A Pakistani cleric has launched an attack against the Shehbaz Sharif government over the escalation between Islamabad and New Delhi following Pahalgam terror attacks.
A video has surfaced showing Abdul Aziz Ghazi, a controversial cleric of Islamabad’s Lal Masjid, criticising the government saying that the Pakistani government “is far cruel” than India.
The cleric, while addressing students and followers at Lal Masjid, asked the gathering to raise their hands if they would support Pakistan in case of a war with India. However, he was met with silence.
“There are no hands, which means that the people are aware. The issue is that the war between India and Pakistan is not a battle of Islam. The war of Pakistan is for patriotism,” Ghazi said, adding that the war for patriotism is not permitted in Islam.
لال مسجد کے مولانا عبدالعزیز غازی کا خطاب سنئیے جس میں وہ کہتے ہیں کہ پاکستان کی لڑائی قومیت کی لڑائی ہے اسلام کی نہیں اور پاکستان میں بھارت سے زیادہ ظلم ہے وغیرہ وغیرہ۔ ریاست کے وہ کارندے غور سے سُنیں جو ان حضرات کی سرپرستی کرتے ہیں اور سیکولر پاکستانیوں کو خطرہ سمجھتے ہیں۔ pic.twitter.com/l9Or4OJWHl
— Husain Haqqani (@husainhaqqani) May 4, 2025
He claimed that the government in Pakistan is more cruel than in India and denounced the war with India.
“There is a cruel government in Pakistan…It is more than in India. There is no cruelty in India like in Pakistan. Does an incident like Lal Masjid happened in India,” he added.
The cleric was referring to the 2007 operation ordered by former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf at the Lal Masjid in Islamabad, which served as a platform for propagating Islamic extremism.
During the operation on July 3, 2007, Pakistani forces surrounded the area and three days later entered the premises of Lal Masjid. At the end of the stand-off, more than 100 people, including commandos, were dead. The mosque was also severely damaged.
The speech comes amid heightened tensions after the deadly Pahalgam terror attack in Jammu and Kashmir on April 22, which claimed 26 lives and has pushed India-Pakistan tensions to a new high.
Abdul Aziz Ghazi also hit out at the Pakistani government over alleged atrocities in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces and accused the government of bombing its own people.
“What happened in Balochistan, what they did in Pakistan and across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa – these are atrocities. When the people were ready, the state bombed its own citizens,” he said.
The video was reportedly recorded at Jamia Hafsa and Lal Masjid on May 2 during the Friday sermon.
