Indonesia: Muslim priest recruits thousands for jihad group, ‘main target remains the US’

[duluxe]

https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/poli...t-indonesias-arrest-jemaah-islamiah-terrorist

‘US still the target’: Indonesia’s arrest of Jemaah Islamiah terrorist leader reveals thousands of recruits,” by Amy Chew, South China Morning Post, December 12, 2020:


About two months ago, Indonesian counterterrorism task force Detachment 88 arrested a little-known cleric named Ustad Arif, according to a senior security source.

The 54-year-old from Klaten, Central Java, turned out to be the leader of Jemaah Islamiah (JI), the Southeast Asia branch of al-Qaeda.

JI was behind all the deadly terror attacks in Indonesia from 1998 to 2010 before it was weakened by Indonesian counterterrorism police, who arrested hundreds of its members during the period, including several leaders.

“Ustad Arif was arrested about two months ago,” a senior security source told This Week In Asia on condition of anonymity this past week before adding a tantalising detail: “He has links to Malaysia, but those links have not been profiled. They are sleeper cells.”

Following the JI-masterminded 2002 Bali bombings, which killed 202 people, including 11 Hong Kong residents, JI had split into two factions, said Robi Sugara, a lecturer and counterterrorism analyst at Syarif Hidayatullah Islamic University in Jakarta. One faction believed in violent jihad and supported al-Qaeda and later, Islamic State, while another believed in what Sugara called “jihad proselytisation”.

JI suffered a near extinction in 2007 when an armed clash with police in Poso, Central Sulawesi, led to the arrest of more than 40 of its members, including top leaders, according to a 2017 report by the Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict (IPAC). From 2007, it has also been known as “neo-JI”, IPAC said.

Sugara said it was mostly members of the jihad proselytisation faction of JI that were arrested recently as “they supplied funds to terrorists”.

“This jihad proselytisation [faction] doesn’t call itself JI any more,” Sugara said, and has instead set up schools and charity organisations to raise funds for the group.

The advent of Islamic State (Isis) in 2014 saw the rise of Isis-linked Jemaah Ansharut Daulah (JAD), which replaced JI as the main perpetrator of all major terror attacks in Indonesia since 2016. In that same year, at least eight people, including four terrorists, were killed when bombs were detonated and shooting broke out outside Sarinah department store in central Jakarta…

“JI’s main target remains the US and its allies due to its involvement in the Middle East, according to some of the recent JI documents that we found,” the source said, adding that one of the factors behind JI’s targeting the US was President Donald Trump’s support for Jerusalem to be the capital of Israel, which is a holy city for both Muslims and Jewish people….

 

[JohnTan]

“This jihad proselytisation [faction] doesn’t call itself JI any more,” Sugara said, and has instead set up schools and charity organisations to raise funds for the group.

Outside of Singapore, vast majority of moslem religious schools and charities are fronts of religious militancy, terrorism and religious intolerance.

 

[laksaboy]

Outside of Singapore, vast majority of moslem religious schools and charities are fronts of religious militancy, terrorism and religious intolerance.

There are no moderate Muslims, only shy ones.

 

[syed putra]

Oi! I am a liberal moslem!

 

[syed putra]

Saudi has announced prohibiting wahabism and stopping its influence.
Quran is a book that warns human about the futility of religion ( idol worship). free from being dominated by priests and clerics ( like this jemaah islamiyah leader), and senseless rituals. There are no rituals in the quran.

 

[rushifa666]

Finish the jihad. Thats what happens when you stop halfway. The three groups of camel riders should war until one group is left.

 

[JohnTan]

Oi! I am a liberal moslem!

The islamists over here have declared you an apostate or something close to it. If you were living in jiuhu, you would be in real physical danger by now.

 

[syed putra]

The islamists over here have declared you an apostate or something close to it. If you were living in jiuhu, you would be in real physical danger by now.

I think they have to look at religion from a historical perspective. These are all based on evidence. Then use common sense to come to a conclusion instead of just following what others are doing blindly,

 

[A Singaporean]

If got balls go to US and fight the Americanos instead of remaining in Indonesia and bully non believers.

 

[syed putra]

If got balls go to US and fight the Americanos instead of remaining in Indonesia and bully non believers.

US fought outside of their country so it's best it remains that way,