Contrast this to the light sentence given to the jihadist leader Abu Bakar Bashir for his involvement in the Bali bombings. From AFP, with thanks to Sr. Soph:
PALU, Indonesia - The execution of three Indonesian Christians on death row for inciting violence against Muslims six years ago loomed Thursday, with security forces on alert amid fears of religious strife.Police said this week that Fabianus Tibo, Dominggus da Silva and Marianus Riwu were to face a firing squad in religiously-divided Central Sulawesi province on Thursday....
The three poor farmers, who have denied charges that they masterminded grisly attacks against Muslims, had initially been scheduled for execution last month but were granted a last-minute stay of execution.
Pope Benedict XVI had sent a plea for clemency to the Indonesian president just hours beforehand, but authorities in the world’s most populous Muslim nation denied any link.
Rights activists have raised concerns about the fairness of their trial and complained that few others have been convicted for violence that rocked Central Sulawesi in 2000-01, leaving those most responsible on the run....
Islamic groups have urged the government to proceed with the executions, but Indonesia’s Christian minority has protested.
About 1,000 people of various denominations took to the streets in Atambua, West Timor, on Thursday, to peacefully protest the executions and pray, police there told AFP by telephone.
Amnesty International on Wednesday said it was “deeply disappointed” to hear about the planned executions, which would be the first carried out in Indonesia since May 2005, according to the group.
Supporters of the trio fear that their case has become politicised and linked to the case of three Islamic militants who are on death row for their roles in the 2002 Bali bombings, which killed 202 people.
Yes, it's ironic that meanwhile a criminal like Abu Bakar Basyr, the typical scoundrel that throws the stone and hider the hand, gets away with a light sentence.
Indonesia is a joke of a country, full of people who want to be Arabs but don't live in the desert and don't look like arabs at all.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached."
A senior Indonesian government official, who was granted anonymity in order to learn the government's response, said that it was almost certain that the executions of the Christians, two mechanics and a farmer, would take place.
"We're going to execute the Bali bombers soon after," he added, by way of explanation. In this overwhelmingly Muslim country, the government considers that the risk of political protests would be too great if it executed the Bali bombers and not the Christians
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/09/21/news/indo.php
21 September 2006
Nude women ‘worse than Bali bombing’
ALLEGED terror leader Abu Bakar Bashir said TV shows featuring scantily clad women were more harmful than the 2002 Bali nightclub bombings that killed 202 people, the state news agency reported.
http://www.irishexaminer.com/irishex ... qqqx=1.asp
OOOOOps
http://www.irishexaminer.com/irishexaminer/pages/story.aspx-qqqg=world-qqqm=world-qqqa=world-qqqid=13923-qqqx=1.asp
Off topic, but contrast this also with the case presented on BBC2's gruesome fly-on-the-wall documentary Anatomy of a Crime last night... Nasser Ali Alsenaidi should be doing life in Parkhurst, for first degree murder and at least two other attempted murders/assaults. But here, as in the States, Sudden Jihad Syndrome is officially a form of schizophrenia, its perpetrators hapless victims.
Nobody seemed the slightest bit concerned that his psychiatrist, who pronounced him 'unfit for trial' and recommended his immediate extradition to Oman, was herself a Moslemah. At the police station, Alsenaidi kept shouting "Jihad!" throughout, but the superintendent didn't even recognise this as a word, and thought he was shouting gibberish. His junior officers had to point out to him what "jihad" meant. But there was a punchline, of sorts; the police gaoler was explaining to camera that he wanted to give a Qur'an to Alsenaidi to read in his cell, "because it's his religion", but was unsure as "it has quite sharp edges" and "might be dangerous"...
Within two months he was given a free flight back home.
addendum: He went Islamicidal because he'd failed three attempts to quit smoking, and believed he'd failed allah, and that killing kufr was the only way to 'save' himself and keep his place in paradise. 'SJS' is plainly an act of religious piety, and yet the authorities regard it as mental illness, exonerating brazen jihadis as 'victims'.
It's a mad, mad world.
And here is what our friend Jeff Bargholz claims is HIS idea of a 'moderate' (if not 'heretical') Muslim country.
But to those few folks left on earth who still possess an iota of sanity, it appears that Indonesians are now as warped by Islam as the rest of the ummah.
The Nonest Reportring-sponsored documentary film "OBSESSION:RADICAL ISLAM'S WAR ON THE WEST" shows film footage of Indonesian Muslims sacking and demolishing Buddhist temples.
Good god.
So Amnesty International is merely "deeply disappointed"??
Where are the marches, the snotty whining on CNN, the endless series of press releases? Are the lives of these three people somehow worth less than Mumia Jamal (or whatever his name is/was)?
Well, I guess so. Their "deep disappointment" only comes from people finding out about it.
"We're [i]deeply disappointed[/i] that any Western media chose to cover this story. It really takes the focus off our efforts to blame Westernism for everything. Haven't you people heard of moral equivalence? Isn't it primetime TV season? Come on, help us out here."
Prophet Geoff
The news crawler on CNN stated that 3 "Christian Militants" were executed for, among other crimes, attacking a school and killing 70 civilians.
Whomever wrote it took pains to stress the terroristic acts that the Christians engaged in (not "alleged" acts mind you, but as fact on high) and how they richly deserved the sentence that was carried out against them. There was no mention of anyone saying that they might be innocent or of the protests against the way they were railroaded through the Indonesian courts.
No, in CNN-World (and AP-World, and BBC-World, ad nauseum) this was an opportune moment to highlight the moral equivalence between Christian and Muslim fanaticism. You see, all religions have their terrorists and this proves it!
Dispicable.
The only thing worse than the Bali Bombing is the religion which encouraged it!