inab3 cover front.psd - Khadijah Mosque

egional head of the al-Haramain Foundation,
which was listed by the United Nations in
2004 as an organization with links to al-
Qaeda.
The mechanics of Saudi funding of
activities in Southeast Asia was through
institutional or personal links that Saudi
donors established with ideologically
compatible organizations or individuals in
Southeast Asia to whom they channeled
funds and scholarships for study at Saudi
universities. For instance, beginning in the
1970s the Rabithat al-Alam al-Islami (World
Muslim League) funded programs run by the
Dewan Dakwah Islam Indonesias (DDII).
The Religious Affairs Officer in Saudi
embassies abroad is a channel for direct
Saudi propagation of Wahhabi ideology. For
instance, the Saudi office in Jakarta finances
the translation of about one million books a
year from Arabic to Bahasa Indonesia and
offers scholarships to Indonesian students
for study in Saudi universities.3
Third, the consequences of the Afghan war.
The war against the Soviets in Afghanistan
attracted militants from all over the Muslim
world. The war not only served as the training
ground for many of today’s terrorists and
radicals, but it provided the context for the
creation of the transnational networks that
served as the foundation for al-Qaeda and
its associated groups. About a thousand
Southeast Asians are estimated to have
participated in training or combat in
Afghanistan. Of greater consequence, many
of the leaders of extremist organizations had
experience in Afghanistan, for instance:
former Jemaah Islamiyah leaders Hambali and
Abu Jibril, the late Fathur Rahman al-Ghozi
and Zulkarnaen; former Laskar Jihad leader
Ja’afar Umar Thalib; and Abu Sayyaf Group
founder Abdurajak Janjalani, among others.
Fourth, there is an organizational basis for
the spread of radical ideologies. Radicals by
and large are a minority, but in many areas
they hold the advantage because they have
developed extensive networks spanning the
Muslim world and sometimes reaching
beyond it. Hizb ut-Tahrir, for instance, is an
international organization, and many of the
Southeast Asian Salafi groups have intimate
ties to their mentors, funders and
counterparts in the Middle East. Liberal and
moderate Muslims, although a majority in
almost all countries, have not created similar
networks, although efforts are now
beginning to be made, by some of the people
present in this room, to network together
moderate Muslim organizations in Southeast
Asian—an effort that perhaps could be
expanded on a global scale.
Fifth, another reason for the spread of
radical Islamist groups is their aggressive
and sophisticated recruitment techniques.
The targets are separate potential pools of
recruits, each requiring different methods
and venues for recruitment. The key
recruitment nodes are mosques and Islamic
study circles; schools, universities, and
youth organizations; health and welfare
organizations, including charities; and other
social clusters. Recruitment methodologies
vary: in universities, for instance, the
process involves Quranic study groups or
circles where members gradually internalize
the ideology of the group. This has been the
specialty of the PKS in Indonesia. In
economically and socially marginalized
districts, recruits might be willing to join the
extremist group as an avenue of escape from
boredom or unemployment. Laskar Jihad
recruited among the poorest and less
educated segments of the population,
especially the young rootless urban poor.
Sixth, I should mention that violence itself
plays a central role in recruitment.
International jihadists have become involved
in conflicts from Chechnya and Kashmir to
Maluku and Poso, ostensibly to help
beleaguered Muslims in these regions, but
also to gain credibility among some sectors
of the broader Muslim communities and
especially among the young people that they
hope to entice into joining. We see, for
instance, that the playing of sometimes very
graphic tapes of the armed jihad has a central
role in recruitment events. But these local
jihads also provide new members with a “rite
of passage” which is the functional
equivalent of the previous generation’s
experience in Afghanistan Beyond that, it
could be that from the jihadist standpoint,
violence is its own justification. According
to Zachary Abuza, the concept of purifying
68 Masjid Khadijah