A senior Pakistani Taliban leader has sent a letter to Malala Yousafzai, saying he was shocked when his own Taliban gunmen shot her in the head last year.

16-year old Malala has recovered well and has become an international spokesperson for educating girls, especially in countries in which women are relegated as second-class citizens.  She spoke before the United Nations General Assembly last week and is considered a contender for the Nobel Peace Prize.

The Taliban were universally condemned after the exceptionally cowardly act of shooting a little girl in head as she tried to go to school. 

In his error-filled letter to Malala, Adnan Rasheed does not apologize, but he says he wished the attack “had never happened”.  He also claims the shooting was not in response to Malala's campaign for girls' education, but because his gunmen thought she was running a “smear campaign” against the Taliban.  The rambling letter also contains the usual anti-Semitic conspiracy theory crap and urges Malala to give up western education and go to an all-Female madrasa.