Analysis: Norwegian tragedy, Pakistani worries

Most would run down Breivik as a sick young man, nurturing hatred and bias. But rejecting Breivik’s “Manifesto 2083” – a projection of Europe in slightly over 70 years from now, hardly serves those dismissive of the Norwegian who plunged the country into a state of mourning after gunning down some 68 youngsters attending a summer camp.

Of all Muslim societies, Pakistan seized Breivik’s imagination as a country typical for “denial of justice, intrusive religiousity and denial of rights to non-Muslims.” This must be a matter of introspection. In essence, Pakistan, for him, represents an embodiment of  contradictions and denials, injustice, misgovernance and disorder which, in the long run, he fears would go on to galvanise other countries across the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic.

Breivik’s knowledge of Pakistan and Pakistan-origin Norwegians is based on his personal experiences, and extensive study of writings of people like Allama Muhammad Iqbal and Maulana Abul Ala Maududi, as well as prominent human rights activist Hina Jilani and Dawn columnist Irfan Hussain.

The image that Pakistani, Turk or Algerian Muslims have created for themselves is nothing new but people in Europe have started viewing them as inflexible members of the societies which are feeding them. For these Muslims, European values don’t matter.

Breivik’s childhood best friend, a Pakistani Muslim immigrant to Norway, comes across as someone who despite having lived several years in Europe still resented Norwegian society because it “represented the exact opposite of Islamic ways.”

Through close ties with Muslim families, Breivik must have also observed the paradoxes that most Pakistanis, Arabs and Turks live in: treating sons different from the way they treat their daughters.

The refusal of Muslim immigrants to assimilate into European society also seems to drive Breivik’s fears. Much of this is rooted in the conservative backgrounds that many Pakistani immigrants come from. It also results in a ghettoized style of living.


Last year, I met a young Pakistani driver in Washington. His father had migrated to the USA. The young man was born in the US but still found American ingredients of a breakfast – bread, cheese, coffee, marmalade – “not for us.” He loved paratha and lassi or black tea. The family lives together in a big house – with the women busy serving the rest. Their lives hardly vary from their relatives back home.

Based on personal experience, one can say most Pakistanis and Turks start having nightmares when their daughters reach adolescence – the fear of their girls dating drives such parents crazy, and they start thinking of how to preempt that eventuality.

As far back as in the mid 1980s, when one visited Scandinavia for the first time, one could see how many people from Pakistan – all of them practicing Muslims, were milking the social security system.

They do this even today.

Very recently, a friend based in Paris was blacklisted for abuse of laws that bestow certain privileges to parents of immigrants settled in France. It was a painful story to hear. There are countless such stories across Europe.

As a whole, the picture that emerges from the lives of a majority of Pakistani immigrants is dismal. They refuse to integrate. These conditions have shaped Breivik’s thesis on Pakistan. One is neither buying this thesis nor suggesting it is the ultimate truth. Our Pakistani brothers and sisters, however, must reflect as to why he arrived at such conclusions.







Published in The Express Tribune, July 26^th, 2011.