Former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated Thursday by Islamic radicals….a leading pro-democracy and pro-Westerner political reformer in the Muslim world, Bhutto had just finished addressing a campaign rally of supporters in the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi….jihadists opened fire on the once and possibly future premier using automatic weapons, hitting her in the neck and chest….a suicide bomber then blew himself up at site, leaving Bhutto dead and killing at least 20 others….the attack is certainly another tragedy for Bhutto’s family (her father, who was premier in the late 1970s, was hanged by radicals in 1979) and we should be praying for their peace and comfort during this difficult time….but why else does Bhutto’s death matter?….to be blunt: Pakistan and her nuclear weapons are in danger of falling into the hands of Islamic radicals….such radicals have attempted to assassinate Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf multiple times in the last few years, hoping to seize control of the government and impose sharia law….today’s attack is a sobering reminder that Pakistan is just one coup d’etat away from Osama bin Laden or one of his fanatical, murderous allies suddenly gaining control….it is difficult to imagine a more nightmarish scenario than al-Qaeda in possession of Pakistan’s nuclear arsensal, but this is not an impossibility…..for several years, and certainly throughout 2007, Musharraf has been severely criticized by Western leaders — including those here in Washington, D.C. — for imposing martial law and employing other heavy-handed tactics in an attempt to crush the radicals and safeguard the country from their control….he has deserved some of this criticism, but we must also keep things in perspective….while we all want Pakistan to become a fully-developed democracy — peaceful, prosperous and healthy in all respects — we must be very careful never to underestimate the danger that Musharraf and his colleagues are in from the radicals….they are in a battle not just for the soul but the very survival of their country..

http://joelrosenberg.blogspot.com/