That spring and summer, India and Pakistan briefly went to war in Kashmir. Mr. Singh said he received a phone call one morning from an Indian-American club member demanding that the Pakistani members be kicked out.

Mr. Singh said he was stunned. “I said, ‘You know what? You’re not going to play in our club anymore — that’s not the kind of club we are.’ ”

On Sunday, at a reporter’s request, a group of the party guests agreed to move into the poker room to discuss the most recent escalation. There was no one from Kashmir, the region at the center of the rivalry, whose residents are often left out of the debate about the two country’s actions. It wasn’t long before differences emerged.

Omar Virk, 28, who grew up outside Lahore and came here three and a half years ago to study for his bachelor’s degree at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell, said he believed that India’s prime minister was purposefully stoking the conflict.

“Modi is trying to push into this one,” he said. “You know how he won the last election, right? He was anti-Pakistan from the start.”

“I disagree with that,” said Moin Ghouse, 38, who is from the Indian city of Hyderabad.

“I think Modi is politically savvy enough to understand the risks involved in going for an all-out war,” Mr. Ghouse added.

Mr. Virk began talking about theories he said were being discussed on Indian television suggesting that Mr. Modi himself was behind the terrorist attack. “Nobody can prove that,” he added, though he said he had been thinking the same thing.