Car bomb in Peshawar’s Meena Bazaar targets women and children

A car bomb killed over 95 people, mainly women and children in the Meena Bazaar area of Peshawar today. According to Riffatullah Orazkai of the BBC:

“All that could be heard were the cries of women and children.”

According to one witness who brought a number of victims to the hospital:

“I could see some people trapped inside… I saw this girl lying unconscious on the road outside and I brought her here.

“But no one has come to claim her so far,” he said.

Images from the attack can be seen here and here

Out of all the horrific Taliban related violence in the last few weeks, this one must be the worst. The terrorists specifically targetted an area bound to be full of women and children shopping for clothes and toys. This is reminiscent of the ominous signs put up all over Mingora market places earlier this year which banned women from entering markets of clothing and jewelry. It is reflective of an ideology that regards any form of female self-expression – even something as mild as shopping for clothes, or bangles or jewelry – as an act of sin worthy of being punishable by death.

These lines are from Kishwar Naheed’s poem “Ye hum gunahgaar auratein” which best explain this hypocritical and misogynistic ideology:

Ye hum gunahgaar auratein hein
Ke sach ka parcham utha ke niklein
To jhoot se shaah-raahein ati mile hein
Har ek dahleez pe sazaaon ki daastaanein rakhi mile hein
Jo bol sakti theen voh zubaanein kati mile hein

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