Islamic radicalism and terrorist activity in Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia is diverse in terms of ethnic and language. There is no common shared language in Southeast Asia which as a result makes the inhabitants to be tolerant to new cultures and traditions. The Muslims therefore emerged and co-existed with the inhabitant s cultures and traditions which were not very strong, as a result a new version of the religion that became more popular was born. However, orthodox and Sharia Islam were the most practiced, though from time to time radical Muslims would attempt to introduce their extreme Islamic ideologies of the religion (Spencer, 2003).
History of Islamic Militia in Southeast Asia
In the years 1820s and 1830s in Sumatra, the Padri group attempted to introduce Wahhabism. They were subscribing to Wahhabi teachings that they had received in Mecca during the month of Saum. In the colonial period, around the beginning of the 19 Century, Islam had gained popularity and so were the Muslim radicals. There emerged armed Jihad with the aim of liberating oppressed Muslims from the colonial Europeans, particularly reclamation of their land and right to property. For instance Indonesia had Darul Islamic rebellion during the period of year 1949 to 1962. Their rebels aim was to build an Islamic state in Indonesia and produce a king who would be just and also who would bring a reign of justice. There ideal way of achieving justice in their society was through violence (Kumar. 2010).
In 1961 the movement leader known as Kartosuwirjo claimed that he had a vision. In his vision he saw the road leading to an Islamic state covered with piles of dead bodies. These rebels had initially originated from the West Java then spread to other parts of Indonesia. However, they did not gain popularity and September 1962 Kartosuwirjo was executed by the government which was headed by Kukarno.
Funding of operation by the Middle East
The radical Islamic in Southeast Asia has rather been catalyzed by worldwide view of Islamic religion. This revelation has come through particularly by assistance of the Middle East who funded this region with the aim of championing certain ideologies about the Islamic religion. For instance Saudi Arabia funded Islamic religion to ensure the right Quran scripture is being preached, on the other hand they have secretly funded militant Islamic movement (Singapore. 2003).
The funding of militant groups has allowed for expansion of extreme Islamic activities. These groups having gained economic power managed to input their say into the Indonesian religious academic system. As a result, the Arab religion and social practices slowly started displacing the inhabitant s. Other radical militant Islamic movements also found their way from the Middle East into South Asia into Southeast Asia (Spencer. 2003).
Migration of Militant Islamic Movement to Southeast Asia
This migration of Islamic militant groups lead to the spread of other Islamic militia groups such as Hizb ut-Tahrir, Komunikasi Ahlu Sunnah Wal Jamaah, Laskar Jihad among others. The latter was famous for recruiting people to go to war in the Moluccas. Laskar Jihad had a training camp for its fighter in Bogor, West Java and Ambon. The militant groups were unstoppable even after the then president Wahid ordered them not to go into war. The involved themselves in violence against Christians. There were also sub groups of the main Laskar Jihad by the names Laskar Jundullah and Laskar Mujahidin operating in the eastern Indonesia which were suspected to have links with terrorists (Spencer. 2003).
Sharia Law
These entire militia Islamic groups main objective was to impose Sharia law in Indonesia. They therefore masqueraded as protectors of the Muslims. For instance, once the Laskar Jihad leader known as Jafar Umar thalib chaired an illegal Islamic court that saw an execution of an adulterer. The adulterer was stoned to death. This action is said to have been the first application of Islamic criminal law popularly referred to as hudud, that was ever recorded in modern history. Jafar was arrested but however released upon protests by other extreme Islamic groups (Smith. 2005).
Introduction of Osma bin Laden to Southeast Asia
In 1987, Osama bin Laden a leader al-Qaeda Islamic terrorist group is said to have met with Jafar in Pakistan in a Peshawar town. However, Jafar has been recorded to have criticized Osama bin Laden following the famous terrorist attacks of September 11 of the twin tower in the United States. In his attacks, he said Osama had become a Khawarji, meaning that he had defected from the true Islamic religion (Spencer. 2003).
The scholars in Indonesia have associated Islamic extremism with the Arab clerics especially those with routes from the Hadrami or Yemeni origin. The Laskar Jihad leader Jafar and Jamah Islamivah come from this origin. These scholars have also documented evidence the influences from the Middle East have shaped the ideologies of most militant groups in Indonesia. However, the scholars have also said that the reason the Indonesian Muslim is moderate is because it is the least Arabized compared to countries of Muslim popularity (Pape. 2009).
Origins growth of Jamah islamiya
Another popular terrorist network that is believed to have links with the al-Qaeda is Jemmah islamaiya popularly refered to as the JI. The JI is believed to have been started by brothers the late Abdullah Sungkar and the late Abu Bakar Ba asyir in early 1990s. They were living in Malaysia at the time. They are said to have established a boarding school in Pondok al-Mukmin in 1971, which was later move to the central of Java. This became the epicenter of radical Islamic teachings in Southeast Asia. The objective of these teachings was to revive the initial Darul Islamic agenda by establishing communities that would then be turned into Islamic states. Greg Fealy an Australian analyst says that the association of the Darul Ismal and the JI is going to remain strong in the future (Kumar. 2010).
Training Camps for the Militias
The two brothers Basyir and sungkar were later imprisoned by the government of Suharto for refusing to fly the Indonesian flag at their training school among other things. However, they were set free upon an appeal in 1982 after which they fled to Malaysia for protective measures. They perceived their fleeing to be similar to prophet Mohamed s flee from Mecca to Medina, and therefore they also referred to this flee as hijra, which in Islamic religion refers to an immigration with religious significance (Bilveer. 2009).
On reaching Malaysia, they met Abu Jibril a veteran Indonesian Afghan war fighter. Together they established a similar training school to al-Mukmin known as Luqmanul Hakiem in Ulu Tiram in the state of Johor. They also linked up with key terrorist leaders of various groups such as Riduan Isamuddin who was had also fought in the Afghan war, and was a member of the al-Qaeda terrorist group. Through him they met Osama bin Laden. He also facilitated their JI network to be funded by the al-Qaeda network. They al-Qaeda network also allowed them to recruit fighters for Southeast Asia from their camp (Spencer. 2003).
The JI later moved their training camp of new recruits to Mindanao, the headquarters of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. The camps name was Hubaidiyah, solely for training foreign fighters, and was also within Abubakar camp. In 2000, the Philipine overran the latter forcing the JI to relocate to central Sulawesi near Poso. This camps are very crucial in teaching extreme Islamic ideologies as well as indoctrinating the trainees.
Sources of the JI ideology
The teachers of JI use parts of teachings of the Quran to dismiss any doubts from the recruits. Having made religion a central part of their teachings and training facilitates indoctrination of the extreme Islamic operations. They discuss and rationalize the need for Jihad and they exaggerate the danger at which Muslims are under against Christians and other religions (Pape. 2009).
They then identify from the trainees those interested in witnessing the plight of Muslims in other areas such as Molucass, and Bosnia. They teach corded languages that would only be understood by the JI affiliate and also come up with coded names. This is intended to create a strong bond amongst the group members and to foster commitment to the JI. Those who show intense interest are therefore invited on board to join the JI (Bilveer. 2009).
The JI has a manual showing their general struggle. In the manual they have also stipulated their vision of achieving transnational Islamic states. These include Indonesia, Malaysia, and the south of Philippines. The JI has international and local sources. Their first source was Darul Islam whose vision was to turn Indonesia into an Islamic state and the sole means struggle and usage of arms was necessary. The alternative method known as Sala is conversion to Islam through Islamic propaganda referred to as Dakwah (Spencer. 2003).
In 1976 the two brothers, founders of the JI, sungkar and Basyir fell out with Darul Islam. They accused Darul Islam to be subscribing to the ideologies of the Shiites and the Suni. This breakup lead to the JI to come out as a distinct group from the Darul Islam. In a report submitted by Singapore parliament in 2003, Indonesian radicals were said to have been injected with the ideologies of the Middle East Islamic radicals. Particularly the al-Islamiyya a group that is said to have delinked from the Egyptian brotherhood Muslim who were also known to be terrorists. They have been alleged to have influenced the radical moves of the conservative Indonesian Muslims to turn into radical Muslims. The Indonesian also had connection with the Afghan who facilitated the penetration of the al-Qaeda to Indonesia and thus the al-Qaeda used this opportunity to popularize their concept of the global jihad. They also created awareness of terrorist attacks against the United States and other western states (Bilveer. 2009).
An investigation by Singapore on the JI activities provided evident that the militants are taught that any Muslim who did not follow or subscribe to the movements teachings was infidel. They believed that they had an obligation to enter into armed war with the west in order to protect their religion and its followers. These ideologies were subscribed to by all terrorist groups such as the Sayyid Qutb, Mohammed Faraj, al-Zawahir as well as the al-Qaeda. The members of these groups enjoy exclusive treatment by the militant group leaders. Therefore, they feel that they have sense of belonging and therefore they are loyal to the movement and to Allah as preached by the group. They are taught that their teachings are the truthful and that through this radical practice they are the closest to Allah as opposed to other mainstream Muslims. They are also promised that should they die in the process of committing jihad they would be martyrs. The mainstream Muslims believes that Muslims should not go against their leader s orders however, the JI ignore this and engage in armed jihad (Singapore. 2003).
Reasons for Islamic Terrorist Attacks in Southeast Asia
It is said that the vigor at which the JI commit terrorist attacks against the west particularly the United States is in line with the intense hatred that they have against them. For instance there has been a series of attacks in Bali, Indonesia by the JI to express their anger towards the west. For instance in October 2005, various media including the British Broadcast Corporation reported that 26 people had been killed in a terrorist attack in a resort island of Bali. Amongst the people who were killed in the attack were foreign nationals. It was reported that more than 50 people were injured and 3 restaurants and a beach resort were destroyed. The previous similar attack that saw 202 people perish occurred in Kuta in 2002 (Bilveer. 2009).
It was also alleged that the reason Bali was prone to attacks by Muslim militia terrorist was because it was a favourite visit of the western tourist and also it was predominant with Hindus. Iman Samudra who was behind the bombings of 2005 responded by saying that it was an act of solidarity amongst the Muslim fraternity, and that he was only following orders from Allah to protect the weak in order for the American terrorist to know how valuable and expensive a Muslim blood was. Mukhlas the chief operator of the JI during his trial by the west retorted that the west needed to be wiped out since were all insects and dirty animals (Pape. 2009).
Generally the Muslim militias believe that Bali had allowed foreigners particularly the west to walk into Indonesia change the Indonesian women. They feel that these foreigners have introduced narcotic drugs to the region which is contrary to the
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