Support for Bin Laden in Indonesia Indicates Possible Spread of Violence
By JAY SOLOMON Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
YOGYAKARTA, Indonesia -- Radical Islamic groups in the world's most populous Muslim nation are rallying in support of Osama bin Laden, illustrating how last week's deadly violence in the U.S. could spread even to traditionally moderate Muslim countries in Asia.
Western intelligence officials believe a number of these Indonesian Islamic organizations have links to Mr. bin Laden and other suspected international terrorist networks, due to their ties to Afghanistan and their history of using violence. The leaders of these Muslim groups say it is their shared religious ideology, rather than any organizational links, that is driving their support for the Saudi exile and militant Islamist, whom Washington has named as a prime suspect in Sept. 11's terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
The Laskar Jihad is the most prominent of these Islamic organizations, because of its role over the past two years in mobilizing thousands of recruits to take part in a sectarian conflict in eastern Indonesia that has left thousands dead. Its commander, Ja'far Umar Thalib, fought alongside the mujahedeen in Afghanistan as a volunteer in the late 1980s, against the Soviet Union. The group's founder, Ayip Syafruddin, says Mr. Ja'far also met with Mr. bin Laden and studied among many of his contemporaries while in Pakistan.
The Laskar Jihad, or "militia of the holy war," has capitalized on its Afghan links by recruiting more than a dozen Afghan nationals to fight in the sectarian conflict in Indonesia's Maluku islands, according to Western intelligence officials in Jakarta. Mr. Ayip wouldn't confirm this, but did say that the Laskar Jihad has recruited veterans of conflicts in Afghanistan and Pakistan as "trainers" for their militia members. Mr. Ayip stressed, however, that his organization has no "structural links" to Mr. bin Laden or his al Qaeda organization.
Mr. Ja'far said in an interview that there is a wide ideological gap between his group and Mr. bin Laden's. "Bin Laden feels that all non-Islamic people are his enemies, but we feel this is wrong … We will not support the terror he's launched."
A number of Western officials, however, are still worried that the Laskar Jihad and other militant Islamic groups could foment a backlash against U.S. interests in Indonesia, should Washington strike Afghanistan or other Middle Eastern countries. A string of bombings has rocked the Indonesian capital of Jakarta over the past year, some of which are alleged to have been committed by Islamic organizations. And the U.S. embassy has been shut on two separate occasions because of "credible evidence" of planned terrorist attacks, according to the U.S. State Department.
A Sunday rally in the central Javanese city of Solo underpinned these fears, as 2,000 members of fundamentalist Islamic groups gathered to voice their support for Mr. bin Laden's cause and their antipathy toward the U.S. "Bin Laden is fighting for our beliefs … so we must support his struggle if possible," Abu Bakar Baasir, a leader of the Laskar Mujahedeen task force, told the gathering. "We could help Afghanistan in defending attacks launched by the U.S. government."
The central region of Java island, Indonesia's most populous, is viewed as a breeding ground for the Islamic militancy that is growing in a country that still holds largely to moderate religious views. Indeed, in the province of Yogyakarta, a sultan still holds power. And in the city of Solo, royal palaces dot the landscape, signifying its feudal, rather than Islamic, traditions. But residents say the fall of former Indonesian strongman Suharto in 1998 unleashed long-suppressed religious sympathies in the area.
The formation of the Laskar Jihad is seen as a prime example of this trend. Mr. Ja'far, according to his associates, was a little-known Islamic cleric in the mid-'90s, who traveled the country preaching the importance of Islamic laws. Such proselytizing was largely anathema under the Suharto regime, which had a history of suppressing fundamentalist Islamic movements, often violently.
The catalyst for the Laskar Jihad, senior members say, was the escalating war that broke out between Christians and Muslims on the eastern Indonesian island of Ambon in early 1999. Declaring that Indonesian authorities weren't doing enough to safeguard Muslim interests there, Mr. Ja'far and his supporters quickly set up recruitment camps and training centers for Indonesians willing to fight in the conflict. Thousands were shipped off to the Maluku islands, the archipelago where Ambon lies. The Laskar Jihad has now widened its efforts to embrace the conflict raging in the city of Poso in central Sulawesi.
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