The origins of modern Islamicism are among groups like the Muslim Brotherhood, in Egypt, and the Ayatollah Khomeini and his followers in Iran.
You still haven’t defined “Islamicism”, so it is hard to know exactly what you are describing.
I still don’t see how anyone familiar with the development of Islam as a political force in SE Asia can call it a “contagion” that spread from the Middle East. I’m sure that this view is appealing to those who have not bothered to study the subject, and convenient as well, but if you look closely, it’s simply insupportable.
I’ve seen way too many articles written by people who seem to assume that because they became aware of Al Qaeda after 9/11, and they became aware of Jemaah Islamiyah after the Bali bombing, that the sequence of development matches the sequence of their awareness.
Middle Eastern Islamic radicalism did not create JI, Laskar Jihad, Laskar Mujahedin, Darul Islam, GAM, the MNLF, the MILF, or the Abu Sayyaf. (If you can’t identify and briefly describe each of those, you probably shouldn’t be in this discussion in the first place.) None of these groups are directed by, or even significantly assisted by, Middle Eastern radical groups. Certainly they communicate with each other, a trend that was significantly accelerated by US-supported recruitment of SE Asian Muslims for the Afghanistan conflict. Certainly a certain conformity of rhetoric has evolved, largely as a result of improved communications. But to say that one spread from the other is simply inaccurate. |
