Febriamy Hutapea & Markus J. Sihaloho

A banner in Central Java on Thursday shows a police poster depicting the fugitive terrorist Noordin M Top, the chief suspect in the Jakarta twin suicide attacks. (Photo: Lutfi Ali, JG)

Pesantren Seen As Key To Fighting Terrorism In Indonesia

The reluctance of Islamic boarding schools to focus on pluralism and tolerance is a major obstacle to changing the mind-set of their students, leaving open the road to radicalism and conservatism, an Islamic political observer said on Thursday.

“Anyone can become a terrorist if he or she is being indoctrinated into a certain perspective. Economics is not the only factor in the making of a terrorist,” Syafii Anwar, the director of the International Center for Islam and Pluralism, said during a discussion organized by the International Religious Freedom Consortium.

Syafii said including aspects of pluralism and human rights in the curriculum was important and needed to be done more often in the country. These issues, he said, should be given more emphasis at Islamic boarding schools, which are better known as pesantren .

“Such an educational focus would be very useful in changing the mind-set of the pesantren community,” he said.

Syafii said that many clerics at the helm of pesantrens were often resistant to attempts to teach pluralism at their schools, adding that these clerics frequently accused the Central Intelligence Agency of being behind efforts to introduce the subject.

“Radicalism can be brought about because of misleading perceptions of religion,” he said.

Sue Gunawardena, IRFC program manager, said the government had a huge role in educating its citizens about multiculturalism and religious tolerance.

If the government fails to uphold such issues, she said, then nongovernmental organizations and the media should take over the role of supporting pluralism.

Conservatism and radicalism have long been believed to be at the heart of terrorism, including the recent suicide bombings at two luxury hotels in Jakarta.

Many people have pointed out that the two suicide bombers and their suspected accomplices are thought to have graduated from a pesantren in Ngruki, Central Java, founded by hard-line Islamic cleric Abu Bakar Bashir, the alleged spiritual leader of the Jemaah Islamiyah terrorist network.

Meanwhile, the Organization of Retired Army Soldiers (PPAD) demanded that the government step up efforts to root out terrorism in the country.

Speaking at a news conference in Jakarta, Lt. Gen. (ret) Soerjadi, PPAD’s chairman, said terrorist attacks would not stop until the government successfully addressed the root causes of such attacks.

“The government should be more active in finding out the triggers behind such acts and how to solve the problem in the future,” Soerjadi said.

The retired general also voiced concern over the national security situation, adding that the recent bombings at the JW Marriott and Ritz-Carlton hotels and the spate of armed attacks in Timika, Papua, were not merely part of some domestic conflict.

“There is foreign involvement,” Soerjadi said. He declined to point to any particular countries, saying only that these incidents should be handled simultaneously by the military and intelligence agencies.

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