Aryn Baker (’01) was inside Islamabad’s Red Mosque (Lal Masjid) on July 3rd, when government troops attacked students and clerics holed up inside. She wrote an account of the experience for TIME:

Umma Aman tells me she is prepared to die for her god. This is the kind of rhetoric I’ve come to expect from students at Jamia Hafsa, the women’s seminary attached to Lal Masjid. I am not expecting an immediate demonstration of her faith. But during a six-hour battle between students and Pakistani paramilitary forces, which ended with four students, one policeman and several bystanders, including a local journalist, dead, and scores injured, it’s clear these seminarians do not take their religion lightly.

I came to Jamia Hafsa to interview its headmistress, Umma Hassan, for a story about Islam in Pakistan. Aman, a pretty 22-year-old student in her final year, was her translator. Before the interview started, Aman talked about her desire to live according to the teachings of Islam, and how angry she was that her government did not support her…

Read the full article here.