The West Can't Afford to Have Compassion Fatigue

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Much of the destruction from the quake happened in the disputed Kashmir region, controlled by Pakistan and claimed by India. It's been the source of violent conflict for many years. Are any Muslim religious scholars looking at signs of cooperation between India and Pakistan in the quake's aftermath as a positive affect of this disaster?

Yes, this will come [from some clerics], but they're not that quick to connect the dots. If nothing else, for the first time, the Line of Control that separates India and Pakistan in Kashmir is now open; families [separated by the conflict] are rejoining. Despite the [Oct. 29] terror attack in Delhi [attributed to Kashmiri separatists], people are still talking about dialogue and a peace movement. It did not quite derail the process. Another spin-off may be that the [Pakistani Muslim] religious parties are back in the running. The most active people on the ground in the relief effort are the religious organizations, some of whom have been banned because they're supposed to be the terrorist organizations.

Gen. Musharraf, the military dictator turned self-styled president, is the leader of the country and since 9/11, he has been seen a U.S. ally. What does all of this mean for him?

This is an important question for Pakistan. Everyone's saying this is the worst natural disaster in history of Pakistan, but the biggest natural disaster in Pakistan's history was in 1970 when a cyclone hit what was east Pakistan and was said to have killed an estimated half a million people. It devastated the low-lying, densely populated territory, just swept people away. It convinced a lot of Bengalis, who were already restless with Islamabad, which they saw as ethnically different and ethnically dominating them, as indifferent to their suffering,and this stoked the nationalist movement against Islamabad and eventually became the movement that led to the creation of Bangladesh in 1971.

Now, this is not the case in the earthquake in Kashmir. But there will be, without doubt, a political interpretation and political implications of this earthquake because of its scale. And therefore, the relief agencies must not succumb to compassion fatigue, but continue to be engaged precisely because of the political ramifications, apart from the humanitarian needs.

In Pakistan, people are very quickly going to start judging President Musharraf in terms of how he's performing with the relief. This earthquake came at the moment when he was getting a lot of bad press for his performance as leader. I believe he should personally supervise this relief effort, because he's also commander-in-chief, he has the resources of the Pakistan army, resources the civil structure does not have. And unless you can combine the two, there will be greater disaster on the ground because very soon winter will set in, there will be no mobility, no transport, no coordination between the agencies. My recommendation is that he should simply make camp in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Azad Kashmir.

And has he followed any of these suggestions?

No, he didn't. If he had done that, the people there would have felt a great moral booster. They would have seen him in their midst. He would have been able to coordinate between the army and the civil organization and the foreign agencies, and the people would have found him a very sympathetic figure. But he did not, and now the commentary that I'm reading is quite critical, saying he doesn't care for the people. There's a lot of static building up now against him, and this will grow.

If the earthquake disaster has contributed to political instability in Pakistan, what does that mean for America and would it bring an Islamist regime to power?

Musharraf has been fielding the argument: If I go, you will have mad Islamic fanatics take over; therefore, support me. It is a common theme that most Muslim leaders of a dictatorial bent take in Washington, and Washington, alas, falls hook, line, and sinker for it.

But the structure of the Pakistan army is such that if a coup happens, there will be another general who could take over. All this should be discussed right now, because I would say, unless there is far greater coordination on the ground in the next few weeks, you will be hearing more cases of tragedies and this will increase the anger. I've heard stories that Pakistani army people have already been shouted at and heckled even in Islamabad.

Were you directly responsible for the region that is heavily devastated by this earthquake?

Yes. I found the people simple, rural, warm, very hospitable--really wonderful people who at that time had not really been affected by the materialism and consumerism that we face now in the 21st century.

How would you characterize the kind of Islam that is practiced there?

The Islam there was tinged with a great deal of hospitality and compassion. When I think of what happened in Balakot, where an entire school collapsed, killing a couple of hundred children, I feel very emotional. I can't even talk about it. That was my first posting and the first posting for a young assistant commissioner is like a first love, so you have a lot of feeling for it. In fact, my first book was called "Mansehra," and it was dedicated to the people of Mansehra "who will always evoke affection in me whenever I think of them, wherever I am."

If you were to have our readers take away a single message from this conversation, what would it be?

I want your readers to be thinking about one word-compassion. This is not a time to be thinking of Pakistanis as jihadists or people who backed [Pakistani scientist] A. Q. Kahn [who sold nuclear materials to other governments], or who are ruled by a dictator called Musharraf. They should just remember that these are ordinary human beings. Many of them have lost everything, they're just sitting there in the middle of nowhere and have no hope. This is like a death sentence. So at this moment, they need compassion.

And the world ignores this at its peril, because this is a very sensitive part of the world. And if you create this kind of angry reaction against Musharraf or Americans, that will then spread into Afghanistan, into Indian Kashmir, into Pakistani Kashmir, and into Pakistan itself.

Apart from the politics, I would go back to the human response that we need, because we're living in a globalized world where we are all interconnected. Yesterday was Katrina, today is Pakistan, tomorrow it may be-God forbid-in a country nearer to us, and we need to be responding as human beings to care for each other.

Is this notion of compassion a central virtue or value within Islam?

The notion of compassion is the nearest you get in Islam to godliness. Zakat, or charity, which comes from Judaism, is one of the five pillars of Islam. A Muslim has to be charitable. He's obliged to be charitable and in cases like this, he must reach out to the point where he must say, "My home is open to the suffering, I'll give everything to the suffering." [.] In Islam, we have codified it, which means every Muslim has to give.

Zakat is something around which every Muslim organization gave aid-so if there was something in Bosnia or Palestine or Kashmir, there was a tragedy, people are killed, people have died, you'll get Islamic organizations sending money, relief, blankets, whatever, everywhere, from all over the world. Particularly from America, because American Muslims are a bit better off than Muslims elsewhere. Then came 9/11, and the argument began here that Islamic charities are covers for terrorist activities. So many were closed.

The result was that people froze up, and in a crisis like this, Muslims are suddenly ambiguous and they think, "Look, if I give money, the FBI will come and check up with me." So even in this essential feature of Islam, there has been a disruption after 9/11 and Muslims attribute it to one nation alone, the United States. Therefore, a lot of people in the Muslim organizations will be saying, `Look, we could have got you much more, but they are banned in America. People are under suspicion."

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