From AP, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:
JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) Indonesia plans to formally outlaw the al-Qaida-linked terror group Jemaah Islamiyah, a move that will make it easier for authorities to arrest and prosecute militants in the world's most populous Muslim nation, a top security official said Monday.Banning the organization which is listed by the United Nations as a terrorist group will please the United States and other foreign governments but risks opposition from Muslim groups and political parties that fear it may herald a broader crackdown on Islamic activists.
It would really help if somebody knew where the line was between terrorism and plain ole "Islamic activities." Where will they draw this line, given that Islam is inherently political?
Ansyaad Mbai, who heads the counterterrorism desk at Indonesia's Coordinating Ministry for Political and Security Affairs, said the government intends to outlaw the group, which is blamed for a host of attacks and plots throughout Southeast Asia, including the 2002 Bali nightclub attacks....Authorities have locked up more than 150 militants in the last three years, but officials balk at publicly identifying them as belonging to Jemaah Islamiyah or being motivated by sympathy with al-Qaida.
Part of the reluctance to ban Jemaah Islamiyah rests on its name, which means ``Islamic community.'' Proponents of an Islamic state in secular Indonesia, who were brutally repressed under former dictator Suharto, fear that such a ban could mean they too will be targeted.
"They too?" Aren't terrorists THE proponents of an Islamic state? What's the difference? Where's the line?
Mbai said that banning the group was essential in the fight against terror.``We know there are many JI members who have got military training and have the ability to make bombs and use weapons who are still around, but the police cannot arrest them unless there is evidence they are involved in a particular act of terrorism,'' Mbai said....
Gee, Mbai, you don't think the reason why they're getting all this training is to fight for an Islamic state? Well, I guess maybe it's just for the exercise.
Jemaah Islamiyah's alleged spiritual leader, Abu Bakar Bashir, was sentenced to 30 months in jail earlier this month for conspiracy in the 2002 Bali nightclub bombings that killed 202 people. Analysts have said prosecutors would have been able to build a stronger case against the 66-year-old cleric if they had been able to directly charge him with heading the group....
It also continues to be noteworthy how nobody seems to bat an eye at all these Islamic clerics who also double as terrorists.
It would be good if historians were to study Indonesia, and precisely how it was that islands populated by Hindus and Buddhists became largely Muslim. For this history may hold lessons for Western Europe today.
Muslim traders, many of them Hadramis (people from the Hadramaut -- Hadramis were also important at the court of the Nizam of Hyderabad) -- settled little by little. They always brought Islam, for every Muslim is a missionary. Military colonies were founded here and there on the coast. Gradually they helped to subdue larger and larger areas. But exactly how this happened, and how the demographics of the area changed, is something that few discuss.
What were the means by which the East Indies became slowly but inexorably islamized, and what were the intermittent causes of reversals in that process?
Surely this is a subject of interest. Of course, if you are a Muslim, the answer is obvious. Islam is self-evidently so wonderful, that it takes very little to islamize a population. It is just -- so, so right.
If, on the other hand, you are not a Muslim, and find upon inspection the Qur'an and Hadith and Sira to be not merely singularly uninspiring, but the stuff of nightmares, then you must ask yourself if perhaps primitive populations are more susceptible (answer: yes) and that there must be other reasons as well, and those reasons deserve to be examined and analysed.
Otherwise, given the flaccid response of the Western world, we may have one more go at the "Heute Europas, Morgen die Welt" problem -- and that sort of thing, once every millennium or so, is quite enough.
test
Hugh-
Good post. Very insightful info.
What I think Indonesia is doing is giving the "extremists" in their faith a warning that: they are jumping the Islamic gun- by 'giving away the game' before the rest of the Muslim world is strong enough to openly say AND DO what the "fanatics" are advocating.
In other words, it is merely a strategic call for a 'stand down', to let the rest of the Muslims, globally, get better armed. And undermine their infidel enemies, meanwhile, with deception, immigration, demographics (population growth) and intimidation.
Osama Bin Laden also made a dangerous tactical error in cluing the U.S. in to the ultimate aim of radical Islam by striking too hard too soon.
Plus, these home-grown Indonesian maniacs are scaring off needed tourist dollars, some of which can easily be diverted and used to build up the military in Indonesia, strengthen indoctrinating Islamic 'schools', etc.
I've read their blueprint. The 'Holy' Qur'an.
The extremists are just being more honest about what it says.
"Bad form", as the Brits used to say.
The 'Great Game' demands greater subtlety.
You can't sucker punch people TWICE.
Profitsbeard:
You said:
How is that english translation coming?
According to the pedophile muhamad:
terrorist fighting jihad for allah = GOOD mooslim
peaceful muslim = BAD mooslim ("hypocrite")
mooslim dictators want to appear to their subjects as GOOD mooslims, i.e. fighting jihad for allah, but in their dealings with the West they have to pretend to be peaceful. So they have to keep flipping back and forth. This is especially true for our "friends and allies", the saudi royal jihadists.
Unfortunately, our skull and bones prezident's cranium is not evolved enough to understand this.
Mentat-
Been slowed down by fiscal compications... nothing new there... (hit a deer and had to pay off what my insurance wouldn't cover by getting some sidework)
RE:
The translation of the Dutch book warning against the Islamic Invasion of Holland & also its intriguing autobiographical tale woven throughout by apostate author 'M. Rasoel'-
It is going slowly, but will get there...
I've been caught up for over a month doing some interesting additional work that came to me after I posted my credentials through a well-known online job site... the one named after a Hindu spiritual teacher... but I won't give them a free plug on JW/DW, since this ain't the place... taken on because I needed it to keep the wolf off the doorstep.
"THE DOWNFALL OF THE NETHERLANDS- land of the naive fools" will be formatted and sent up to Mr. Spencer once I have the extra time to hone it and finish the idiosyncratic text, and then get my wife (born in Holland) to proofread it for the best idioms.
I've done a few homegrown forms of 'sticking' it to the Islamo-fascistas, using their own words, of course. To 'hoist them with their own petard' (as the old Tarzan author was fond of saying), and have enjoyed reading the comments by Hugh and RS and all at JW/DW when I could.
Far less trolls, lately. I guess they're over on MuslimWakeUp and other boo-hoo-hoo-ing sites lamenting the lack of success by the jihadists in Iraq and Lebanon, and the instability of Iran. Nary a beheading since Christmas!
But a bad sign by Bush & Co. to sell F-16's to BOTH India and Pakistan. Smells a little too realpolitik to be decent. Prince Machiavelli, anyone?
India, yes. But the soon-to-fall Musharref regime? Plus, what does Pakistan need F-16's for? The U.S. Administration line I heard yesterday was "to help them in their fight against terrorism". Sure. How many MIG's or Mirages does Osama Bin Laden have?
Now, back to the thing that makes my creditors happy... cha-ching!
Meantime...
Islam Will Fall of the Weight of its own B.S.!
Happy Easter [or: add generic celebration here] to all!