazaars are full of young men eager to boast of their
willingness to fight for the Taliban.
Ullah is different. People like him are not found on the
streets. Two days of negotiations through trusted local
intermediaries lead him to an apartment in a
Peshawar backstreet.
It is not Ullah's own and he sits in a small guest room.
The questions are drafted beforehand. He does not
use his real name. Yesterday's meeting with The
Observer lasts just 45 minutes.
Ullah knows he is at risk. If the feared Pakistani secret
service, the ISI, knew where he or his handful of fellow
fidaiyan lived and prepared, they could expect little
mercy.
There is little doubt the ISI is on the look-out. Suicide
bombers have been produced at numerous camps in
the disputed Indian region of Kashmir, and the ISI
helped set them up. Supporting Islamic militants was
once an ISI trademark. Now Pakistan is an American
ally and those activities could backfire.
Despite this, Ullah is determined. He acts, he says,
out of a sense of Islamic justice. It his religious duty to
protect the oppressed and fight injustice. Joining the
fidaiyan is the most effective way of defeating the
American attacks. 'It is a way of relieving oppressed
people from being oppressed. It will save them. Islam
guides us to the rescue of an oppressed person,' he
says.
For him, the picture is simple. Poor and weak
Afghans are being attacked by rich and powerful
America. The duty of every Muslim is obvious. It is
nothing to do with a war between religions. 'If a Muslim
sees a woman or anyone being oppressed, a Muslim
is obliged to go to their aid and try to rescue them. If
they do not do it, then he is out of Islam,' he says.
America 'oppresses and suppresses Muslims and
even Christians, and even non-Zionist Jews are not
spared by them. No just person can tolerate this.'
No one knows the number of fidaiyan inside
Afghanistan or preparing in Pakistan. However, small
squads of the suicide fighters have been raised in
Jalalabad and Kabul. Some are Afghans but many
are foreigners, veterans of Islamic wars across the
globe. They are believed to include Arabs,
Palestinians and Chechens as well as Pakistani
militants. Training is thought to take place inside
Afghanistan, but suicide bombers have also been
trained in Kashmir. Ullah will not say where he was
trained.
Inside Afghanistan the fidaiyan travel in specially
marked vehicles and sport bands of cloth across their
chest inscribed with verses from the Koran. They are
allowed free access across Taliban-controlled areas
and are believed to be led by a Moroccan with close
links to extremist Palestinian groups. Their ties to
Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda group are unknown.
Ullah confesses that he does fear death. But he knows
his duty and will carry it out. The Americans have
brought this upon themselves, he says. 'The American
leadership has put too much attention to the
short-term interest of the Zionist financiers, rather than
the safety of the American people.'
Yet there are no wild condemnations, or loud talk of
death to America. Ullah's thoughtful conversation
makes his words all the more chilling, as does the fact
that he is an ethnic Tajik, not a Pashtun, the main
Taliban supporters - further proof that the Islamic call
to fight in Afghanistan can cross ethnic divisions.
Ironically, Ullah once fought with American weapons.
An ex-Mujahideen fighter from the rural province
around Kabul, he is in his early forties and forged
close links with foreign Islamic fighters when they
came to fight the Soviet invasion. He knows that
American money and arms once supported his
struggle. He regrets that he now aims to kill his former
allies.
'I am afraid that as a result of my operation individuals
are killed whose parents may have supported our
jihad, even some who sent us money,' he said. He
even professes concern for the soldiers he wants to
destroy.
'My greatest fear is that I will cause the death of a
person who in no way has any role in imposing this
war, nor has interest in being part of this war,' he says,
blaming the American leadership for sending its
young soldiers to Afghanistan.
Ullah says that neither he nor the American soldiers
can really be blamed for the war. Both are victims of
more powerful men who brought the current crisis into
being.
'I should not be considered guilty for this. Nor should
the ordinary Americans who are also innocent. This is
not our mistake or guilt, because circumstances have
imposed this situation.'
Ullah and the rest of the fidaiyan are potentially one of
the greatest threats to any significant deployment of
American and British ground forces. Suicide bombers
are hard to stop. The memory of the 1982 suicide
attack on a US Marine base in Lebanon still haunts
American military tacticians. It cost more than 200
lives and precipitated a withdrawal.
Few things are more controversial in the Islamic world
than the use of suicide fighters. The Koran expressly
forbids Muslims from taking their own lives. In
Afghanistan the appearance of fidaiyan is a
development, even after more than two decades of
war. 'This is not Islamic and it is not Afghani,' said a
senior ex-Mujahideen.
Ullah disagrees. His sacrifice will save lives and
defeat an oppressor, and is thus permitted, he says.
He will set out for Afghanistan within days. 'When I am
being killed I am going to be given the status of
shaheed (martyr). I am sacrificing myself and
eliminating an enemy before he causes harm. Why
should that not be called Islamic?'
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