Word: salafi
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...That message is being broadcast from thousands of new mosques and Islamic schools, or pesantren, now proliferating across the 17,000-island archipelago. Many are funded by Middle Eastern groups that see Indonesia as fertile ground for spiritual purification. Clerics at these religious institutions preach the Salafi strain of Islam, which advocates a return to the religion as practiced in the era of the Prophet Muhammad. (Wahhabism, Saudi Arabia's strict form of the faith, is considered an offshoot of Salafi Islam.) By contrast, most Indonesians, like other Southeast Asian Muslims, had for centuries practiced a far less orthodox faith...
...With millions of rural Indonesians pouring into the cities, this Salafi message has trickled into urban society, chipping away at Indonesia's multiethnic heritage. At many public schools in Jakarta, female students and teachers are strongly encouraged to wear the jilbab on Fridays-and face stigmatization if they don't. In 2005, the nation's top religious body, the Indonesia Ulema Council, issued a fatwa stating that "religious teachings influenced by pluralism, liberalism and secularism are against Islam." Equally worrisome, some of Indonesia's homegrown terrorists, whose bombing campaign has claimed hundreds of lives since 2002, profess their violence...
...Baghdadi" implies he is from Baghdad.) At the beginning, five groups were represented on the council, including Al Qaeda in Iraq. The number of groups has expanded to nine, says Abu Bara. The groups are all Islamic hardline fundamentalist fighters with names like Brigade of Abu Bakr the Salafi and Battalion of the Foreigners. At the time it was formed, Zarqawi named Abu Abdullah Rasheed al Baghdadi (who had until then been known as Abu Hamza al Baghdadi) to head the council, technically putting al Baghdadi in a rank above Zarqawi. This could mean that the new head...
...revenge spiral is taking a dramatic toll. In December three Sunni brothers from Washash who belonged to the extremist, virulently anti-Shi'ite Salafi sect were gunned down just outside the neighborhood. The family sought retribution. On a subsequent evening, say witnesses, a mob of 15 gunmen, all relatives and friends of the three dead brothers, surrounded the house of popular Shi'ite clergyman Sheik Razzaq. A frail man in his 50s with a white skullcap and a ready smile, Razzaq had tried to stem the tide of sectarian hatred in the neighborhood, even accepting both Sunni...
...this day, Razzaq doesn't know whether he was attacked solely out of revenge for the Salafi brothers' killing or his assassination had already been planned. Regardless, the killings then escalated. At least 33 people--Sunni and Shi'ite alike--have been killed in Washash this year, and the pace seems to be picking up. One of the latest victims was Shi'ite house painter Ali Jeri, whose death was especially painful to the neighborhood. Jeri was known as a kind and wise mediator who had many Sunni friends. Three gunmen pulled up in a car while he was painting...