Pakistanis fight back agaqinst Taliban

Washington Times:

Suicide attacks and bombings have driven some neighborhoods to take up arms in the city best known as the gateway to terrorist hide-outs in Pakistan's tribal areas.

Budabar is one example of a Peshawar neighborhood with its own squad of "Guardian Angels." But unlike the U.S. vigilante group known for its red berets and armed only with martial-arts skills, the Pakistanis make their rounds with Kalashnikov rifles.

When the Taliban blew up one of the government's girls schools, a member of Peshawar's provincial assembly called a meeting of more than 200 elders.

"The school bombing made us realize how close to home the Taliban had come," said Daud Sadiq Khan, 26, who picks up its rifle to go on patrol each night. "That's when we realized that we had to fight back."

Operating from hide-outs in the rugged tribal areas on the outskirts of Peshawar, the Taliban and al Qaeda have unleashed a nightmare of bombings, beheadings and girls-school burnings throughout Pakistan's North West Frontier Province.

But the Aug. 25 attack in the neighborhood of about 1,000 families marked the first time terrorists had targeted a school inside Peshawar itself.

Explosives were planted in the school building, which housed almost 1,200 students and was the only girls school in the area. All 26 rooms, along with office records and 16 computers, were destroyed when the explosives were detonated.

"We began patrolling the area at night," said Khushdil Khan, a deputy speaker in the regional parliament. "Every evening from 8 p.m. to 1 a.m., almost a hundred men from our area can be seen on the streets."

Such citizen efforts have become a matter of routine in neighborhoods in and near Peshawar.

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I am sure the Taliban appreciate the heads up on when to attack in the area. After his story all they need to do is set their alarm for after 1 a.m. and they will know the area is unprotected.

The heart of the story is still important. An insurgency like the Taliban needs the support of the people and if it does not have it, bad things will start to happen to it. They will not be able to swim among the people and they will lose their ability to hide.