altmuslim
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Indonesia has always been a unique country in the Muslim world. Peaceful and tolerant, it has vigorous press freedoms and has a robust democracy. With 225 million people, it is the world’s most populous Muslim country, getting Islam not from Muslim armies or invaders but from traders who shared their faith with the island. While Indonesian Islam is moderate, in recent years militancy has seeped in from abroad and has taken root among young Indonesians, and after a string of bombings (including the devastating Bali explosion), President Megawati Sukarnoputri has had enough. Indonesian police announced this week – after weeks of no arrests – that they had caught 18 members of Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), a militant Muslim group believed to have been behind scores of bombings, including the Bali attack. The founder of JI, Abu Bakar Bashir, has been in custody for a while and will be facing treason charges soon, having been charged with ordering Christmas Eve, 2000 bombings of churches and priests which killed 19 people (He isn’t being charged with the Bali bombing due to lack of evidence.) Others are falling into the dragnet as well, including Bashar’s hand-picked successor Abu Rusdan and Habib Rizieq of the Islamic Defenders Front. “We will have thousands of new Osama bin Ladens who will be ready to destroy US facilities,” warned Rizieq before the onset of war on Iraq and his arrest (the attacks never happened). The arrest of Rizieq in particular shows what Indonesian authorities are up against, as he managed to escape authorities for a short while when about 50 supporters raided the prosecutors office and whisked him away. He did, however, manage to turn himself in later.
Shahed Amanullah is editor-in-chief of altmuslim.com.
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