Abdul Rashid Ghazi

Abdul Rashid (عبدالرشيد; ca. 1964 – 10 July 2007) was an Islamist Pakistani fundamentalist and a jihad activist, son of Muhammad Abdullah Ghazi, and younger brother of Maulana Abdul Aziz Ghazi.

After negotiations allegedly failed, the military decided to take action. This began as Pakistan Army Special Forces (SF), Pakistan Army Rangers, and Special Service Group (SSG) stormed the mosque. Ghazi himself remained in seminary with a few students. He called for a safe way in which he would not be humiliated like his brother, but government denied his requests. The Pakistan Ministry of Interior reported that he was killed on 10 July 2007 during Operation Silence.

On 20 September 2007, bin Laden released a new tape called "Come to Jihad" with his voice over previously released footage of him. In the tape bin Laden called on Pakistanis, especially the soldiers, to overthrow President Pervez Musharraf, promising what he called retaliation for the storming of the Red Mosque, stating that "twenty years after the soil of Pakistan soaked up the blood of one of the greatest jihadi fighters, the Imam Abdallah Azzam, today Pakistan is witness to the death of another great Muslim, Imam Abdul al-Rashid Ghazi." Another leading Al-Qaida operative, Abu Yahya al-Libi, in a statement dated to 31 July 2007, talked of him as being "at the top of this regiment of lions is the courageous imam and the active scholar, the martyr, the son of a martyred father, and a martyred mother too, as we consider them as such, but Allah is the final Judge, Abd-al-Rashid Ghazi, may Allah bestow His mercy upon them, who spoke the truth at a time of subordination, and exalted faith at a time of submissiveness, and despised he who was evil and proud, who depended on his own strength and relied on his own omnipotence. He would confidently, surely and serenely tell him, 'You depend on your audacity and conceit, but I depend on Allah'."

In early 2005, one morning just after dawn, Ghazi was returning from teaching a class at the Al Faridia Seminary (which he managed and was the chancellor of). He was driving along a four-lane highway in the shadow of the Margalla Hills when he noticed that someone in a nearby car was waving a gun at him. Ghazi fired warning shots from his licensed pistol, confusing the assassins, after which they sped away. It's the reason why he always carried an AK-47.

In August 2004, the Pakistan government claimed he was involved in a plot against the president, the army and parliament; however this was later refuted by the government minister for religious affairs, and later by the government.

Ghazi was a well-known activist against enforced disappearances in Pakistan. In 2004, he founded Defense of Muslim Rights, and in 2006, he co-founded Defence of Human Rights Pakistan, together with human rights activist Amina Masood Janjua and Khalid Khawaja.

Abdul Rashid Ghazi first came on the scene in 2001, when the religious parties of the country announced an organization for the defense of Afghanistan against the American invasion. Abdul Rashid Ghazi pledged support for the Taliban against the Americans, criticizing Musharraf for his submissive attitude towards them and openly challenging his authority.

During the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Ghazi's father Muhammad Abdullah Ghazi played a major role in recruiting and training Mujahideen, who were Muslims that were struggling in their religion. In 1998, Ghazi and his father met Osama bin Laden. Ghazi, when referring to these events, stated: "The meeting inspired me to work for the establishment of Islam." Furthermore, he also recalled that at the end of the meeting, he picked up a glass from which Laden was drinking water and drank it. An amused bin Laden asked Ghazi, "why he did that?" To which Ghazi replied : "I drank from your glass so that Allah would make me a (great) warrior like you." It's said that it's during this visit to bin Laden and Mullah Omar in Kandahar that Ghazi became radicalized and eschewed his former modernist outlook.

A week after Ghazi and his father returned from Kandahar, on Saturday 17 October 1998, Ghazi's father who had a routine every day whereby he would walk to his seminary (the Al Faridia University in Sector E-7 Of Islamabad) for giving lectures, At noon when he returned Abdul Aziz, his elder son, approached him and spoke to him. When Maulana approached his house, a man standing in front of the door walked towards him and pulled out a gun and opened fire until the magazine was empty, badly injuring Maulana. Afterwards, he fired at Abdul Aziz, who barely escaped death. The assassin escaped with the help of an accomplice waiting outside in a car. Maulana Abdullah died of his injuries on the way to the hospital.

In his youth Abdul Rashid defied his father's wish that he receive formal Islamic education as he wanted to live a modern life. He completed his MSc in International Relations from Quaid-e-Azam University Islamabad in 1987–1988. According to one of his professors, "He was a normal, modern student who was well adjusted to a co-educational system." Remembered by his friends as "a bright student and an active member of a progressive student organisation", He could have been a diplomat in the foreign office or an educationist,” his friend once stated in an interview.