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| Southeast Asia |
| Indonesia fighting against Islamic extremism |
| 2006-02-22 |
| Indonesia is working to uproot militant Islamic ideas but officials and moderate clerics say they face a long struggle, while also coping with setbacks such as anger over cartoons that lampooned the Prophet Mohammad. In November, Indonesian police discovered videos showing three young suicide bombers using Islam to justify attacks on restaurants in Bali that killed 20 people the previous month. Vice President Jusuf Kalla said the videos showed radical ideas had penetrated deep into Indonesia's Muslim community. He ordered Muslim clerics who had been reluctant to criticize militancy to speak up. Three months later, a team of top Islamic clerics and scholars set up after Kalla's concerns has had some successes. "We are trying to embrace all, the soft and the hardline, to keep them away from violent acts. Some have resisted, but we have been largely effective in cleansing the general understanding (of militancy)," said Ma'ruf Amin, who heads the team. "But terrorists are still looking for recruits while we are deflecting their influence. If they succeed, they won't get 10 followers but thousands." The team has been to Islamic boarding schools across the world's most populous Muslim nation, including some accused of fanning militancy, and convinced some hardline clerics to tone down their rhetoric, said Amin. Such schools were seen as off limits until discovery of the videos and the intervention of Kalla, who has strong Muslim credentials and is unlikely to be accused of attacking Islam. The team will also publish books for schools that set out why the use of violence in Indonesia cannot be justified under Islam. Moderate cleric Ali Maschan Moesa said he had toiled to shield pupils of his Islamic school in East Java, the country's political heartland, from the temptation of radicals. "There are groups that have twisted the meaning of jihad for their political gain. They are intensifying the agenda to create an Islamic state here," said Moesa, a senior member of the 40 million-strong Nahdlatul Ulama, Indonesia's largest mainstream Muslim group. Jihad means "struggle" in Arabic but Islamic militants and some non-Muslims link it to warfare. Moesa felt his version of jihad and other moderate teachings had sometimes failed to find an audience among disenfranchised Muslim youth, politicians and the media. "How can we stop the wave of radicalism if (moderates) are disregarded," he said. He is not alone. The leader of Indonesia's second biggest Muslim organization, the 30 million-strong Muhammadiyah, has also chastised the media and some officials for giving radicals too much airtime and room to move. Hardliners have been energized by publication of cartoons denigrating the Prophet Mohammad, first printed in Denmark last year and then by other European newspapers. The cartoons have angered Muslims across the world. "Radicals are getting their second wind. The cartoon row has added a burden on the clerics who are trying to defuse radical ideas," Ansyaad Mbai, a top counter-terrorism official in Jakarta, told Reuters. "The reason why the radical propaganda is effective is because they say the West is against Islam. These cartoons give them a kind of vindication and this is troubling our mainstream clerics who are advocating tolerance." Protests against the cartoons sparked violence in Indonesia and prompted Danish embassy staff to leave. Government officials, politicians and leaders of moderate Muslim groups in Indonesia have condemned the cartoons while urging that protests be peaceful. However, they have been cautious in attacking those responsible for the violence, with some officials saying such acts were spontaneous. "We need to avoid provocation ... Remember, we don't recognize (the labels of) radicals and moderates," parliament speaker Agung Laksono said when asked what should be done to the radical groups. Analysts say many Indonesian public figures, especially those without strong Muslim credentials like Laksono, are reluctant to step into any debate that could give the impression they are trying to create a rift over Islam. Hence, Mbai said the ideological war was far from over. "We still have a long way to go and we need to work hard. One wrong move and the government will be seen as the enemy of the religion," the police general said. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |