ISIS in Southeast Asia

[alaungphaya]

Islamist extremism is spreading Eastward from its spiritual home in the Middle East carried by the flows of Saudi petro-dollars. There are 3 majority Muslim countries in SE Asia (Brunei, Indonesia and Malaysia) and quite a number with substantial Muslim populations (Myanmar, Philippines and Thailand). As Islamic societies become more radicalised, we are seeing more and more South East Asians being targeted for recruitment by extremist groups. This thread is intended to discuss this trend that threatens to blight the progress the region has made towards development.

http://online.wsj.com/articles/isis-in-southeast-asia-1409590016
ISIS in Southeast Asia
Canberra and Jakarta settle their intel rift, as jihadi recruiting grows.

Updated Sept. 1, 2014 5:47 p.m. ET
ISIS is attracting followers from Muslim communities across the Asia-Pacific. In Indonesia, radical groups have declared support for the Islamic State in Jakarta, Surakarta and other cities. In Malaysia, police say they have arrested 19 ISIS-inspired militants planning attacks against pubs, discos and a Carlsberg brewery in and around Kuala Lumpur. Australia estimates that 150 of its citizens are now fighting with ISIS in the Middle East, with 15 Australians among the dead, including two suicide bombers.

Enlarge Image

Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (C) witnesses Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop (L) and her Indonesian counterpart Marty Natalegawa (R) sign documents during a ceremony in Nusa Dua in the resort island of Bali on August 28, 2014. Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

In the face of this threat, governments need to broaden avenues of cooperation. So it's good news that Indonesia and Australia have finally ended a feud that started last November with Edward Snowden's revelations that the Australian Signals Directorate tried to tap the phones of Indonesia's President and his top advisers, including the first lady, for 15 days in August 2009.

The disclosures caused a serious rift as Jakarta limited imports of Australian beef, froze trade talks, recalled its ambassador, suspended cooperation on border security and curbed military and intelligence cooperation. Protesters burned flags and effigies in front of the Australian Embassy in Jakarta.

Last week's deal doesn't forswear future snooping—only the use of spy resources "to harm each other's interests," according to Australia's Foreign Minister. But it allows the countries to restore and expand intelligence sharing.

That's necessary given the multinational and connected nature of modern-day jihadism. The October 2002 Bali bombing killed 202 people from at least 23 countries, including 88 Australians, 38 Indonesians, 27 Britons and seven Americans. The alleged spiritual leader of the bombers, radical cleric Abu Bakr Bashir, has pledged allegiance to ISIS from prison.

Jakarta estimates that some 60 of its citizens are fighting for ISIS, but the real number is probably higher. One potential future target is the Borobudur Temple in Java, a major tourist attraction and the world's largest Buddhist monument. An ISIS-linked Facebook page last week expressed hope that the temple "will be demolished by Islamic caliphate mujahidin," as the Taliban destroyed the Buddhist statues of Bamiyan in Afghanistan in March 2001.

Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono recently branded ISIS "humiliating" to Muslims, banned support for the group and ordered police to step up efforts against online radicalization. Malaysian leader Najib Razak has condemned ISIS for "crimes committed in the name of Islam," while his government stepped up monitoring of Malaysians traveling overseas. Australia has tightened customs surveillance and introduced legislation to strengthen intelligence monitoring of social media and to mandate that telecom providers save two years' worth of phone and Internet metadata.

Critics of Western intelligence agencies obsess about the theoretical risks their activities pose to civil liberties, while downplaying the risks of an all-too real and rising terrorist threat. But intelligence gathering and cooperation are vital to preventing another Bali-style bombing that would kill more innocents and force governments to take stronger measures.


Malaysia Arrests Suspected Islamic State Militant Recruits Amid Fears of Rising Extremist Support | VICE News
Malaysia Arrests Suspected Islamic State Militant Recruits Amid Fears of Rising Extremist Support

By Samuel Oakford

August 23, 2014 | 9:20 pm
Malaysian authorities announced this week the arrest of a group of 19 suspected Islamist militants who had plans to join the Islamic State in Syria, as well as carry out bombings on a brewery and bars in the outskirts of Kuala Lumpur.

The arrests took place between April and July, and seven of the suspects have already been brought up on terrorism charges. Several of the accused were apprehended at airports, where authorities said they intended to embark on flights to Turkey in order to join the extremist group, also known as ISIS and ISIL, which recently beheaded American journalist James Foley.

The news was the latest to underscore the increased influence the Middle Eastern conflict, and ISIS in particular, has exerted on small but well-connected extremist elements in Southeast Asia. Estimates vary widely, but Malaysian police believe at least 100 of its citizens could be fighting with the Islamic State.

Pro-Islamic State recruitment video encourages foreign fighters to join jihad. Read more here.

Several hundred Indonesians and 150 Australians are also reported to have joined the group, along with a "handful" of Singaporean nationals, according to authorities. The Islamic State has seized on the support, recently releasing a recruitment video that features an Indonesian jihadist exhorting his compatriots to join him in Islamic State-controlled territory.

In May, a 26-year-old Malaysian factory worker named Ahmad Tarmimi Maliki reportedly blew himself up in Iraq, killing 25 Iraqi soldiers before members of the Islamic State stormed the military facility where they were based.

Malaysian and local authorities estimate at least 15 Malaysian nationals have already been killed in Syria.

Involvement in such a distant conflict is painful for many in Southeast Asia, the region with the most Muslims in the world. Historically, it has also been home to mainstream forms of Islam that are more syncretic compared to stricter interpretations in parts of the Arab world.

"It was far disconnected from the Middle East," Gregory Poling, a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies who specializes in Southeast Asia, told VICE News. "Over the centuries there was a lot more mixing with traditional religions and Hinduism."

"You still have Muslims in Indonesia that can recite the Ramayana," he said, referring to the Hindu epic.

However, local piety began to change among some in the 1970s as Saudi evangelists, funded by the royal family's petrol dollars, decamped for the far reaches of the Muslim world to preach their conservative brand of Salafist Islam. In the 1980s, Indonesians and Malaysians joined the mujahideen in Afghanistan as they attempted, with American assistance, to expel Soviet forces. Just as al-Qaeda was birthed out of the CIA-abetted fight in Afghanistan, jihadist and al-Qaeda-linked groups in Southeast Asia can also trace their genesis to the return of fighters during those years.

ISIS Has a Really Slick and Sophisticated Media Department. Read more here.

The most prominent of those radical groups, Jemaah Islamiyah, wasn't officially created until the early 1990s. Its followers quickly spread throughout the region with intent to establish a pan-Southeast Asian caliphate spanning Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Brunei, the Southern Philippines, and southern Thailand.

"Jemaah Islamiyah set up a number of cells that were responsible for certain functions — Indonesians did the fighting, while Malaysians raised the money and did most of the bomb making," Pek Koon Heng, Malaysia-born director of American University's ASEAN Studies Center, told VICE News.

In 2002, the group, coordinating with al-Qaeda, set off a series of bombs near in the resort city of Bali, killing over 200 — more than half of them Westerners tourists -- and thrust the region onto the radar of American counterterrorism officials.

After the Bali bombings, President Bush called Southeast Asia the "second front" in the US' global war on terror. Over the next decade, however, local authorities — with heavy US funding — were largely able to clamp down on Jeemah Islamiyah and other groups like Philippines-based Abu Sayyaf. Leaders were jailed, followers were forced underground, and remnants splintered.

But now, regional governments are once again concerned that returning fighters could restart radical groups or turn their wrath towards domestic targets. The alleged plans to target bars and a Carlsberg brewery in Malaysia's administrative capital, Putrajaya, indicate those attempts have already begun.

"We have to be prepared for when Indonesians come back from fighting in the Middle East," Sri Yunanto, an adviser to Indonesia's national counterterrorism agency said at a recent panel. "We have experience with Afghan fighters, Moro fighters (in the Philippines), we don't want ISIS alumni in Indonesia," he said.

The radicalization of disaffected members of the lower and middle classes in Southeast Asia is in many ways similar to what's occurred in European countries and Australia, says Poling. But it also comes as polls show the vast majority remain moderate, no different from populations in most countries in their views towards religion and politics. In Indonesia, surveys show that fighting terrorism is a high priority for most people.

"Perhaps they have folks coming from more conservative families, perhaps they grew up relatively disaffected, or went to conservative madrasas and ran into the wrong kind of people," said Poling.

The rise of Saudi-funded Wahhabist madrasas in the region has also coincided with greater persecution of members of minority Shia communities, a pattern that mimics increased sectarian strife in the Middle East. In March, more than 100 Malaysian Shias, including women and children, were arrested simply for attending a religious ceremony. Last December, Malaysian Home Minister Ahmad Zahid explained he had banned Shia books as they "derail from real Islamic teachings."

"We insist on Sunni as our main belief in Islamic teachings," Zahid said at the time.

Now even the Islamic State has its very own whistleblower. Read more here.

Tensions are further ratcheted as Sunni Islam becomes a nationalistic totem and means to identify as a member of the country's Malay majority. By some accounts, more than 100,000 Iranians live in Malaysia, part of an estimated population of 250,000 Shia. Sixty percent of the country of 30 million is Muslim.

"The Malaysians have been cracking down on the Shia, and the Saudis of course are behind the anti-Shia campaign," said Heng. "Shia are increasingly being told that the form of Islam they are practicing is not real Islam."

Indonesia, while officially recognizing six religions including both Protestantism and Catholicism, only considers Islam as a singular entity, and this leaves some hardline groups to interpret that to mean nothing but Sunni Islam. Indonesia's one million Shias have felt the brunt of extremist ire.

In April, thousands attended a rally organized by the Anti-Shia Alliance, where Ahmad bin Zein al-Kaff, leader of the anti-Heresy Front, called for a jihad against all Shia. Without Islamists in power, he said "we will never be able to purge the Shiites."

For Malaysians, part of the current allure of the Islamic State is what they see "as defending Sunni Islam against Shia oppression," said a recent Center for Strategic and International Studies analysis.

Other minorities have been targeted, too. In June, mobs aligned with hardline groups and attacked a church in the Javanese town of Pangukan. It was the third church in Yogyakarta region to be attacked this year. Elsewhere, groups like the Islamic Defenders Front have busted up bars and protested beauty pageants they consider as affronts to Islam.

Returning jihadist can only serve to inflame sectarian tensions, says Heng.

"At what point do these jihadists start training their sites on non-Muslims at home?" she said. "If they decide to target them, all you need is a handful of militants to destroy the fragile equilibrium. This is true in Malaysia as well as Indonesia."

Radical sentiment, however, is still outside of the mainstream.

Indonesian president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono this week called the Islamic State "embarrassing," and reiterated in an interview with The Australian that "Indonesia is not an Islamic state."

Meanwhile, the next governor of Jakarta province, Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, is not only Chinese but Christian as well. The man he is replacing, Indonesia's newly elected President Joko Widodo, is a fan of heavy metal music and prefers checkered shirts to traditional or religious garb.

But in a country as large and spread out as Indonesia, all it takes are a few to create havoc, says Heng.

"There's this big picture in the Middle East and what's happening in Southeast Asia is a reflection of that," she commented. "You're getting this second generation of jihadists, which is much more serious. I don't think it's going away anytime soon."

Follow Samuel Oakford on Twitter: @samueloakford

 

[alaungphaya]

Joseph Chinyong Liow | ISIS Goes to Asia | Foreign Affairs | Foreign Affairs
ISIS Goes to Asia
Extremism in the Middle East Isn't Only Spreading West
As the United States sought in recent weeks to assemble an international coalition to combat the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS, also known as the Islamic State), it looked mostly to the Middle East and Europe, regions that it said face a direct threat from the militant Islamist group. But other parts of the world are just as anxious about ISIS -- above all, Southeast Asia. The governments of that region have not publicized their concerns very loudly, but they are acutely aware that ISIS is a menace. Their top concern is that its extremist ideology will prove attractive to the region’s many Muslims, lure some of them to the Middle East to fight as part of the group, and ultimately be imported back to the region when these militants return home.

There is a clear precedent for this scenario. During the 1980s, many young Muslims from Southeast Asia went to Pakistan to support the Afghan mujahideen’s so-called jihad against Soviet occupation. Many of these recruits subsequently stayed in the region, mingling with like-minded Muslims from all around and gaining exposure to al Qaeda’s militant ideology. Many eventually returned to Southeast Asia to form extremist groups of their own, including the notorious al Qaeda–linked organization Jemaah Islamiyah that was responsible for several high-profile terrorist attacks in the region over the last 15 years. With evidence now surfacing of Southeast Asians among the ranks of ISIS casualties, it’s only natural that governments in the region are feeling a sense of déjà vu.

RADICAL CHIC

Singapore has already revealed that several of its nationals have made their way to the Middle East to battle with ISIS, and the Philippine government has suggested that local ISIS sympathizers are attempting to recruit from among the Bangsamoro populations in the country’s southern islands. But the greatest concern comes from Indonesia and Malaysia. Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim country, has already confirmed that more than 50 of its citizens are currently fighting in Syria and Iraq; Malaysia has suggested that between 30 and 40 Malaysians are doing the same. In both cases, the actual numbers could be much higher if we consider those who may have traveled to the conflict zones from other destinations. Indonesian authorities have already noted that several of their nationals have been killed fighting for ISIS in Syria. On May 26, a Malaysian suicide bomber killed himself in an ISIS attack in Iraq. Another Malaysian fighter who died fighting for ISIS in Syria several months later has been celebrated as a martyr by leaders of the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party, the same party that had earlier dismissed him after he departed for Syria. Intriguingly, three Malaysian women were also alleged to have left for Syria to wage a “sexual jihad” (jihad al-nikah), offering their bodies to ISIS fighters to “boost their morale.”


ISIS’ reach in Southeast Asia is based on several factors. First, certain devout Muslims feel a theological affinity for the militant group. They see parallels between ISIS’ mission and prophecies in Islamic holy texts of the eventual creation of a Khilafah Minhaj Nebuwwah (“end-times caliphate”) following the fall of dictators in the Arabian Peninsula; they are also reminded of the apocalyptic struggle that is said to be fated between the forces of Imam Mahdi, an Islamic messiah figure who is supposed to fight under a black flag, and those of the Dajjal, or Antichrist. Anecdotal evidence suggests that this millenarian perspective is growing in Indonesia and Malaysia with radical clerics such as Aman Abdurrahman, who, though in jail, are expanding their reach through the Internet and radical tracts -- including a book titled Strategi Dua Lengan (Two-Armed Strategy) -- increasingly finding their way into Indonesian translation.

Another reason for ISIS’ appeal is its sectarianism. The ISIS challenge is seen in some quarters as an extension of the Sunni-Shiite schism. To wit: The group’s struggle against Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite regime is considered legitimate in fundamentalist Sunni-Salafi circles. In much the same way, ISIS militancy in Iraq is seen as a consequence of Sunni grievance against the Shiite-led government of Nouri al-Maliki. This support needs to be understood in the context of Southeast Asia’s own problems with sectarianism: Shiite Islam is banned in Malaysia and is not widely accepted in Indonesia.

Finally, the question of the recruitment of Southeast Asians into ISIS cannot be divorced from the larger context of the humanitarian crisis in Syria. The universal sympathy for the Syrian people among Southeast Asia’s sizable Muslim populations has undoubtedly prompted a large number of humanitarian missions to depart for the conflict zone. Many members of these missions may well have set off with noble intentions. But once they arrive in territory held by ISIS, it is not difficult to imagine how they would be exposed to ISIS indoctrination and recruitment.

FALSE ANALOGY

In many ways, Southeast Asia seems to be seeing a repeat of its experience with Afghanistan in the 1980s and 1990s. The most familiar aspect is ISIS’ recruiting efforts, mostly undertaken by Southeast Asian sympathizers rather than ISIS leaders based in the Middle East. In 2012, ISIS’ appeal started to grow among Indonesian and Malaysian civil society groups that had mobilized in response to Syria’s humanitarian crisis by creating local awareness and fundraising. Within a year, several Islamic preachers in Indonesia had pledged allegiance to ISIS’ caliphate, and about half a dozen graduates from Indonesia’s Ngruki Islamic boarding school, previously a hotbed of Jemaah Islamiyah membership ideology and recruitment, are believed to have left to join the jihad in Syria (often with funding from Jemaah Islamiyah and other affiliated extremist groups). ISIS has also been actively recruiting in Malaysia through Islamic study groups known as usrah. In turn, those Malaysian recruits are believed to have attempted to recruit from Singapore. It is still not yet known exactly how successful these recruiting efforts have been. But it is clear that ISIS has been able to promote its jihad through sympathizers plugged into the region’s local Islamic communities and networks, just as Afghan militants did in earlier decades.

But there are also significant differences between the present-day jihad and the earlier one in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union. While the Afghan mujahideen’s struggle was widely embraced, ISIS has proven extremely divisive in Southeast Asia, even among extremist groups, some of which have rejected and virulently condemned the organization. Jemaah Islamiyah, for one, has accused ISIS of being takfir (Muslims who pass judgment on fellow Muslims of being un-Islamic ) and dismissed its members as khawarij (extremists). Other groups, such as the conservative Majelis Mujahidin Indonesia (Indonesian Mujahideen Council), have cast doubt on ISIS’ religious credentials, proclaiming that it is an organization and not a caliphate and hence has no legitimate claim to the loyalty of Muslims. Furthermore, they have also argued that ISIS’ process for appointing Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi as caliph was in violation of Islamic law, as it did not take place before a religious council that represents the entire Islamic community. As the terrorism expert Sidney Jones has rightly pointed out, the existence of this divergence of opinion on ISIS speaks to a split within Indonesia’s extremist community between those who support ISIS and others who remain loyal to al Qaeda and the al Nusra Front. Unsurprisingly, the other major difference from the days of the jihad in Afghanistan is ISIS’ use of social media. ISIS has consistently used Twitter and Facebook to amplify its message and broaden its reach. Also, the fact that authorities in Indonesia have been reluctant to shut down radical websites that carry ISIS propaganda, such as al-Mustaqbal.net, despite already imposing a ban on the group’s jihadist teachings (likely because of a misplaced concern for its religious credibility in the eyes of the vocal radical Islamist community), has only enhanced its visibility in the region.

KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON

Without downplaying the ISIS threat to Southeast Asia, there are nevertheless limits to the effectiveness of its recruitment in the region. Despite huge investments from Arab governments, particularly Saudi Arabia, in Islamic education across Southeast Asia over the past three decades, the lingua francas of the region’s Muslim communities remain Malay and Indonesian, not Arabic. The vast majority of Muslims from the region are insufficiently literate in Arabic to even appreciate ISIS’ propaganda without translation, much less fully integrate with ISIS fighters in Iraq and Syria. In Afghanistan during the 1980s and 1990s, this problem was in part surmounted by the creation of dedicated training camps for Southeast Asians; although the situation may change, this does not seem to be the case in Syria or Iraq at the moment, where Southeast Asian recruits are thrown onto the front lines with everyone else. Second, Muslims in Indonesia and Malaysia enjoy social and economic conditions far better than those of their coreligionists in the Levant (or even in Europe, where there is a palpable sense of alienation and marginalization among Muslim immigrant populations). By and large, Southeast Asians simply have fewer incentives to travel to Syria or Iraq.

Finally, unlike the immediate aftermath of the Afghan conflict in the 1990s, terrorist recruitment in Southeast Asia today has lost the tactical advantage of surprise. With regional security and intelligence agencies alert to the potential threat emanating from Iraq and Syria -- thanks precisely to the lessons they learned from the 1990s -- conditions are considerably more difficult for the kind of clandestine recruitment that went on two decades ago. Two other factors are instructive in this regard. First, whatever its shortcomings, the Indonesian state today is not nearly as weak as it was in the late 1990s, when radical groups flourished after the fall of former President Suharto. Second, the apparent resolution of the long-standing conflict in the Philippines between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front has potentially opened the way for cooperation on counterterrorism.

That said, it’s understandable that the governments of the region are concerned that ISIS might spawn a new generation of jihadist leaders, fighters, and ideologues in the region. Afghanistan still casts a long shadow over discussions in Southeast Asia -- and with good reason. But regional policymakers would be well advised to appreciate not only the similarities between the former challenge and the present-day conflict but also the very significant differences.

 

[Norwegian]

Finally our ISIS brothers are in South East Asia as well! Good job

 

[Gunsnroses]

Finally our ISIS brothers are in South East Asia as well! Good job

Spreading like Gog magog....

 

[Norwegian]

Spreading like Gog magog....

No, more like a virus...

 

[Gunsnroses]

No, more like a virus...

They are fitna no less than Yajooj Majooj.

 

[alaungphaya]

Indonesian Extremists Drawn To Syrian Conflict | The Diplomat
Indonesian Extremists Drawn To Syrian Conflict
A new report elucidates the allure of the Syrian conflict to Islamic extremists from Indonesia.

By Ankit Panda
February 01, 2014

It was the Indonesian jihadist leader Abu Bakar Bashir who once described Syria as a “university for jihad education,” and it appears that his assertion was taken to heart by Indonesia’s extremists.

A new report released by the Institute for Policy Analysis of Conclit (IPAC) titled “Indonesians and the Syrian Conflict” (PDF) sheds light on the troubling extent to which the Syrian conflict has drawn Indonesian extremists “in a way no foreign war has before.” The report isn’t the first to emphasize that Indonesia Islamist organizations have fixated on Syria – this much was known as early as 2012. It rather focuses on explaining the allure of Syria in comparison to similar causes in the past, such as Palestine, Bosnia, and Afghanistan, that have drawn the attention of Indonesian extremists .

At the core of it, the report takes to Islamic eschatology which predicts that “the final battle at the end of time will take place in Sham, the region sometimes called Greater Syria or the Levant, encompassing Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine and Israel.” It additionally emphasizes that coverage of the Syria conflict within Indonesia has focused on framing the conflict as one where Bashar al-Assad’s government has directed atrocities against pious Sunni Muslims.

According to IPAC, some 50 of the 11,000 or so foreign fighters in Syria from over 74 countries are “thought to be Indonesian.” The number is based off an Indonesia foreign ministry estimate from December 2013 but is widely unconfirmed.

The report finds that Indonesian jihadis are divided between the two major hardline Sunni factions in Syria – the al Nusra front and the Islamic State of Iraq and Sham (ISIS). Indonesian extremists are also divided on the sectarian nature of the conflict with some viewing the conflict as a broader manifestation of Shia-Sunni rivalry and others viewing the sectarian narrative as an inaccurate imposition by the West.

According to Sidney Jones, an expert at IPAC, the Syrian conflict has inspired a wave of anti-Shia rhetoric within Indonesia. Jones speculates that this is partly due to the involvement of “Saudi-funded organizations” within the country. Saudi Arabia has been devoting greater attention to Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation, as of late; the governments of Saudi Arabia and Indonesia recently concluded a defense cooperation agreement.

Within Indonesia, Jemaah Islamiyah, the perpetrator of the 2002 Bali bombings and a still influential extremist organization, is an important source of the inflow into Syria according to IPAC. The report notes, “From late 2012 to January 2014, JI’s humanitarian wing, Hilal Ahmar Society Indonesia (HASI), sent ten delegations to Syria, bringing in cash and medical assistance to the Islamist resistance in a way apparently designed to open channels for more direct participation in the fighting.”

Concerns that Indonesian jihadists could return from Syria reinvigorated and ready to bring the fight to Southeast Asia are worth taking seriously. Jemaah Islamiyah, in particular, is thought to have links to the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and other extremist groups in the region. As more Indonesian extremists head to Syria and eventually return to Indonesia, instability in Aceh could grow more severe. The IPAC report advises that it may be premature to conclude that these extremists will return from Syria more troublesome than before; Indonesia’s relative political stability, economic fortitude, and tranquil regional environment generally provide an inhospitable environment for widespread extremism.

 

[Nike]

What i can say is, Indonesia is a Nationalist country in which just having a large Muslim populations among their citizens. Indonesia not a religion affiliated country, the Saudi funds can't make any big differences.

 

[alaungphaya]

What i can say is, Indonesia is a Nationalist country in which just having a large Muslim populations among their citizens. Indonesia not a religion affiliated country, the Saudi funds can't make any big differences.

And long may it continue to be. But the Saudis have an almost limitless supply of petrodollars and have already changed the political landscape of other countries through the export of their wahhabism. What makes you think Indonesia is immune to this? Fundamentalists prey on poverty and despite Indonesia's progress, it is still a poor country where many live below the poverty line. In a country of nearly 300 million, there will be millions living in poverty who are disenfranchised by nationalism. We have already seen in neighbouring Malaysia, which is further along the development path, that it is not immune to creeping extremism.

 

[Nike]

And long may it continue to be. But the Saudis have an almost limitless supply of petrodollars and have already changed the political landscape of other countries through the export of their wahhabism. What makes you think Indonesia is immune to this? Fundamentalists prey on poverty and despite Indonesia's progress, it is still a poor country where many live below the poverty line. In a country of nearly 300 million, there will be millions living in poverty who are disenfranchised by nationalism. We have already seen in neighbouring Malaysia, which is further along the development path, that it is not immune to creeping extremism.

the fundamental on how Indonesia and Malaysia is existence is very much different between Indonesia and Malaysia.

Indonesia has long been known to suppress their fundamentalist and extremism party even when our economic condition is in much worsen condition than today and when our Nationalism sentiment is at our lowest point. But yes we prevail, progressing and achieving what we had gained and stands today, there is no reason for us to lose against them in near future or in unforeseeable future. I hate it when some random guy without adequate of Indonesia history playing down our struggle against terrorism. Be it against Christian radicals like in Maluku, Muslim radical like western Java and Central Java, Communist radicals like Indonesia Communist Party, we will not deffer and back away from our struggle to crush them.

 

[alaungphaya]

the fundamental on how Indonesia and Malaysia is existence is very much different between Indonesia and Malaysia.

Indonesia has long been known to suppress their fundamentalist and extremism party even when our economic condition is in much worsen condition than today and when our Nationalism sentiment is at our lowest point. But yes we prevail, progressing and achieving what we had gained and stands today, there is no reason for us to lose against them in near future or in unforeseeable future. I hate it when some random guy without adequate of Indonesia history playing down our struggle against terrorism. Be it against Christian radicals like in Maluku, Muslim radical like western Java and Central Java, Communist radicals like Indonesia Communist Party, we will not deffer and back away from our struggle to crush them.

So your answer is because Indonesians don't think twice about brutal crackdowns?

 

[Nike]

And you must know it at first place, Wahhabiism has been existence in Indonesia since ages, they have been influenced Islam in Indonesia since long, we had no problems with them as they teach us to love our country first and gaining independence for yourself is a must. Indonesian National heroes, Tuanku Imam Bonjol is a Wahhabist, so with several heroes in our history.

 

[mike2000]

So these scums are now leaving the middle east for the more forward looking/advanced east Asia? They should limit themselves to killing each other in their region in the middle east and leave east/south east Asian countries alone focus on improving their living standards/economy. These scums and their religious bullshit should remain in their respective countries/region. They have become a virus to mankind as a whole.

 

[alaungphaya]

So these scums are now leaving the middle east for the more forward looking/advanced east Asia? They should limit themselves to killing each other in their region in the middle east and leave east/south east Asian countries alone focus on improving their living standards/economy. These scums and their religious bullshit should remain in their respective countries/region. They have become a virus to mankind as a whole.

They've been active for decades. Extremism didn't start in 2001.

 

[Nike]

So your answer is because Indonesians don't think twice about brutal crackdowns?

The answer is not as simple as that, without people support the effort to minimize or eradicate radicalism will futile. You can see on how desperate ISAF trying to suppress radicalism in Afghanistan today although they were killing thousands of extremist for years, Or how American is failing to prevent the collapses of South Vietnam in the hands of Communist although years of brutal war, or how they can't prevent the fall of Kingdom of Campuchea against Khmer rouge in the past, winning the heart and mind is important as important to keep them in check.