Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council

On March 31, a series of coordinated bombings, the likes that have not been seen since 2007, rocked the Southern Thai cities of Yala and Hat Yai.

These attacks were spectacular and garnered both domestic and international media attention. While a wakeup call to the international community and the Thai political elite, the attacks do not portend the insurgency entering into a new stage, but rather they are a reminder of a conflict that is now in its ninth year; a slow-burn insurgency in the heart of prosperous Southeast Asia, which has claimed the lives of 5,100 people, wounded approximately 9,000 in more than 11,000 incidents of violence.

Imagine the following terrifying scenario for the international community - a rogue, impoverished country armed to the teeth with doomsday weaponry, a regime infamous for its belligerence, yet one whose perceptions of reality and decision-making processes are a mystery. Let us further imagine such a ‘hermit kingdom' with the capacity to inflict the gravest catastrophe on the world yet ruled by an unknown and inexperienced young leader in his twenties.

A visit to Semarang, the largest city in Central Java, is in many ways an assault on the senses. The humidity, with searing heat and blustery winds, is unavoidable, as are the blinding colours and the food which comes in two varieties - syrupy sweet or hot and spicy.

My recent trip, to participate as an Australian delegate to the 6th Asia/Pacific Regional Interfaith Dialogue (RID), included assaults, but welcome ones, on two other senses.

A political storm in Malaysia over controversial remarks by opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim's on Israel has not yet come to a close.

Back in January, a war of words erupted between Anwar and several top government officials, including his former mentor Dr. Mahathir Mohammed, regarding Malaysia's policy on Israel - a raw nerve among the country's Muslim-majority population...

The Maldives is an island paradise in the Indian Ocean with an overwhelmingly Muslim population. Last week, the country experienced a coup, where, reportedly with a gun to his head, the democratically-elected President Mohamed Nasheed resigned, paving the way for his replacement by Vice-President Mohammed Waheed Hassan Manik.

The politics of the coup are complex and unclear, and part of the story appears to be that many of the coup plotters are associated with former President / Dictator Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, who Nasheed succeeded following elections in 2008. However it does seem clear that caught up in the mix is the growing influence of very extreme Salafist Islamist influences and factions in the Maldives. Moreover, these factions have been promoting bizarre anti-Israel conspiracy theories as part of their efforts to undermine Nasheed...

As Netanyahu attempted to point out, the assumption that Israel is becoming more isolated in recent years makes sense only if one's focus is mainly on a segment of opinion in Western Europe - ignoring the US, Eastern Europe and Israel's renewal of old ties in Sub-Saharan African. But a most important part of the real world, and an area of major opportunity for Israel, is in South, Southeast and East Asia.

Israeli President Shimon Peres's groundbreaking visit to Vietnam in November with a delegation of more than 60 prominent Israelis, including two government ministers and leading figures in finance, industry, agriculture and defense was a landmark event. The delegation was given a rousing welcome, including a dinner with all the members of the Vietnamese government in which Peres's hosts surprised him with a group of Vietnamese singers who had prepared renditions of Israeli songs in excellent Hebrew.

Concerns about growing religious intolerance in Indonesia have been heightened in recent weeks in the wake of violent attacks and restrictive local laws, but legislative moves appear unlikely to address the core problem.

Some recent scene-setting events demonstrate the scope of the problem.
More than a decade after Christian-Muslim clashes killed thousands across Indonesia's Maluku Islands, violence erupted in Ambon on September 11 after a fatal traffic accident in which an ojek (motorcycle-taxi) driven by a Muslim teenager was struck by an automobile driven by a Christian.

On a different scale, but in some ways belonging to the same brand of journalism, was a piece in the Sydney Morning Herald: "A sex guide from Malaysia's Obedient Wives".
The article delivered, as one expert on Malaysia put it, "some richly deserved ridicule" - reporting the "Obedient Wives Club's sex guide" (which it did not name but simply termed "the book") was about "ways a Muslim man can have sex with all of his wives at the same time. Under strict Islamic tradition a man can have up to four wives if he can provide for them all."

Malaysian Insider Online, however, had no hesitation in publishing the book's full title: "Islamic Sex - Fighting Jews to Return Islamic Sex to the World".

After weeks of controversy over a Palestinian statehood bid of little real consequence, some in the UN have been attempting to shift their focus onto one of the many situations in the world in which innocent people are being killed on a daily basis. To this end, the UN Security Council attempted to pass a motion to prevent Syria's ongoing crackdown on dissenting citizens. Initially, the European countries were attempting to sanction Syria through imposing an arms embargo. As Foreign Policy's UN correspondent Colum Lynch reports, even a watered-down version of this that merely condemned Syria and did not call for any tangible sanctions was vetoed by Russia and China...

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The beheading of Ruyati binti Satubi - an Indonesian maid executed by Saudi authorities in June for the killing of an allegedly abusive Saudi employer - has stirred such revulsion in Indonesia that Islamic leaders there are openly challenging the harsh, Wahhabist creed of Islam that has gained a footing in Indonesia via the funding of religious schools.

A story by the Washington Post's Indonesia correspondent illustrates the depth of this backlash.

"Some Indonesians began to think that Wahhabism is the true teaching of Islam, but thanks to God, there has been a change of thinking," said Siraj, who heads Nahdlatul Ulama, an organization with about 50 million members and 28,000 Islamic boarding schools.

"There is a fifth dimension, beyond that which is known to man" may have kicked off each new episode of the Twilight Zone but it can equally be applied to the alternate reality that is the United Nations.

Bizarrely, this week, North Korea assumed the presidency of the UN's Conference on Disarmament despite being under a sanctions regime for its nuclear weapons program.

One of the most reliable indices of political heat in Malaysia is when the spectre of Jews or Israel is invoked to discredit domestic political enemies. That no instance seems too far-fetched is an interesting indicator of how Jews are perceived in a country with no Jewish population of its own - a fantasy notion of Jewish omnipotence, antisemitism or probably a combination of both.

What do Malaysia, New Zealand, Pakistan and Egypt have in common?

In the past week, all four countries have been abuzz with conspiratorial news stories suggesting that Israel has been maliciously meddling in their internal affairs.

Three bombs rocked crowded districts of Mumbai during rush hour on Wednesday, killing at least 21 people and injuring at least 141 people in the biggest attack on India since the November 2008 terrorist attacks also in Mumbai which were perpetrated by the militant Pakistani group Lashkar-e-Taibe.

The United Nations, in its infinite wisdom, has just allowed North Korea to become the chair of the U.N. Conference on Disarmament....

This UN decision follows the election last week of Iran as one of the Vice-Presidents of the upcoming session of the UN General Assembly (with Qatar as President). Meanwhile, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon controversially made a statement appearing to endorse an Iranian conference on “Terrorism” where not only were the US, Britain and Israel accused of fomenting terrorism, but  Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad reportedly alleged that Washington manufactured the Holocaust and the 9/11 attacks as pretexts to put down Muslims.

With Malaysian Opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim still detained by a farcical trial and Prime Minister Najib Razak's sclerotic UMNO-led coalition firmly in control, the entrenched political stalemate could yet be upset from a surprising direction. Long viewed as a promoter of fundamentalist Islam in politics, Parti Islam SeMalaysia (PAS) is undergoing something of a renovation that could turn the fortunes of the struggling opposition coalition.

North Korean cooperation is a linchpin in Iran's development of ballistic missiles, without which progress would be retarded a very great deal. On Iran's nuclear push, the evidence is less conclusive, but North Korean assistance seems likely to be very significant to Iran’s nuclear progress to date.

On Aug. 9, 2010, members of Indonesia's elite counter-terrorist police force arrested the militant cleric Abu Bakar Bashir as part of their ongoing investigations into a terrorist training camp discovered in February 2010 in Aceh, plots to kill President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and scheme to launch Mumbai-style attacks in Jakarta. While the government had previously alleged that Bashir was a financier of the cell and training camp, the arrest and his role in terrorist operations took many by surprise. The ongoing counter-terrorist operations, including Bashir's arrest, says much about the state and metastasisation of Jemaah Islamiah.

As elsewhere, the Israeli military confrontation of activists aboard the Freedom Flotilla's MV Mavi Marmara on May 31 put Israel at the centre of fiery rhetoric in Southeast Asia over recent weeks. In Indonesia, demonstrations were staged in Jakarta and regional cities over several days.

No country deserves more credit for improving its counter-terrorism operations and capabilities than Indonesia. While terrorism will never be eliminated, Indonesia has developed a strong and effective counter-terrorist force, while at the same time consolidating its democratic transition.

The genial complexity of Wahid's character, which drew millions to him, was not adequate to the pressures of the presidency. But his life, career, and elements of caprice contain abundant clues for anyone who would understand modern Sufism, global Islam, and the Republic of Indonesia.

Almost uniquely among Muslim leaders and the heads of Muslim states, Wahid was not reticent about his friendship for Israel and his close ties and desire for even closer ones with the Jewish people.

With the death of former Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid last week, on behalf of the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council, Executive Director Dr. Colin Rubenstein conveyed sincere condolences to his family and the Indonesian people.

While there is no imminent prospect of Indonesia establishing diplomatic relations with Israel, Jakarta's longstanding political stance is no impediment to a burgeoning commercial relationship with the Jewish state.

Indonesia's success in building democratic institutions in just 10 years is equally remarkable. It is yet another demonstration of the appeal of free institutions, in this case to people with East Asian value systems and in a country with the largest Muslim population in the world.

Today, we offer an interpretation of the most recent Jakarta hotel bombings from one of the world's top experts on extremist terrorism in Southeast Asia, Dr. Zachary Abuza of Simmons College in the US. Abuza agrees with the dominant view that Malaysian-born terrorist Noordin Mohammed Top was likely behind the latest bombings but takes issue with arguments, particularly in the Australian media, that Top is operating largely independently of Jemaah Islamiyah (JI).

Jemaah Islamiah has for more than 15 years fought to transform Indonesia into an Islamist state. In recent years, its terrorist campaign has suffered setbacks. As Jemaah Islamiah regroups, it builds upon the experience of Middle East terrorist groups.

Israeli commentators have watched with interest the reaction to North Korea's illegal ballistic missile launch - under cover of a "civilian satellite" launch - on Sunday. They see the reaction of the US administration and international community as important signposts for their treatment of the Iranian nuclear and missile proliferation threat.

What was a small news item back in November blew-up in a big way at the height of the Israeli military offensive in Gaza. The Indonesian internet was abuzz for several weeks as Islamist-oriented websites like Hidayatullah.com, Arrahmah.com and Eramuslim.com attacked Muhammadiyah for its supposed ties with Israel.

Until his death in 1979, Mawdudi was the critical link between the various theatres of transnational activism, between the Muslim Brotherhood and the Iranian Revolution, between Kashmir and Western Europe. Mawdudi's thinking was South Asian in origin and character, as was the international Islamist movement he inspired – a movement whose flowering we are still watching today.

There has already been so much material in the media generally about the terrorist attack in Mumbai... Therefore, this Update is devoted to analysing elements of the attack, and the lessons that can be drawn from it, which were less prevalent in the general coverage.

Indonesia continues to play an intriguing role in Israeli-Palestinian matters, issuing the time-honoured declarations of support for Palestinian self-determination and condemnations of Israeli conduct, while at the same time developing further unofficial links with the Jewish state.

In the six years since Jemaah Islamiah (JI) carried out the deadly October 12 bombing of a Bali nightclub that claimed 202 lives, Indonesia has made great strides in tackling terror. But according to some of the world's top terrorism experts, the job will remain incomplete until Indonesia proscribes JI as an official terror group.

Either the prime minister's suite or a prison cell awaits Malaysia's Anwar Ibrahim, depending on how events play out over the coming months.

As I accepted my invitation to participate in the 2nd World Peace Forum in Jakarta this June, I had in mind a comment made by a participant in the 2006 World Peace Forum, that the environment had been "hostile to Jews, even antisemitic".

There were, as usual, some mixed signals from Indonesia as Israelis and Palestinians alike paused to consider 60 years of the Jewish state. The lead negative item was an international anti-Zionist conference at the University of Indonesia in Depok, West Java, held to coincide with the anniversary celebrations in Jerusalem.

It's a sad commentary on much of the Islamic world that anyone seen to have a connection, however tenuous, with Israel or Jews is tainted and obliged to furiously deny any such link. So it was when Anwar Ibrahim, de facto leader of Malaysia's People's Justice Party (PKR), felt compelled to refute a statement by former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohammad that only Israelis would vote for him if he were to compete for the prime minister's post.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's four-day visit to Japan in late February re-emphasised the increasingly warm and intimate ties developing between Israel and Japan in recent years. The growing warmth reflects interlocking economic synergies reinforced by more than a decade of practical Japanese support for the US-led Middle East peacemaking process.

This month's issue of AIR goes to press as Australians head to the polls. Whichever party has won government, John Howard's and Kevin Rudd's answers to the AIR's policy questionnaire in the October issue allow us to say with confidence that Australia will be in good hands on the key issues important to the Australian Jewish community.

As readers are probably aware, Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf on the weekend promulgated a State of Emergency, and began a series of moves to control and muzzle the judiciary, political opponents, and the media in Pakistan.

Today's Update features advice about the Middle East peace process from two big names in peacemaking - former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, and David Trimble, the former Nobel Peace Laureate who played such a crucial role in the Northern Ireland peace process.

On 4 January 2004, a group of armed men raided a Thai Army camp. They were equipped with acetylene torches and bolt cutters; in all they made off with more than 300 M-16s, ammunition and other weaponry. It is the date most commonly used to mark the current manifestation of the insurgency in Thailand's restive south, dominated by Muslim Malays.

People are punished for crime, for creating anarchy and for subjecting humanity to horrifying terror. But, could we ever believe that someone would be arrested, tortured and imprisoned for 17 long months just for being in favour of global peace, inter-faith dialogue and ending religious hatred?

t's a twelve year old murder case and it looks likes its finally been cracked. Eighty five people were killed and since last year, we have known exactly who did it. Last week, the prosecutor responsible for the case asked for arrest warrants for those who put him up to it.

North Korea's apparent test of a nuclear explosive culminates more than ten years of diplomatic failure, for which all of the world powers share blame.

Hezbollah in South-East Asia

The Coup and the Muslim Insurgency in Thailand's South

Recently translated documents found by American troops in post-Saddam Iraq have revealed extensive links between the former regime and a whole host of Iraqi and international terrorist organisations...

On September 27, Gareth Evans -? president of the respected International Crisis Group (ICG) and former Australian foreign minister -? gave a keynote address in Australia in which he proclaimed, "JI no longer poses a serious threat in Indonesia or elsewhere". Four days later, three suicide bombers walked into crowded restaurants in the Indonesian resort island of Bali and detonated their devices.

What public role should Islam play in the modern state? This is the central issue that dominates the struggle of ideas in the Muslim world today and Indonesia is no exception.