Posted on 10/13/2005 10:59:05 PM PDT by HAL9000
Bin Laden doctor joins ‘jihadi’ relief work
A Pakistani doctor who once treated Osama bin Laden is among hundreds of volunteers from an Islamic group who are participating in relief work in quake-hit areas of Pakistan and Kashmir.
"We have sent 50 trucks carrying relief goods to Kashmir and those areas of north-western Pakistan where the quake killed thousands of people," said Yahya Mujahid, spokesman for Jamat-e-Dawad group, which describes itself as a charity.
The group is headed by Hafiz Mohammed Saeed, a senior cleric who founded the anti-India Lashkar-e-Tayyaba in 1989.
Lashkar-e-Tayyaba was banned by Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf after New Delhi accused the group of being involved in a December 2001 attack on the Indian parliament in which 14 people were killed, bringing the two nations close to war.
Yesterday, Mujahid said Jamat-e-Dawad had set up a field hospital in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistan's part of Kashmir, where the 7.6-magnitude quake caused massive casualties and damage.
"Our people are also helping those affected by Saturday's earthquake in Indian-held Kashmir," he said.
"It is also jihad (holy war, or struggle) to help calamity-stricken people." He said the group's main field hospital in Muzaffarabad is being run by Amer Aziz, a British-trained orthopaedic surgeon who was detained after the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States. He was suspected of links to militants, but was later freed.
Aziz has acknowledged in an interview with the Associated Press that he saw bin Laden after the 2001 attacks and that the al Qaeda leader was in good shape at the time.
Mujahid said Aziz immediately accepted his group's request when it asked him to be in charge of the field hospital.
"Doctors and surgeons headed by Amer Aziz so far have treated 600 patients," Mujahid said. "Right now our priority is to save people and bury dead."
It brings a tear to my eye.
underneath his burly exterior is the heart of a teddy bear, and a dynamite laden vest.
have to consider the irony that US choppers have probably evacuated a certain number of jihadis - this area is infested with them and possibly even rendered medical assistance to them.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.