Indonesia's Dirty Little Holy War

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hat isn't the only reason Washington is worried about Laskar Jihad and its commandos. Once, a few dozen deaths in inter-religious violence on Sulawesi might have rated little more than a few minutes on CNN. But in the post-Sept. 11 world, battlefield victories by Laskar Jihad will have a profound impact on external debt negotiations, international investment and other issues critical to Indonesia's stability. Although there is little evidence that militant Islamic groups in Indonesia have links with Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda, the growing strength of Laskar has already set alarm bells ringing in Washington. Noting the lack of Indonesian border controls and the recent flood of Afghan refugees, the commander in chief of U.S. military forces in the Pacific warned on an early December swing through the region that al-Qaeda members fleeing Afghanistan might attempt to set up new bases on the archipelago, given the presence of "sympathetic groups." Admiral Dennis Blair said U.S. intelligence was looking very hard at Laskar Jihad.

When the first Laskar commandos arrived in Sulawesi in July, they were formally received by the Governor of Central Sulawesi province and the head of the local parliament. Such a welcome underscores what the group's opponents and many independent analysts say is the greatest challenge to controlling the militants: their support at the highest levels of Indonesia's government. From direct infusions of cash to fund the fighters to phone calls to local military commanders to prevent crackdowns, sympathizers have ensured that the Laskar Jihad can operate with impunity. The current total of its fighters on Sulawesi—as high as 7,000 by some estimates—far outnumbers the 2,000 or so police and army troops stationed in the region.

A brief visit to Poso by Chief Security Minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono on Dec. 5 and a pledge of several thousand more troops did little to reassure Christians. "What is really needed is for the security forces to go in and disarm these outsiders," says S. Pelima, a civil servant and Protestant preacher based in the regional capital of Palu who served on a reconciliation team of community and religious leaders set up by the Governor last year. Since the May 2000 eruption, he says, the team had managed to contain the violence between the two communities to a few killings a month. Now the council's work has collapsed completely.

Like almost everyone else, Pelima is too scared to blame the Laskar Jihad directly. But he is unequivocal in dating the most recent round of troubles to the arrival of the outsiders. "In the past four months many Christian villages have been cleaned out and many killed. Now you can see people walking around carrying guns openly in those villages," he says despairingly. "How can that be? We are farmers here and know nothing about automatic weapons. Where did these men get the guns from and the training to use them?"

Laskar jihad was founded in 2000 by an unassuming Islamic teacher named Ja'far Umar Thalib. A 40-year-old from the east Java heartland of Indonesian Islam, Ja'far's mild demeanor disguises a fierce devotion to what he sees as the plight of Muslims in Indonesia. Like many of Southeast Asia's radical Muslims, he spent several years in Pakistan and Afghanistan in the mid-1980s, both studying and fighting against the Soviet invasion. (Ja'far says he met Osama bin Laden then, but was unimpressed: "He couldn't even read the Koran without stumbling.")

After his return, Ja'far might have stayed an obscure preacher in Yogyakarta but for an explosion of Muslim-Christian fighting in the Maluku Islands, the famed Spice Islands, in 1998. "We waited and waited for the government to respond and finally we gave up hope they would defend the Muslim community and decided to act ourselves," Ja'far says. His call for an armed defense force elicited a speedy response, both in personnel and cash. Within months the newly formed Laskar Jihad had sent some 3,000 volunteers to Ambon, the capital of Maluku province, a force the group still maintains there. An estimated 9,000 people have died in the fighting in the Maluku Islands, 79 of them Laskar fighters, Ja'far adds.

Ja'far similarly justifies the group's intervention in Sulawesi: to defend his Muslim brothers and prevent what he claims is a plan by Christians to declare a separate state. He denies any plot to take over Christian villages. "Ours is a passive defense organization," says Ja'far with one of his characteristic soft smiles. "We only attack if we are attacked."

A study in contrasts, Mohammad Ichsan, deputy commander of Laskar Jihad's forces in Sulawesi, exudes a high-energy rage that reverberates in his hoarse voice, as he leans forward on the edge of a chair in the group's headquarters, a small house at the end of a narrow alley in Poso. Ichsan also denies that his forces are on the offensive. The town, a once thriving fishing port famous for its carving of ebony wood harvested from nearby forests, is now shuttered and virtually deserted but for Laskar fighters. Even police and army troops stay close to their base and travel in groups. Using tense, chopping gestures, Ichsan warns visiting journalists: "If what you report is not fair to us we will come and get you." It is evidently a familiar threat. A Hindu reporter for a local newspaper was recently killed.

A few Muslim families are still living in a row of shops in what was once Poso's commercial district. Adults peep out from behind heavy green metal shutters. Their children are bolder, and a gang of five- or six-year-old boys dressed in black vests and bin Laden T shirts, their heads covered by black balaclavas, race in and out of the grimy front room of the Laskar headquarters repeatedly shouting "Assalamu' alaikum" (may peace be with you) as they wield machetes, 30-cm daggers and loaded shotguns. Their antics draw an abrupt, approving laugh from Ichsan. Obviously the boys' role model, the stocky 32-year-old is clad entirely in black, down to the socks he wears under his army-issue combat boots. He says he has just returned from what he calls a "clash" in Tabula near Tangula's village.

Speaking on the morning of Nov. 28, Ichsan also warned that if the other side retaliated, anything was possible: "If one Muslim is killed by a Christian, we're going to chase him to his grave." Days later Laskar launched its all-out attack that left behind smoldering villages and tens of thousands of refugees fleeing toward the safety of Tentena, an hour's drive inland from Poso. The raids have died down, but only after Christian sources reported that Laskar troops took over the last remaining road connecting Tentena to the outside world. That's when Christian community leaders like Pelima feared the worst and words like genocide began to appear on Internet list servers devoted to the Sulawesi conflict. "What is their intention in wanting to go to Tentena, wanting to cut it off from the rest of the world?" he asks. "People there are very, very frightened. They don't know what is going to happen to them."

What happens next in Sulawesi depends in part on the young policeman stationed in Poso who calls himself Rudi. Despite being heavily armed—he carries a holstered pistol as well as an automatic rifle and a bayonet—Rudi is reluctant to stop at a Laskar Jihad checkpoint on the road outside Poso. "Do we have a letter of authorization?" he asks, keeping his finger on the trigger guard of his rifle. Although they muster only an antiquated shotgun and a homemade rifle among them, he hangs back from the villagers manning the makeshift wooden hut from which the black flag displaying Laskar's symbol of crossed scimitars droops in the afternoon heat.

Rudi, like many of his colleagues, is pessimistic that, even with substantial reinforcements, peace can be imposed. There are too many constraints, too many generals and politicians in Jakarta and Palu who are backing one side or the other. "Whenever we try and do something, it seems like someone from the top stops it," he says. But Rudi, a Javanese Muslim, has no doubt about what would be an indispensable, giant step toward peace: "It would be much safer without the Laskar Jihad. The locals all want peace, but the people from outside keep the fighting going."