Muslims experiencing hate attacks after California shooting

Sat Dec 5, 2015 9:55AM Muslims pray at Dar al-Hijrah Mosque in Falls Church, Virginia, on Friday, December 4, 2015. (AP photo) American Muslims fear that a new wave of Islamophobia is spreading across the United States, fueled by this week’s mass shooting in California. Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, and Tashfeen Malik, 27, stormed a holiday party in San Bernardino, California, on Wednesday, killing at least 14 people and injuring 21 in the deadliest shooting in the US in three years. Hours later, the couple died in a fire exchange with police. Only hours after news broke that suspects had Muslim names, American Muslims strongly condemned the incident, but this did not stop the US mainstream media from spewing hate and venom against Muslims and Islam. American Muslims and their prayer leaders across the country say they are experiencing a wave of death threats, assaults and vandalism unlike anything they have experienced since the September 11 attacks in 2001 in the United States, The New York Times reported on Saturday. Followers of the Islamic faith in the US say that they observed an escalation in hateful attacks against Muslims this autumn after two of the Republican Party’s leading presidential candidates, Donald Trump and Ben Carson, made hideous remarks against Islam and Muslims. They say the threats, vandalism and violence grew after the last month attacks in Paris that were allegedly claimed by the Daesh terrorist group. The female shooter involved in Wednesday’s killing spree in California had also pledged allegiance to Daesh leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, according to three US officials familiar with the investigation. An investigator looks at a black SUV that was involved in a police shootout with suspects, Thursday, Dec. 3, 2015, in San Bernardino, California. (AP photo) As the San Bernardino attack was happening, investigators believe Malik put a post on Facebook, pledging allegiance to al-Baghdadi, the officials told CNN on Friday. Salam al-Marayati, president of the Muslim Public Affairs Council, said at a news conference in Los Angeles on Thursday that groups like Daesh and al-Qaeda are “trying to divide our society and to terrorize us.” “Our message to them is we will not be terrorized and we will not be intimidated,” either by the terrorists or, he said, “by hatemongers who exploit the fear and hysteria that results from incidents like this.” Many of America’s approximately 3 million Muslims say such tensions could increase during a US presidential race that they fear is already injecting anger and bigotry. “My identity and everything that I am becomes erased every time one of these incidents occurs,” Nabihah Maqbool, 27, a law student at the University of Chicago told The New York Times. “It all becomes collapsed into these senseless acts of violence being committed by people who are part of my group.” Maqbool said that while driving back to Chicago after recent Thanksgiving vacation with her family, she did not stop to pray on the grassy lawn outside an interstate rest stop because of concerns of being victimized. “I just got so nervous that something could happen to me by any unhinged individual who saw me as someone who deserved violence,” she said. Republican presidential hopefuls Ben Carson (left) and Donald Trump participate in the Republican Presidential Debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California on September 16, 2015. (AFP photo) Some Muslim Americans say they fear that the recent divisive remarks by Republican candidates Trump and Carson could strengthen their appeal in a race in which controversial comments laced with xenophobia and misogyny have failed to diminish the popularity of candidates. ============================================================================================== Sat Dec 5, 2015 | 11:42 AM EST Pakistani in California shooting became hardline in Saudi Arabia: relatives ‹ The Pakistan identification card of Tashfeen Malik is shown in this undated handout picture from a government official and obtained by Reuters on December 5, 2015. REUTERS/Handout via Reuters The Pakistan identification card of Tashfeen Malik is shown in this undated handout picture from a government official and obtained by Reuters on December 5, 2015. Reuters/Handout via Reuters Tashfeen Malik is pictured in this undated handout photo provided by the FBI, December 4, 2015. REUTERS/FBI/Handout via Reuters Tashfeen Malik is pictured in this undated handout photo provided by the FBI, December 4, 2015. Reuters/FBI/Handout via Reuters The Pakistan identification card of Tashfeen Malik is shown in this undated handout picture from a government official and obtained by Reuters on December 5, 2015. REUTERS/Handout via Reuters The Pakistan identification card of Tashfeen Malik is shown in this undated handout picture from a government official and obtained by Reuters on December 5, 2015. Reuters/Handout via Reuters Tashfeen Malik is pictured in this undated handout photo provided by the FBI, December 4, 2015. REUTERS/FBI/Handout via Reuters Tashfeen Malik is pictured in this undated handout photo provided by the FBI, December 4, 2015. Reuters/FBI/Handout via Reuters › Pakistani in California shooting became hardline...X KAROR LAL ESAN, Pakistan (Reuters) - The estranged relatives of Tashfeen Malik, a Pakistani woman accused of shooting dead 14 people in California, say she and her father seem to have abandoned the family's moderate Islam and became more radicalized during years they spent in Saudi Arabia. Malik, with her husband Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, is accused of storming a gathering in San Bernardino, California, on Wednesday and opening fire in America's worst mass shooting in three years. Investigators are treating Wednesday's attack as an "act of terrorism." On Saturday, the Islamic State (IS) group claimed the couple as their followers. There is no evidence yet that IS directed the attack or even knew the attackers. Malik's killing spree has horrified her Pakistani relatives. Her father cut off contact with his family after a feud over inheritance, they told Reuters, and moved to Saudi Arabia when his daughter was a toddler. There, it seems, he turned to a stricter form of Islam. "From what we heard, they lived differently, their mindset is different. We are from a land of Sufi saints ... this is very shocking for us," said school teacher Hifza Bibi, the step-sister of Malik's father, who lives in Karor Lal Esan town in central Punjab province. Sufism, a strain of Islam popular in parts of Pakistan, emphasizes a mystical, personal religious connection. Devotees often play music and dance at shrines, and their practices are looked on with suspicion by orthodox Muslims. "Our brother ... went to Saudi and since then he doesn't care about anyone here," Bibi said. "A man who didn't come to attend his own mother's funeral, what can you expect from him?" Tashfeen Malik returned to Pakistan and studied pharmacy at Bahauddin Zakaria university in Multan from 2007 to 2012. She lived in a university hostel. An identity card said she was 29 years old at the time of the shootings. "She was known to be good student with no religious extremist tendencies," an intelligence official based in the nearby town of Layyah told Reuters. Malik's uncle Javed Rabbani, a clerk in the town's education department, said he has not seen his brother in 30 years. "We feel a lot of sadness but we also feel ashamed that someone from our family has done this," he said. "We can't even imagine doing something like this. This is a mindset that is alien to us." Malik visited Pakistan in 2013 and 2014, security officials told Reuters, but it's unclear who she met or where she visited. Pakistani media reported she had links to the radical Red Mosque in the capital of Islamabad, but a cleric and a spokesman at the mosque said they had never heard of her before. (Additional reporting by Amjad Ali in ISLAMABAD and Syed Raza Hassan in KARACHI; Writing By Katharine Houreld; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan) ==================================================================== Sat Dec 5, 2015 | 2:19 AM EST Exclusive: Investigators piece together portrait of Pakistani woman in shooting massacre 1:11 AM EST | 01:54 Unveiling the female killer in California shooting By Mehreen Zahra-Malik ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Tashfeen Malik's path to accused mass killer in California began in a small city on the Indus River in Pakistan's Punjab province. It was from here, when she was a toddler, that she moved with her father Gulzar 25 years ago to Saudi Arabia, where he became more deeply religious, more conservative and more hardline, according to a family member. A picture slowly emerged on Friday of the role and possible motivations of 27-year-old Malik in this week's killing of 14 people in California, including her apparent pledge of allegiance to the leader of the Islamic State militant group, according to U.S. officials. Malik, with her husband Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, is accused of storming a holiday party on Wednesday in San Bernardino, California, and opening fire in America's worst mass shooting in three years. The intensive search for clues, extending to Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, could help U.S. investigators piece together what drove Malik and her husband to leave their infant daughter with his mother, don assault-style clothing and carry out the shooting. Malik, who entered the United States on a fiancée visa, and Farook, the son of immigrant parents from Pakistan who had worked as a health inspector, were killed in a shootout with police just hours after the attack. U.S. investigators were evaluating evidence that Malik, a Pakistani native who had been living in Saudi Arabia when she married Farook, had pledged allegiance to Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, two U.S. government sources said. They said the finding, if confirmed, could be a "game changer" in the probe. CNN reported that one U.S. official said Malik had made the pledge to al-Baghdadi in a posting on Facebook on Wednesday, the day of the attack, under an account that used a different name. Though large information gaps remain, it appeared to be the strongest evidence so far that the attack may have been inspired by Islamic State. But U.S. government sources said there was no sign that it had been directed by the militant group, which has seized swathes of Syria and Iraq and claimed the deadly Nov. 13 attacks in Paris. FATHER BECAME "CONSERVATIVE AND HARDLINE" Two Pakistani officials said Malik was from Karor Lal Esan, a city on the west coast of the Indus River in southern Punjab province. She moved to Saudi Arabia with her father, an engineer, 25 years ago, they said. She returned home five or six years ago to study at Bahauddin Zakariya University in Multan to become a pharmacist, they said. The area in Punjab where she spent her early years and later went to university is a “recruitment ground” and stronghold of Islamist groups with ties to al Qaeda, said Husain Haqqani, a former Pakistani ambassador to the United States. Among the militant groups with a presence there is Lashkar-e-Taiba, which has been blamed for the November 2008 killing spree in the Indian financial capital of Mumbai. "Our brother changed a lot since he went to Saudi," Malik's uncle, Javed Rabbani, said of Malik's father. "When relatives visited him, they would come back and tell us how conservative and hardline he had become," he said in an interview with Reuters. A source close to the Saudi government said that during Malik’s time in Saudi Arabia nothing came to authorities’ attention there that suggested she was involved with radical Islamic groups. Malik was not on any Saudi law enforcement or intelligence watchlist, the source said. Malik's father, Gulzar, had built a house in Multan, where he stays when he visits Pakistan, according to another uncle, Malik Anwaar. He said Gulzar had a falling-out long ago with the rest of the family, citing a dispute over a house among other matters. “We are completely estranged,” Anwaar said. Rabbani said he had been contacted by Pakistani intelligence as part of the investigation into the San Bernardino shooting. Malik had two brothers and two sisters and was related to Ahmed Ali Aulak, a former provincial minister, the Pakistani officials said. The exact circumstances of how Farook and Malik met remained unclear but they had apparently been married for two years. The Federal Bureau of Investigation said Malik was in the United States on a visa under a Pakistani passport. While Farook had an active presence online, Malik's digital footprint is harder to trace. A Facebook profile established under an alias by Malik was removed by the company for violating its community standards, which prohibit praise or promotion of “acts of terror," a spokesman said on Friday. But her name was attached to a gift registry for their baby hosted by the website TheBump.com. According to the registry, Malik's baby had been due on May 17. Just hours before the couple opened fire on Farook’s co-workers in a government building in San Bernardino, they had dropped off their daughter at his mother’s house, telling her they had a doctor’s appointment. (Additional reporting by Idrees Ali, Warren Strobel and Jonathan Landay in Washington; Writing by Matt Spetalnick; Editing by Bill Trott, Will Dunham, Toni Reinhold) ============================== The Latest: Islamic State group praises California shootings Dec. 5, 2015 5:47 AM EST 0 5 photos Kayla Gaskill, Connie Pegler Kayla Gaskill, left, is comforted by her mother, and Connie Pegler, right, at a makeshift memorial... Read more SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. (AP) — The latest on the mass shooting in San Bernardino, California (all times local): 2:40 a.m. The Islamic State group's official radio station has aired a statement saying the mass shooting in California was carried out by two "supporters" of the extremist group. While praising the attack, the group stopped short of claiming responsibility for it. The Al-Bayan report Saturday echoed a claim carried Friday by the IS-affiliated Aamaq news agency. The radio report did not refer to Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik as actual members of the Islamic State group. Militants affiliated with IS who carry out attacks are commonly referred to in the group's propaganda as "lions," ''fighters" or "mujahedeen." — From Associated Press writer Maamoun Youssef in Cairo. ___ 11 p.m. Police say a package addressed to the home of the suspected attackers in Southern California's mass shooting has been determined to be safe after it spurred the evacuation of a UPS facility. San Bernardino police Chief Jarrod Burguan says Friday night that the item has been rendered safe and posed no threat. Burguan said earlier that the package was from a "reputable vendor" and the UPS center was evacuated out of caution. The evacuation lasted about three hours. The facility is about a mile from the social services center where 14 people were killed by a husband and wife on Wednesday. ___ 9:45 p.m. Police say a Southern California UPS facility has been evacuated because a driver noticed a package addressed to the home of the husband and wife behind this week's deadly attacks. San Bernardino police Chief Jarrod Burguan says it appears the package is from a "reputable vendor" but the facility was cleared out and a bomb squad has been called out of caution. Burguan said the driver had left the facility Friday night and returned after noticing the address in nearby Redlands. The facility is about a mile from the social services center where 14 people were killed on Wednesday. ___ 6 p.m. The brother of one of the shooters in an attack that killed 14 people in California is a Navy veteran who earned medals for fighting global terrorism. According to military records obtained by The Associated Press on Friday, Syed Raheel Farook — the brother of gunman Syed Rizwan Farook — was in the Navy from 2003 to 2007. During his stint, he received the Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary Medal and the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal, among other awards. After going through training in the family's native Illinois, Syed Raheel Farook served for three years aboard the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise as an information system technician. He now lives in Southern California, where his brother and the brother's wife were killed in a shootout with authorities after the Wednesday attack. ___ 3 p.m. Attorneys for the family of a California shooter say he was married to a soft-spoken housewife who only spoke with female relatives. Mohammad Abuershaid and David Chesley, who represent Syed Farook's family, say Farook's wife, Tashfeen Malik, wore a veil that covered her face and didn't drive. The couple opened fire on a holiday party of Farook's co-workers, killing 14 people. They say Farook's mother lived with the couple but she stayed upstairs and didn't notice they had stockpiled 12 pipe bombs and well over 4,500 rounds of ammunition. Abuershaid and Chesley say the couple left their 6-month-old daughter in her care when they carried out Wednesday's attack. They say the child is with child protective services. Farook's brother-in-law is beginning the legal process to adopt the girl. ___ 2:35 p.m. Attorneys for the family of a California shooter are cautioning the public against rushing to judgment about terrorist connections to the attack. Mohammad Abuershaid and David Chesley, who represent Syed Farook's family, said there's no proof linking the shooters to a broader terrorist organization and most of the evidence focuses on Facebook posts made under an alias by Farook's wife, Tashfeen Malik. When asked to explain possible motivations for the attack, Chesley said at a news conference Friday that co-workers made fun of Farook for his beard and said he was isolated with few friends. Abuershaid and Chesley said the family was shocked by the attack that left 14 people dead and they saw no signs that the couple would be aggressive or had extreme views. The FBI has said it's investigating the shooting as an act of terrorism. ___ 1 p.m. FBI Director James Comey says findings in a sweeping federal investigation into the California mass shooting indicate the two shooters showed signs of radicalization but were not part of a broader network. But Comey noted there's still "a lot evidence that doesn't quite make sense." Comey says Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik didn't appear on the FBI's "radar screen" before the shooting Wednesday that killed 14 in San Bernardino. The couple opened fire at a holiday banquet for Farook's co-workers before dying in a gunbattle with police. ___ 12 p.m. An IS-affiliated news agency Aamaq says the two shooters in the deadly California attack were "supporters" of the Islamic State group, but it stopped short of claiming responsibility for the attack. David Bowdich, assistant director of the FBI's Los Angeles office, said he wasn't aware of the report but wasn't surprised IS would attempt to link itself to the attack. He said investigators are looking carefully to determine if there is an IS connection. Bowdich said at a news conference that the bureau is investigating the shooting that left 14 people dead as an act of terrorism. He says neither Syed Farook nor his wife, Tashfeen Malik, was under prior investigation. The couple opened fire at a holiday banquet for Farook's co-workers before dying in a gunbattle with police Wednesday. ___ 11:29 a.m. The FBI says it is investigating the deadly mass shooting in California as an "act of terrorism." David Bowdich, assistant director of the FBI's Los Angeles office, made the declaration at a news conference Friday in California. He also said the shooters attempted to destroy evidence, including crushing two cellphones and discarding them in a trash can. He said authorities continue to investigate the case to understand the motivations of the shooters and whether they were planning more attacks. ___ 10:45 a.m. The woman who helped her husband kill 14 people at holiday party in California praised the leader of the Islamic State group in a Facebook post just minutes into the attack. A Facebook executive told The Associated Press that Tashfeen Malik posted the material under an alias account at 11 a.m. Wednesday. That was about the time the first 911 calls came in and when the couple were believed to have stormed into the San Bernardino social service center and opened fire. The executive spoke on condition of anonymity because this person was not allowed under corporate policy to be quoted by name. The company discovered the Facebook account Thursday. It removed the profile from public view and reported its contents to law enforcement. — From Associated Press writer Tami Abdollah in Washington, D.C. ___ 10:20 a.m. Pakistani intelligence officials say Tashfeen Malik, one of the shooters in the California massacre, moved as a child with her family to Saudi Arabia 25 years ago. The two officials say the family is originally from the Pakistani town of Karor Lal Esan, about 200 miles southwest of the capital of Islamabad in Punjab province. The officials spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to talk to the press. Her father, Gulzar Malik, moved to Saudi Arabia about three decades ago for work. The officials say his family — including Tashfeen Malik, then only a few years old — joined him there 25 years ago. Another person close to the Saudi government says Tashfeed Malik didn't stay in Saudi Arabia but eventually returned to Islamabad and lived there, returning to Saudi Arabia for visits. Tashfeen Malik and her husband, Syed Farook, killed 14 people at a holiday banquet for his co-workers before dying in a gunbattle with police. — Associated Press writer Zarar Khan in Islamabad ___ 9:45 a.m. An expert says the revelation that one of the California attackers pledging allegiance to the Islamic State group on Facebook suggests the woman was inspired by IS ideology but wasn't necessarily in direct touch with the group. John Cohen, a former counterterrorism coordinator for the Homeland Security Department and a Rutgers University professor, said those people are harder to detect. He says the counterterrorism infrastructure is built on preventing tightly organized attacks directed by a specific group, not detecting people inspired by IS but operating independently. He says that means different tools are needed to prevent those types of attacks. Cohen says IS has aggressively used social media and have "successfully inspired thousands of people." Tashfeen Malik helped her husband, Syed Farook, kill 14 people at a holiday banquet for his county co-workers before dying in a gunbattle with police. ___ 9:35 a.m. A California landlord has invited media into the town house rented by the California attackers. An MSNBC reporter on Friday found a crib, toys, a child's book of the Quran, family pictures and shredded documents inside the Redlands, California, home. There was a computer screen, but no computer. Authorities have said that Syed Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, stockpiled 12 pipe bombs, tools to make more explosives and well over 4,500 rounds of ammunition at the home. The couple had a 6-month-old daughter. The residence is in a neighboring city to San Bernardino, where the couple opened fire on a holiday party of Farook's county co-workers Wednesday, killing 14 people. ___ 8 a.m. A U.S. law enforcement official says the wife of the couple blamed in the deadly California shootings pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group and the terror group's leader on Facebook using an alias then deleted the messages before the attacks. Specifics details about Tashfeen Malik's postings weren't disclosed Friday by the law enforcement official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because this person was not allowed to discuss an ongoing investigation. The remarkable disclosure about Malik's online activities provided the first significant details suggesting a motive for her participation with her husband, Syed Farook, in the shootings that killed 14 people and injured 21. Malik was a Pakistani woman who came to the U.S. in 2014 on a fiancee visa before Farook married her in California. — From Associated Press writer Tami Abdollah in Washington, D.C. ___ 5:50 a.m. The brother-in-law of one of the attackers in San Bernardino, California, says Syed Farook was a 'bad person,' but he wasn't radical. Farhan Khan also told NBC News he is beginning the legal process to adopt Farook's 6-month-old daughter, who was dropped off with relatives Wednesday morning before the shooting that left 14 dead. Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, were killed in a shootout with police following their deadly rampage. In excerpts of the interview released Friday, Khan expressed disbelief that Farook would leave behind his infant girl and said he was angry with Farook for the attack. ======================================== Photo The main gate of Bahauddin Zakariya University, where Tashfeen Malik studied pharmacy, in Multan, Pakistan, on Sunday. Credit Asim Tanveer/Associated Press Advertisement Continue reading the main storyContinue reading the main storyShare This Page Email Share Tweet Save More Continue reading the main story CAIRO — As a tide of Islamist violence washed across Pakistan in recent years, Bahauddin Zakariya University in the southern city of Multan struggled to halt spreading intolerance, with mixed results. That university has come into the spotlight in recent days as one of the few known way points for Tashfeen Malik, the Pakistani-born woman who along with her husband, Syed Rizwan Farook, took up assault rifles and, the police say, killed 14 people last week in San Bernardino, Calif. Ms. Malik’s role in the decision to attack is of particular interest, in part because on the day of the assault she posted on Facebook that the couple was dedicating the massacre to the Islamic State. She and her husband were killed in a gun battle with the police after the attack. Continue reading the main story RELATED COVERAGE President Obama in the Oval Office on Sunday night.Obama Says of Terrorist Threat: ‘We Will Overcome It’DEC. 6, 2015 President Obama in the Oval Office last year. His aides usually prefer the imagery of the president striding to a lectern in the East Room to deliver an address.For Speech, Obama Selects a Setting He Usually Shuns: The Oval OfficeDEC. 6, 2015 At the Islamic Community Center of Redlands in San Bernardino, Calif., on Sunday, prayers were written for the 14 people killed last week.The City: San Bernardino Community Struck by Massacre Seemed on Verge of TurnaroundDEC. 6, 2015 During Ms. Malik’s time as a pharmacy student at the Multan university, starting in 2007, as Taliban attacks shook Pakistan, the area around Multan and her nearby hometown gained notoriety as centers of radical sectarian activity. The authorities’ concern became so great that in the months after Ms. Malik left the university, officials there began helping Pakistani intelligence agencies monitor for extremist activity on campus. The officials even installed surveillance cameras in the residence halls, out of concern that they had become recruiting grounds for radical groups. Photo Tashfeen Malik Credit FBI, via Associated Press Teachers described Ms. Malik as a polite and driven student who was visibly devout, always wearing the niqab face covering and avoiding contact with male students. But that hardly made her unique in southern Pakistan, particularly after she had spent most of her life in Saudi Arabia, and the timing and circumstances of her shift into militancy remain a mystery to investigators. Still, in the turbulence of that moment, and in the broader generational tensions stemming from Pakistani families who, like Ms. Malik’s, go to Saudi Arabia for opportunity and return practicing a more conservative brand of Islam, there are clues to the cultural and religious way stations of her apparent transformation. Culturally, Ms. Malik, 29, straddled several worlds, having been born in Pakistan, raised in Saudi Arabia and married in the United States. Her family, which comes from the remote Layyah District of Punjab Province, moved to Jidda, Saudi Arabia, in 1989, according to interviews with some of her relatives and former neighbors in the area. They say that her father, an engineer, left in anger, having fallen out with his brothers over a property dispute. From 2007 to at least 2012, Ms. Malik studied in Multan, the main city in southern Punjab, famed for its sparkling religious shrines that mark it as a historical center of Sufism, a mystical form of Islam. Although Ms. Malik obtained her place under a quota system that reserves places for the children of expatriate Pakistanis, she quickly impressed professors with her diligence and ability. Some thought she might eventually become a lecturer. “We felt she could be an asset to the university if she joined the faculty after completing her studies,” Dr. Khalid Hussain Janbaz, a former lecturer, said in a phone interview. Advertisement Continue reading the main story No male lecturer knew what she looked like, however, because of the niqab. And though conservative Muslims were not unusual there, Ms. Malik developed a reputation as someone who purposefully avoided making friends with men and who was deeply rooted in her Saudi upbringing. After two years living at Maryam Hall, a hostel for female students, she complained to one faculty member that she was uncomfortable with the behavior of the other women. “She told me, ‘My parents live in Saudi Arabia, and I am not getting along with my roommates and cannot adjust with them, so can you help me?’ ” Dr. Syed Nisar Hussain Shah recalled. Soon after, Ms. Malik moved into a private house in the city that her parents rented for her. “I would call Tashfeen a Saudi girl,” Dr. Shah said. “She had just come to Pakistan for her degree.” In many ways, Ms. Malik was a classic product of the conservatizing influence that Saudi Arabia has brought to bear on countries like Pakistan. Critics of Saudi influence usually focus on the funding of hard-line mosques and religious schools, a criticism echoed on Sunday by the German vice chancellor, Sigmar Gabriel, who connected the export of Saudi-style Islam to the danger from growing extremism in Europe. “We must make it clear to the Saudis that the time of looking the other way is over,” Mr. Gabriel said an interview with the newspaper Welt am Sonntag. But Ms. Malik’s family represents a different strand of the same phenomenon: changes wrought by Pakistanis who, since the 1970s, have migrated to Saudi Arabia for work, only to return with a far more conservative creed. Relatives and neighbors said that, after some years in Saudi Arabia, Ms. Malik’s father, Gulzar, rejected the Barelvi school of Sunni Islam that his family had traditionally practiced, and turned to the stricter Deobandi school. He stopped returning home for weddings, and his children, including Ms. Malik, did not meet their Pakistani relatives. “There was a lot of friction within the whole family as they adhered to different sects,” said Zahid Ghishkori, a journalist based in Islamabad who is from the same district as the family. In recent interviews in the United States, some of Mr. Farook’s male relatives spoke of Ms. Malik’s conservative ways with suspicion, saying they had never seen her face and noting that she chose not to drive. Dr. Shah, of the university faculty, said he was shocked by the news that Ms. Malik was suspected of committing a mass killing. He said he did not think she had become radicalized at the university, because it does not have a reputation for extremism. But neither Multan nor Ms. Malik’s university have been immune to extremist currents. A proliferation of hard-line religious schools across southern Punjab have obtained a reputation as incubators for sectarian and militant groups, some of which enjoy the tacit support of political leaders and elements of the Pakistani security forces. In response, the university kept a “very vigilant eye” on its students, said Dr. Janbaz, the lecturer, and coordinated with intelligence agencies to install surveillance cameras. Ms. Malik, however, never came under scrutiny, he said. Advertisement Continue reading the main story Advertisement Continue reading the main story “We never heard anything suspicious about her activities,” he said. “She kept to herself and seemed to just focus on her studies.” But the authorities did little to stop a virtual witch hunt on campus that led to a nationally publicized death after Ms. Malik left the university. In 2013, Islamist students there accused Junaid Hafeez, a young lecturer in English who had traveled to the United States as a Fulbright scholar, of insulting the Prophet Muhammad in comments he made on his Facebook page. Mr. Hafeez was later charged with blasphemy, a crime that carries a possible death penalty in Pakistan, and he is currently in jail awaiting trial. Mr. Hafeez has struggled to find legal representation since two men fatally shot his lawyer, Rashid Rehman, in May 2014, in what was seen as punishment for daring to defend someone accused of blasphemy. Pakistani security officials say there is no indication yet that Ms. Malik moved in extremist circles on campus or in the city. Yet they have sought to restrict reporting from the area in recent days, often by issuing quiet threats to Pakistani reporters to back off. The officials conducted a search of Ms. Malik’s former home in Multan on Saturday. On NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday, Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch said that investigators from the United States were “working closely with our foreign counterparts,” including Pakistan, to gather more information about Ms. Malik and Mr. Farook. At a news conference in Islamabad on Sunday, Pakistan’s interior minister, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, pledged to cooperate with the American investigation. But Mr. Khan criticized some of the American news media’s coverage of the attack. “The wrongdoing of an individual Muslim or Pakistani does not mean the entire country or religion is at fault,” he said. Ms. Malik’s estranged relatives, however, have been vocal in expressing shame over her actions. “We are ashamed and shocked about this act done by our niece,” Malik Ahmed Ali Aulakh, a relative and a former provincial minister, told Agence France-Presse. “Why did she do something so gruesome? We can’t believe it.” Salman Masood and Taha Siddiqui contributed reporting from Islamabad, Pakistan, and Waqar Gillani from Lahore. A version of this article appears in print on December 7, 2015, on page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: In Conservative Pa