US funds madrassas in Afghanistan

[Hugabear]

Source: Financial Times

The US military is funding the construction of Islamic schools, or madrassas, in the east of Afghanistan in an attempt to stem the tide of young people going to radical religious schools in Pakistan.

Such schools spawned the Taliban movement, which harboured Osama bin Laden, the al-Qaeda leader behind the September 11 terror attacks on the US, before it was swept from power in 2001.

US reconstruction cash has helped establish two state-run madrassas in the province of Khost, and a third is on its way.

Commander David Adams, head of the US provincial reconstruction team in Khost, the province on the border with Pakistan, said more were planned.



Read more: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/d1b9e546-ceb4-11dc-877a-000077b07658.html

---

I'm sure something like this would never backfire, would it?

[dbackjon]

1. Are they naming them after Obama?

Knowing this admin, they'd try to do something like that.

[Nickster]

2. What the article fails to spell out is that just because it's a madrassa

doesn't automatically make it a breeding ground for terra-ists. They fail to address what makes the folks at the schools radicalized, like abject poverty for one.

[Hugabear]

4. Maybe, but we don't really have a very good history with this sort of thing

Just sayin, is all. And I really don't trust this particular administration.

[ohio2007]

7. The curriculum in the Pakistani madrases are limited to reading the Koran

not much learning going on if reading only one biased source for all information related to any subject

I'm sure the US sponsored schools will demand a more rounded education and will demand real educators.

[plantwomyn]

8. I think the Koran they are taught from is in Arabic

They learn to repeat it phonetically. They aren't taught to actually read Arabic.

[ohio2007]

9. chanting mindless robots. They need to get more into their heads then what the wahabists

offer to the world.

Maybe people really don't want to go down the "Books not bullets" road but after a point,they have to find a better way the bombing them from the dark ages to the stone age.

[bemildred]

3. Whelp, there goes the separation of church and state. nt

[moggie]

5. A madrasah is just a school

In Arabic, even a secular school would be a madrasah. Maybe in this case the schools are religious; if so, no doubt that's because what the local people want: secular schools would be preferable, but rather pointless if parents wouldn't send their kids.

Not every such school will be a hotbed of radicalism, and surely funding education is a good thing?

[Barrett808]

6. But isn't this how we started al-Qaeda in the first place?

It was the CIA-funded madrassas that created a generation of radicalized Muslim terrorists, targeted at the Soviet Union. There were supposedly textbooks that showed images of violence on nearly every page. I'd love to get hold of one of those, to add to my propaganda collection...

[boruhila]

10. Good Madrasaas....Ohhhhhhhhh.good terrorists

comes from good madrasas sponsored by our own Tax Money?