A Bloody Holiday in Pakistan

Last week, Sunni and Shi'ite Muslims traveled to Islamabad's Bari Imam shrine to commemorate the life of Shah Abdul Latif Kazmi, a 17th century Sufi saint—and repudiate the deadly sectarianism bedeviling Pakistan. Instead, Friday's gathering became a bloodbath when a terrorist blew himself up in a tent full of Shi'ite celebrants, killing at least 20 people.

President Pervez Musharraf responded with a call to oppose "anyone trying to incite hatred." But sectarian violence has worsened under his reign. Musharraf has been reluctant to act against militant groups, largely to avoid alienating the fundamentalist political parties keeping his secular political opposition at bay. "The government does not recognize the threat homegrown terrorists pose to the stability of Pakistan," says Samina Ahmed of the International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based NGO. "Isn't it time the government recognized the price of the game being played?"

A week earlier, 58 clerics in Lahore had signed a fatwa condemning suicide bombings against Muslims or in places of worship. But many conservative clerics declined to endorse the decree, and hard-line orthodox Sunni militants, whom authorities suspect are behind Friday's bombing, do not consider Pakistan's many Shi'ites, Sufis and moderate Sunnis "real" Muslims at all. "There is no place in Islam for such acts," insists Mufti Munibur Rehman, who signed the fatwa. Sadly, there seems to be a place for them in Pakistan.